YAY WTG

It is not over, taxes of a different kind will be coming to a home near you soon.

Tax Plan
I am a private citizen a resident of Narragansett. Among many other taxes Mr. Chaffee is proposing is regarding the fees he proposes for beach goers this will be a rolling ball affecting many of Narragansett’s small business. We are blessed with many attractions in our community nice restaurants among other attractions however without visitors our community support of local businesses will diminish. Comparison of current fees in other communities (who cares our only concern is our own community)
I suggest to look at our RI governments cost a book keeper etc earning six figures with benefits I would say find a comparable job it wont be found earning six figures with benefits.
I suggest two four day work weeks per month paid only for days worked. In addition trim each dept over head back by 10%. Get rid of those plush jobs we have plenty of them in the State of RI government with paid Blue Cross for Life among many other unheard of benifits in private industry.
Enough said

Walter G.Fontaine Jr
A concerned resident

I do think there would be a huge cost saving to doing away with fully paid health insurance for part time legislators and their families. There is no other part time job in this country that I know of that includes fully paid health care. Granted, most of the legislature has started to voluntarily pay a percentage as copay. (5-20% depending on the person) I still think that benefit is one that should go. Since the legislators are part timers (and many are lawyers, teachers and others with full time careers) most have access to health insurance through their full time workplaces.
As far as what Mr. Fontaine suggested I agree that the state is top heavy with administration (look at former Gov. Carcieri's unwillingness to let go of any of his 6 figure aides and administrators). For example, the reason for so much overtime at the Dept. of Corrections is directly due to a plethora of brass and not enough officers. But I don't think it is correct to try to balance the budget on the backs of the ordinary state worker by cutting their salaries by furlough. For the most part, the average worker is doing their job and not getting rich. The business of the state does need people to do it. And those workers are facing the same crunches as the rest of us - increases in gas, oil, food, etc. They aren't immune to that because they are state workers. Let's not demonize the middle class or allow the top 1% to turn us against each other. That is their goal.

When you refer to the top 1% trying to turn us against each other are you referring to the highly paid public employee union officials trying to turn their union employees against the taxpayers who pay their members?

Don't stop at the legislature when it comes to cuts and health care premium copays. Take it all the way through the state, towns/cities and school districts. Paying at least 25% of health insurance should be the norm for all public workers. Perhaps legislators do have access to health insurance somewhere else, but one need look no further than SK, where a teacher who is covered by his or her spouse's policy is entitled to a cash payment if they don't enroll in the school health insurance plan! Huh? That is just greedy and wrong and a disservice to the taxpayers. If you think the legislators should not have it b/c they have other access, stop giving teachers cash back because they are lucky enough to have coverage somewhere else.

I would take MB's thought about the part time legislature a step further and ask that it be applied to public school teachers, who also are part time workers. The federal government currently computes one full time equivalent job as 2080 hours per year for job creation purposes. Teachers are required to work about 1080 hours per year, give or take their "professional" days. Sure, the good ones put in more time, but the majority follow the union script and exit at the last bell. And stop with the "we work at home". Who doesn't ?

The reference to demonizing the "middle class" is curious. The public employee unions have created an elite class of people being paid above and beyond what the ordinary working middle class private sector is being paid. That's because the ordinary working middle class private sector have to live in the real world, where if they've lost their job they may feel they will never be able to get another one; they have no idea how to access/are ineligible for welfare benefits that are provided generationally to able bodied people who have never worked and will never work; they share jobs and take decreases in wages/salary so that one FTE is not cut.

This is the world in which we live, and yet our elected officials can't figure out how to cut spending of our tax dollars. Locally, and at the state and federal levels, our tax dollars continue to be wasted on personnel, benefits and programs that we cannot afford.

This is what happens when you elect someone to govern whose only job outside of politics was as a farrier. Great training for 18th Century England. 21st Century Rhode Island, not so great.

What is the state of our economy? Let's review:

- A comically inept governor
- A corrupt legislature ruled by cronyism and nepotism
- A public sector workforce (local, municipal and state) at least three times as large as needed
- A retirement system that has been financially unsustainable for decades and is only getting worse
- An apathetic electorate incapable of effecting change

The only bright spot I can see is that this pathetic attempt at a state budget was rejected. Without comprehensive reforms -- such as regionalization, consolidation of duplicative services, replacing defined benefit pensions with 401Ks and eliminating early retirement, compounded COLAs, collecting one state pension while working another state job -- our state will continue its inexorable decline.

Kate, great idea, pay the teachers part-time pay. Do you have children in the school system? The teachers don't set the school calendar. Why not suggest going to school all year long if you want them to earn their pay? Suggest that if you think it will benefit the kids academically. I'm not sure paying part-time wages to these professionals is going to attract qualified teachers to provide quality education to the students. I have two children in the public schools and I want them to have the best education possible, not some part-time, minimum wage, employee who really doesn't care. Unless, of course, I didn't have any children in the public schools then I would be okay with your plan.

Pay does not affect the quality of a teacher, her abilities or the education a child receives. Year round school with dismal teachers, resentful for working in the summer, is not going to help any child's education. Simply put, pay should not be why people go into teaching. The high pay/benefits/pensions/early retirement, part-time nature of the work, excessive vacations, paid continuing education, "snow days", no accountability to produce anything at all, least of all an educated child at the end of the day, has clearly attracted people to teaching who have no business near a classroom. Education has since the late 70s/early 80s been an easy college curriculum generally attracting (1) those people who have always wanted to be teachers, who love it, have a natural teaching ability (we all know who those teachers are and they have not been the majority in any school district for awhile), and (2) "C" students who loaf through college and life, seeking 6 hour days, a paternalistic union to speak for them, and summers off so they can continue lifeguarding in the summer until they are 50.

I hope that saying you would be okay with a poorer public education if you didn't have children in public school is just a kneejerk reaction to something you haven't given enough thought to. Public education is critical to our society. What we have now is far from good enough. That might be different if teachers were professionals, but teachers are white collar labor.

Well Kate A. this is where perceptions and assumptions get us into trouble in society. Should I go tell my mother that the rigors of her undergraduate work at the University of Connecticut, one of the top education programs in the country, yield that she has "no business being near a classroom"? Should I go on to explain that earning her Master's degree while raising a family was the right path to "loaf through life". Do I tell her not to worry about the child in her class who didn't sleep or eat last night because, "Daddy beat up Mommy and we had no place to go last night", because she is just a lazy, union pig? That child is sure ready to take that NECAP test today, right Kate A? Do I tell my girlfriend that her double major in Special Education/Elementary Education at Providence College wasn't worth it because she'll have a cushy job regardless of where she went? Do I tell her to stop working at a severe behavior summer camp to give back and become more adept at her profession because she can always just lifeguard?

Let's spend sometime with the facts first before we lash out at professionals who work hard everyday and get zero credit. There are incredible teachers and union representatives who care about our students and are skillful in education policy everywhere. I'm proud of these two women in my life and I'm sick of the ignorant attacks that they must endure. Spend some time in a classroom and you will see the light. Your perceptions and assumptions might change.

How about the families that have essentially "checked out of society" and decided to "loaf through life? Let's work on fixing families that so teachers can be teachers not double as mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, etc.!

Kate,
You're obviously uneducated and your recent comment makes you sound like a complete idiot. Maybe you were taught by one of those educators who shouldn't have been near a classroom. Or maybe your its your parents fault. Either way, you need to get a clue. The only thing I agree with you on is pay does not affect the quality of a teacher, their ability, or the education a child receives. You my question to you is, what is professional educator, with a master's degree, who delivers a quality education, with abilities to reach kids probably more than their parents, that allows a child to achieve a quality education with a brighter future, worth? Part time pay? I agree not all educators are this way, but you think their all worthy of minimum wage. I'm not sure what you do but I can guarantee that you're overpaid.

Kate,
So if I'm hearing you correctly, the only ones deserving to earn more are "professionals, business owners, and professional sports players"? Those other people you spoke of, the ones who defend our borders and save people from death and disease, they sound like intelligent people. I wonder where that came from? I wonder how they learned what they did? What do you think teachers are worth? What do you consider a modest salary?
Those professionals and business owners you speak of... do me a favor and find out how many of them credit any of their education to their success. It sounds like you're suggesting that people should teach out of the goodness of their hearts and be happy with getting a little something.
You never answered my question about what you do? Maybe your a professional athlete.

@Kate A. "Your two women may be excellent teachers, but they are not defending our country and protecting our borders, they are not saving people from death and disease, they are taxpayer paid employees who are not held accountable for educating students. "
I hate to break it to you Kate, but our military and many of our health researchers are funded by us, the taxpayers. We, the taxpayers subsidize Big Pharma, Big Oil and lots of corporations. Exxon/Mobil is raking in profits of $10 billion per quarter and yet we taxpayers give them and the other oil companies $4 billion in subsides. Big Pharm charges American twice what other countries pay for their medicine citing the cost of research & development. What they don't tell you is that the American taxpayer subsidizes most of the R & D. Our tax problems are not because of teachers, it has more to do with GE and other big corporations paying no tax at all in the US because they shelter most of their profits and assets off-shore in places like the Cayman Islands. Part of our bank bailouts (by taxpayers), went to the wives of 2 Bank Presidents who set up a shell company in the Cayman Islands whose whole purpose was to buy up bad investments and stick the US taxpayer with the bill. We "lent" Big banks trillions at near zero so they could turn around and "lend" it back to us at 3%. And yes, teacher ARE professionals, not "white collar labor" whatever that is. If you don't believe it go teach first grade or 7th grade for a week.

Rob T, Please reread my posts. I did not write nor do I believe that teachers should be paid minimum wage. That came from Sox, together with a few other statements he erroneously and misleadingly attributed to me. Other than your reference to the master's degree and reaching kids more than their parents (it's not the degree that makes an educator - there are plenty of people with masters and higher degrees who couldn't teach a frog to jump), I like the gist of your description of an outstanding educator. I like it even better that you refer to them as "educators", because that is what we are paying them to do.

You ask : What is a great educator worth? My answer: their weight in gold, we can't pay them enough. (Realistically we can't pay them that much, but they deserve it. )

I ask: (1) How many great educators are in the public school system in South Kingstown? (2) How is it determined who the great educators are? (3) How many of the great educators are paid more than the mediocre or lousy teachers who have been there as long or longer?

BTW, I was educated in public schools by lousy teachers, mediocre teachers, and teachers worth their weight in gold. I not only remember the names of the great ones, but the lessons as well, and attribute much of my overpaid success to them.

@Walter, you have the ability to delete your own comment if you choose to do so.

By the way, thank GOD this tax bill was shot down! Small business would have suffered greatly along with us struggling taxpayers.

If we took away health benefits for our legislators, we would only be addressing 0.25% of next year's deficit. We have far too many public employees and a far too generous social agenda. There's no need to denigrate any profession, but clearly, how we compensate public employees needs to be addressed. Marylou uses the "part timer" reason for eliminating health care benefits for the GA, but what constitutes part time? RI has no law defining this. It's up to individual buisnesses to set their own policies. If you're using 40 hrs/week, Kate's number of 2080 hrs/year is the number. Clearly, most educators do not meet this criteria. However, I do not suggest taking heath care away from educators. If government was run like a buisness, we would hire the best employees at the lowest cost. Obviously, that's not what we're getting now. Good legislators (and I'm not here to defend them) put in far more time than you think. It bothers me more that there are so many current and retired state pension beneficiaries in our GA. This fact alone, makes it almost impossible to solve our pension time bomb.

"I hate to break it to you Kate, but our military and many of our health researchers are funded by us, the taxpayers." Thanks for clearing that up ML, I guess I really am an uneducated, complete idiot to have thought the subject of the article was the State of Rhode Island, proposed increased taxes, and alternatives to taking more money out of the RI taxpayers' pockets when they are struggling to stay alive, feed themselves, put a roof over their heads, and keep or get a job.

And yes, it is my uneducated, completely idiotic opinion (and apparently heresy to use that sacred cow - the public school teacher - as an example) that public school teachers should not be paid more than our service men and women who are put in harms way defending our borders and freedom, nor should they be paid more than medical doctors. Those are examples folks, not a complete laundry list.

I don't know what Gordon Fox and the GA are going to do about GE, Big Pharma, Big Oil, Barney Frank and Charles Schumer, but I hope to God they do not put those matters on their agenda before they deal with our financial crisis here in Rhode Island.

[ "White collar labor" is an educated person on salary (vs. hourly wage earner) who is a member of a labor union. ]

Thank you Sox, for sticking up for teachers. It is so disheartening to hear teachers getting bashed all the time for things that truly aren't their fault. If you want to teach at a public school, you belong to a union. The evaluation system for teachers is definitely one that needs improvement, but teachers are not to blame for an faulty evaluation system. Are there bad teachers? Yes there are. Do some people get involved in teaching for the wrong reasons? Yes some do. Although Kate, I don't know too many who think to themselves while declaring a major, "I want to make a lot of money...hmm...teacher is the way to go. Maybe it's those snow days that really make being a teacher tempting (which by the way have to be made up in the summer, usually in sweltering heat). Many others like myself, became teachers to help educate our youth, and love doing it. Sox hit the nail on the head teachers are not solely responsible for the success of their students. Parents have a role, that some refuse to play. I could share stories that would make your mouths drop. Teachers have a lot on their plate. They don't want to be put on a pedestal for being teachers, but they certainly don't want to be bashed by people who have never set foot in a classroom. Also if being a teacher is such an easy, high paying job full of perks, why don't you seek a career change Kate?

Hi Folks:

Thanks for generating such a spirited dialogue on the site.

Please check out the update on this issue, featuring the president of the North Central Chamber of Commerce: http://patch.com/A-gCRP

South Kingstown Patch provides an overview of the issue and points to some POSITIVE aspects of the Governor's plan. Whether you agree with a broadening of the sales tax or not, it is useful to understand the background on this complex issue.

Sales Tax Modernization - Good Idea Gone Awry?
http://southkingstown.patch.com/articles/sales-tax-modernization-good-idea-gone-awry

@ Cynthia: I couldn't find a single "Positive" aspect of the Governor's plan. Would you mind pointing them out to me? Unless, of course, one thinks that higher taxes is a good thing.

Economics 101 - Raise taxes stifle growth, lower taxes stimulate growth. It has been proven over and over again. Why dont we try something unique!! Cut Spending!!

HOW ABOUT CATHILIC CHURCH LETTER REGARDING SCHOLS WHERE IS IT

GE, and other big companies don't pay taxes because they pay lobbyists to keep the laws that way. It's all corrupt, same thing in RI. ONE HAND WASHES THE OTHER.....

I agree 100% it's all RI BS. All Rhode Islanders must pay attention come 2012.

Why is NO one talking about the fact Chafees' 1st act as governer was to repeal E-VERIFY! WHAT? Why? He got elected with the support of public employee unions. Now follow the money folks! By not requiring RI businesses to check if someone is here legally... encourages if not promotes the obvoious.. hiring of illegals. This is irrefutable..RI is now a sanctuary state. So with the support of the public emplyees unions.. and the latin population.. he has cornered the market-a market of an EXPONENTIALY GROWING latin population and those that serve them! Add all the "anchor babies, and all thier future babies" creating US citizens...even more business for the human services department! Its job security folks... imagine all the agents, case workers, secretaries, managers, etc. who all will have jobs thanks to the increasing population. THAT is why there is NO discussion about cutting government expenses.. ( 5 year, no exception, lifetime limit on welfare) as an example, or streamlining of redundant services, or the the DMV for example...(the miserable, rude employees there, who act like they are doing YOU the favor.. they never worry about losing thier jobs.. tenure, union protection, etc allows them to act with impunity...) NONE of this is brought up though... instead , a massive broad tax on basicly EVERYTHING...which will destroy the already fragile economy.... we are victims to the exponentially growing, non working, government supported... masses. Welcome to Rhode Island..

WELL, WELL, NOW , ALL THIS CHATTER,,,DON'T YOU THINK IT IS ABOUT TIME THAT THIS SO CALL GOVERNOR IS RE-CALLED???? HE IS SUCH A TOTAL MISTAKE AND A LAUGHING STOCK OF OUR NATION.