June is a month of hope and fear on Smith Hill.
Hope that even star-crossed bills buried for years in the General Assembly could finally pass.
Fear that your industry, client or organization could find itself in the crosshairs of a tax or budget cut.
It’s also a time of surprises, like Gov. Dan McKee last week asking to use $82 million in American Rescue Act money to build a new state health laboratory on the former Route 195 land.
Lawmakers have already polished off some of the bigger issues they faced heading into the year: a big climate bill, a minimum wage hike, minimum nursing home staffing, making permanent free community college and a contract extension for IGT.
But there’s still a lot on the agenda.
Here’s what to watch out for before everyone heads for the beach.
Expect House leadership to drop their annual tax-and-spending plan late this week. (Thursday’s always a good bet.)
When it does come out, expect to see the full $140-million installment of the car-tax phaseout.
There’s also a very high probability it will include money for a new state housing czar, a top priority of House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi, and funding for housing affordability paid for with an increase in the tax on high-end real-estate sales.
As McKee’s team has plunged into the budget weeds, they have made a number of amendments and requests in the past two weeks.
They include:
◘ $38 million to plug a budget hole at the troubled Eleanor Slater Hospital system.
◘ Borrowing $35 million, with no voter approval, to build a new state police barracks in East Greenwich.
◘ Using $113 million of American Rescue Plan funds to build a new state health laboratory on the former Route 195 land and pay for other Department of Health infrastructure.
“Our current building is woefully inadequate and well beyond its years,” Health Director Dr. Nicole Alexander-Scott told lawmakers Thursday, calling the old lab a “horrific working environment.”
The new lab, which the state has been studying since 2009, is estimated to cost $82 million, she said. The I-195 land was chosen at least in part due to having the “best economic potential” on top of its health utility.
Earlier in the week, Shekarchi said the House budget would not include any of the $1.1 billion in Rescue Plan coronavirus aid the state is expected to receive.
Taxes
The most intensely lobbied budget issues (at least publicly lobbied) relate to taxes on people and businesses doing well financially.
Progressive groups, labor unions and left-leaning lawmakers have pushed for an increase in the tax rate for income over $475,000.
And McKee’s budget plan calls for taxing Payroll Protection Plan proceeds over $150,000 as income.
Both ideas mobilized the new Rhode Island Business Coalition in opposition to what businesspeople say is an attack from a emboldened political left.
On personal income taxes, they probably don’t have too much to worry about, at least this year.
McKee has been dead-set against broad-based tax hikes this year and no one close to Shekarchi (who popularized “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu” as a Chamber of Commerce rallying cry) suggests he is eager to raise income taxes.
Despite the long odds, progressives are keeping the pressure up for an income tax hike. Reclaim Rhode Island plans to rally in Shekarchi’s Warwick House district this week to draw attention to the issue.
The business coalition may not be as pleased with the outcome on Payroll Protection Program taxes.
Coalition president John Simmons on Friday said he has heard suggestions that lawmakers may consider taxing PPP, but raising the threshold McKee set.
“For me, it is doing something but not addressing the underlying unfairness of the tax,” Simmons said.
A separate segment of the business world is fighting a proposed tax on sugary drinks, which is still a longshot, but getting more attention than it has in recent years.
McKee took office in March and inherited large parts of his first budget from predecessor Gina Raimondo.
Pot
McKee’s marijuana legalization plan will not be in the budget, even though all of the major State House players say allowing recreational pot sales is inevitable.
Debate about whose version of legalization — the House, the Senate and McKee all have their own proposals — continues, and Shekarchi last week said a resolution could come later this summer or in an anticipated fall session.
Much of the marijuana debate has centered around whether the licensing process will provide opportunities for people of color who are without lots of money to get into the business.
Policing
A year after protests over George Floyd‘s killing energized calls to scale back police protections in the Law Enforcement Officers’ Bill of Rights, the issue hasn’t budged at the Assembly.
Pending legislation would, among other things, lengthen the amount of time police chiefs can suspend officers accused of misconduct.
Advocates would like to go further and repeal the police bill of rights entirely.
“I tend to lean toward repeal when we are looking to hold police accountable and are one of only 15 states that have a LEOBOR,” said Harrison Tuttle, executive director of Black Lives Matter Rhode Island PAC.
If scaling back the bill of rights is the only politically viable option this year, he said, it would be better than the status quo.
Pay Equity
Proponents of legislation to close the gender pay gap think this is their year.
It’s already passed the Senate and negotiations are underway to get a bill through the House, where it has died before, most notably in 2018 when supporters say the bill was gutted by House leadership.
The bill would make it easier for workers to sue for unequal pay and ban employers from asking prospective hires their salary history. The bill also makes it illegal for employers to muzzle workers from discussing their compensation packages.
Education
A moratorium on new charter schools is among the high-profile proposals whose fate lawmakers have yet to decide.
McKee has said he would veto a moratorium and it is not expected to be slipped in the budget, giving the teachers union-backed bill a difficult path to become law.
National Education Association Rhode Island President Bob Walsh said if the moratorium indeed stalls, he hopes lawmakers do something to raise funding for district schools losing money to new charters.
Other significant issues still on lawmakers’ plates include:
◘ A regional pact to reduce transportation emissions through wholesale fuel charges.
The Transportation Climate Initiative is supported by the McKee administration, but its prospects of passing the Assembly this summer are cloudy at best.
The Senate is scheduled to vote on its version of the bill Wednesday, but the House hasn’t even scheduled a hearing on its version.
◘ A bid to take the General Assembly out of the marriage business.
As it stands, lawmakers must give their blessing for non-clergy to officiate weddings. A bill that already passed the House would let the executive branch grant permission for ordinary people to preside over nuptials.
◘ Several gun-control measures, including a ban on straw purchases of firearms, a ban of guns on school grounds, and requiring the locked storage of firearms when they are not in use.
Gun-control advocates are again pushing hard to ban “military-style assault weapons” and feeding devices capable of holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition, but that will be a steeper hill.
◘ And then there is Providence Mayor Jorge Elorza‘s request to be allowed to borrow $700 million to pay down the city’s pension debt. It was not greeted with enthusiasm at the State House.
The opposition
House GOP leader Blake Filippi of Block Island hopes the Act on Climate and IGT contract are the most objectionable bills, from a Republican perspective, the Democrats pass this year.
But he’s not under any illusion that something the minority can’t stand won’t appear.
“There is always going to be problematic bills that come out, a ton of bad deals are made for the budget,” he said. “We don’t know what to look out for, but bills to raise taxes are foolish. We are awash in cash.”
Instead of new gun-control bills, Filippi said lawmakers should require the attorney general to compile detailed analysis of violent crimes, so lawmakers know have a better idea of root causes.
And he hopes his Democratic colleagues say no to the usual raft of auto-body industry bills coming down the pike.
Elorza’s future
Speaking of Elorza, he is expected to run for governor next year, but he faces a challenging Democratic primary featuring an incumbent.
So speculation that he could seek one of the other statewide offices – in particular treasurer – next year is unsurprising, especially as the fundraising circuit has kicked into gear again this summer.
Elorza appeared to shoot down the possibility he might run for treasurer or secretary of state in a WPRI-TV interview last week, but it wasn’t the most forceful denial.
Here’s what Elorza campaign spokeswoman Nora Barre told Political Scene:
“Mayor Elorza has no interest in running for those positions,” she wrote in an email.
panderson@providencejournal.com
(401) 277-7384
On Twitter: @PatrickAnderso_
