- [Jim] This week on "A Lively Experiment", a financial crisis for the Providence School District that has no easy answers.

And President-elect Trump is moving quickly to fill cabinet positions, raising some eyebrows along the way.

- [Announcer] "A Lively Experiment" is generously underwritten by.

- Hi, I'm John Hazen White Jr. For over 30 years, "A Lively Experiment" has provided insight and analysis of the political issues that face Rhode Islanders.

I'm a proud supporter of this great program and Rhode Island PBS.

- Joining us on this week's panel, Sue Cienki, national committeewoman for the Rhode Island Republican Party.

Harrison Tuttle president of the Black Lives Matter Rhode Island Political Action Committee, and Providence College Political Science Professor, Adam Myers.

Welcome into "Lively".

I'm Jim Hummel, and it is great to have you with us this week.

The Providence School District is millions of dollars in the hole just months into its fiscal year with the system threatening to cut sports, bus passes, and a lot more.

The finger pointing between the state, which controls the district, and the city officials, has been vigorous.

What is clear, short of a pile of money magically falling out of the sky, there are going to be some painful decisions in the coming weeks.

Harrison, we could probably do a whole show on this, but as you're looking at this, what strikes you, the court rules that the city needs to cough up more money and they're like, you know, the cupboard's bare.

- Yeah, all this decision came down this week.

You know, this has been a long process between RIDE and the Providence School Districts over funding, over control, and over the best pathway for students in the city of Providence.

We know the troubles that every single day, kids that go to school in Providence face, lack of resources, lawsuits every day around not receiving resources.

You know, the primary issue here, as Mayor Smiley brought up, was the funding that would have to be cut.

He mentioned two things that were really important.

The number one thing would be the funding that would affect students as a result.

You're talking about school programs, you're talking about public safety.

All of these things, when we talk about holistic support for kids, are things that Providence is going to have to figure out.

And oh, by the way, they've already had financial problems to begin with.

And so what this looks like, unfortunately, is Providence residents, Providence families, biting the bullet for incompetence at a state level here for not actually improving schools and showing that the state takeover was a failure.

- And he said, you can't cut your way out of it.

At some point, if it's $10 million, you have to raise taxes, probably the last thing any politician wants to do, right?

- True that.

And it's been, I agree with Harrison, it's been a longstanding problem.

In 1993, we had an overview of the Providence School system's major issues.

Nothing was fixed.

In 2019, John Hopkins came back in and did another evaluation, and that precipitated the state takeover.

So the state has taken over for five years, no improvement whatsoever.

And then now they've agreed an additional three years.

Well, it's not working.

So what do they do?

They cut things for students instead of cutting the administrative salaries, and the administrative personnel.

Instead of focusing in on student achievements, they continue to do the same things over and over again.

So I can understand the frustration of Mayor Smiley.

You took over my school system, I have no control, and yet I'm left holding the bag.

And the bag is increased taxes for the Providence residents, and they're not seeing any improvement in the school outcomes for these students.

- Yeah, I agree.

Listen, I think in the long run, the only solution to this is gonna be increased state funding for Providence Public Schools, and the schools of other low income communities across the state, and I don't think you need to be a radical lefty to accept that premise.

The Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council, which is not a left wing organization, put out a report not too long ago talking about how it's time to change the state's education funding formula, that the state needs to both increase its funding of schools overall, and needs to orient more funding toward Providence, Pawtucket, Central Falls, Woonsocket, and communities like that.

- And there's gotta be, in addition to increased funding, increased accountability.

There's never any accountability for the outcomes.

What are we doing?

Let's look at it.

What are we doing, what are we doing wrong, and how do we get these kids on par?

When you have eighth grade students in the Providence school system with 5% efficiency in math and in reading, that's outrageous.

That should not be allowed.

- Well, we're just not meeting the needs of our children.

We have an increase- - [Jim] Generations of Providence kids.

- Generations of kids that are bilingual that we are not putting money in towards classes around ELA, which is English learning based classes, and which we will test them based on, in English, based on the language that they need to work on, and that we're not investing.

Another thing is, which was particularly concerning, was that the mayor mentioned the fact that RIDE Commission, Angelica Infante-Green, was not responding to the concerns, not only at the city municipal level, but at the parents.

And that is shared across the board when you look at some of the school board races that were occurring over the summer, and you see at the fact that some of these school board candidates, particularly those who are advocates for public education here in Rhode Island, but Providence in particular are saying they can't get in contact with her.

They're not able to have discussions, quote, RIDE just throws numbers at them instead of having conversations.

I mean, that is kind of the frustration that's going on, is you're having these one-way conversations in which parents and families are not feeling involved.

- You've been on the school committee, right?

- [Sue] Yes, yes, sir.

- How, three months into a fiscal year, does this happen?

- Yeah, it's outrageous.

You know, it's outrageous, and- - [Jim] It's not like we're at the end and we're running outta money.

It's like, this is the very beginning of the year.

- This is the very beginning of the year, which should send red flags everywhere.

And the problem with Providence is the school board has no control.

I mean, when the state took over there, the school board has no input, but they're not even having conversations with the education commissioner.

She seems to not even care what they have to say, which is, those are folks on the ground.

Those are the folks that are going into the grocery store and talking to people in their constituents.

So they hear what the issues are.

And when you talk about English language learners, I mean, I don't understand why they don't have language academies.

These students that come in that don't speak English, they're not gonna be successful going forward unless they get a good handle on the English language.

So let's take care of that first before we test them in math and science and all the other studies that they're supposed to be proficient in.

Because if they can't speak the language, they're not gonna be successful.

And if they can't read by third grade, they are set up for failure.

- Do you think the control should go back to the city of Providence, or is, I understand the state got a little bit of a COVID pass, right?

Like, everywhere.

But as Sue said, it's been five years.

How much longer, they said, what, it's gonna be two or three years, should it go back to the schools?

- I don't know how this can go on for much longer.

It shouldn't go on forever.

Schools need to be locally controlled.

But there are these deep-seated structural issues that still haven't been fixed.

And I agree with my two fellow panelists here.

It's mind boggling that they haven't been fixed.

And, of course, this is a decades long problem.

And so when you have something this complex, I understand the solution is difficult to achieve, but, you know, ultimately maybe the way to fix it is to have the voters of Providence assume greater accountability over their school system.

And so returning schools to local control would be the way to do that.

- Which is interesting, because Central Falls has been under the control of the state, and there's been no improvement.

So I think that the citizens- - [Jim] And they're talking about now.

- Right, and then- - Potentially going back.

- The citizens of Providence and looking going, well, wait a minute, are we headed down that same path?

- [Jim] Yeah, three decades later, here we are.

- It started out five years.

We added three more.

Are we gonna be like Central Falls 25 years with no improvement?

- Just briefly, where does charter schools fit into this equation?

- Well, $40 million leaving the school district to address a need in which parents, particularly in Providence, which are Latino parents who are seeking a change in curriculum, that speaks to some of the issues that we're talking about here, which is an adaptive, culturally appropriate educational experience.

But see, the problem here now is that if we do not fix the public schools, the need for charter schools will increase.

And the problem with that is that charter schools will ultimately end up privatizing our education.

And so what the dilemma that we will face here is that how do you rapidly improve traditional public schools in enough time before education is sold off to private equity and private business owners?

- Okay, I should note that a judge is gonna decide exactly what that figure is gonna be next week.

We don't know, but we know it's gonna be many, many million dollars.

Alright, shifting gears a little bit.

The Washington Bridge, Ed Fitzpatrick from the Boston Globe had an interesting article late last week talking about some work being done on the eastbound section, half a million dollars of repairs.

The DOT said that this is regular, but I know Ken Block, who's a panelist here, and Rob Cote, who's been kind of a citizen watchdog in Warwick, say that there may be greater problems here.

- Well, the greater problem is that they're hiding maintenance issues, and they've been hiding them for over 12 years.

I mean, you know that when there's massive amounts of transportation going across these bridges, there needs to be regular maintenance.

It seems as if these reports were ignored for over 12 years.

So of course you're going to have infrastructure problems.

It has to be regularly maintained.

And now it seems they're not taking care of the eastbound span that may have to be closed, and that would be disastrous for the economy, for people that have to use that to work for the hospitals in the area.

How do you fix that problem?

And the problem is there's no accountability.

Why Governor McKee has not said to Peter Alviti, "Your time is up."

Someone has to be held accountable.

And I think that the voters in Rhode Island expect some movement along those lines.

- Yeah, we've talked about the Washington Bridge fiasco every single time I've been on this show.

(all laughing) - Seemingly since you were in high school, Adam.

- It does, it's like the issue that never goes away.

- It was like, this is the modern day 38 Studios.

- Right.

- We've had many issues like this, at Pawtucket Stadium, whatever.

You're right.

Ever since you've been on.

- Yeah, so I just don't know what to say anymore.

I mean, these reports are very disturbing.

Again, I believe the Department of Transportation.

You know, I don't think it's a structural issue.

I imagine it's routine.

That said, as Sue points out, the transparency issues are profound here.

And this just continues to lead to a decline of trust in state government.

And it's not good for citizens not to trust their government and what it's doing.

I mean, this actually goes beyond transportation.

You know, this goes into all sorts of other areas in which state government is responsible.

- I'm just so sick and tired.

(all laughing) I'm just tired every day.

- [Jim] Come live with me in the East Bay.

- Yes.

And this is what people are living through, this reality in which Rhode Islanders are trusting elected officials, taxpayers are paying into the bridge, which was not supposed to be broken down to begin with, or so what we thought, and every day, it is upon folks like Ken Block, who is a regular member of this show.

I'm hearing he's scuba diving, (all laughing) I'm hearing all of these things.

- [Jim] I don't know about that, but- - And you have investigative reporters, and people in the community, who have to come in and figure out what's going on in the state, because our state government isn't being transparent.

- Ken's brave.

I'm not sure anybody would brave the Seekonk River at this point.

You never know what's gonna be down there.

The other thing is, I've heard from reporters, they're having a hard time getting the inspection reports on eastbound.

Now, this has nothing to do, I understand, they're saying the litigation, the litigation, that's the other thing.

Since you've been on, Max Wistow has pulled out.

What do you make of that?

- Yeah, because who are they gonna get money from?

I mean, this was a colossal failure.

And once again, the state of Rhode Island is relying on the federal government to scoop them up and save them.

You know, they want $500 million to rebuild the bridge.

And it wasn't a natural disaster, it wasn't a terrorist act.

This was maintenance failure from your state government not taking care of your infrastructure.

So again, you're right.

It's a failure of the government to do the necessary things that they should be doing.

- [Jim] They better secure that money before January 20th.

- Well, that, you know- - [Jim] It better be in the bank account, don't you think?

- And again, you have a budget deficit of $400 million.

The state just took on another $400 million in debt.

What are we doing here?

This is a small state.

We should be able to figure out what's going on.

And it's just incompetence at the highest level.

- Yeah, well.

- Doesn't even know what to say.

(laughing) - I dunno if I'd go quite that far.

But yes, I mean, I think there's clearly some, and there's clearly incompetence here, and I hope they're able to recoup some of this money via these lawsuits.

I mean, the lawsuits are going forward without attorney, what's his name?

- Max Wistow, yeah.

- Wistow.

- He and Jonathan, just so you know, he and Jonathan Savage were brought in, initially two high powered guys.

They worked on 38 Studios, Wistow for whatever reason, we tried to beat it outta Joe Larisa last week.

And he didn't know.

He heard the communication with them and DOT wasn't great.

But it's not a good look when your signature guy decides not to go forward, for whatever reason.

- Yeah.

Yeah, 100%.

And look, we know that in previous decades, various reports were made that suggested the bridge was structurally unsound, and those reports were either ignored or pushed aside, right?

So it's not like transportation companies and the folks that the state has contracted out with haven't alluded to some problems before, right?

And so I think I agree with Sue that the buck ultimately stops with the state government here.

- And we still don't have any timeline budget.

- No bids.

- No bids, right?

- Well, there was a timeline that was put out, and of course it was still late.

- Well, that was gonna be, we were gonna be in March of, right?

- Right.

- [Jim] They were hoping to fix it in three months.

- Right, right.

And the really, the problem is, is that if folks that are informed in politics don't know, then the average Rhode Islander doesn't know.

And that's a problem.

- Okay.

- And interesting enough, I think that going back years and years, it may have been ultimately a design problem.

The bridge design may have been set up for failure.

So nobody's pointing that out.

And nobody's pointing out, hey, we had a problem- - Mayor Pete pointed that out, when he visited here as Secretary of Transportation- - [Sue] Yeah, that could've been- - No, he said.

- Yeah.

- He basically said this was a design in 1968 not really used anywhere else in the country.

- Right, so it could have been- - [Jim] So who do you blame, dead engineers?

- Yeah.

And it's interesting that McKee has not ever pointed, I don't think, to Governor Raimondo when she was here that this was ignored under- - [Jim] Did he get a couple of calls from Washington?

Keep it on the down low?

- You know, I mean, ultimately it's gotta be fixed, so finger pointing only goes so far.

But he's never brought that up, hey, it was under her watch and I got stuck with it, and now I have to go forward.

And when you talk about recovering money, there's only so many construction companies that are gonna come in and do that work.

You think those bids are not gonna take into account, hey, we're gonna get sued for $20 million, so the bids are gonna come in higher.

So who ultimately loses out?

It's the taxpayers.

- Alright.

It seems like it's been a lot longer than a week and a half since the election, and boy, it's been a lifetime since then.

The things are happening every day.

Let's go back to the election then, and we'll talk about some of president-elect Trump's appointments.

Let's talk to the political science professor.

(all chuckling) Did you see this margin of victory coming?

I mean, as you were going into the election, what were you thinking?

- [Adam] In Rhode Island, or nationwide?

- No, I'm talking about nationwide.

- Um, it was- - We're an outlier.

(Sue laughs) - It was within the realm of possibilities, I would say.

It wasn't necessarily the one I would've predicted, but looking at the electoral map, looking at how the different states shook out, I couldn't say that I was surprised.

It was a decisive victory for President Trump.

And there were some very interesting shifts in voting patterns, historic ones, I would say.

Obviously the question that everybody's asking is will these shifts be durable?

And time will tell.

- You know, there's a difference between campaigning and governing.

So that's what's ultimately gonna determine whether these shifts are permanent.

Do you deliver on your promises?

You know, his first term, he promised things, and he delivered.

Will he be able to do it the second time around with a Senate and a house both in the same party?

I think he's got 18 months.

18 months to actually put things and changes in place.

- Because the midterms could potentially flip one of the changes.

- 'Cause the midterms could flip it.

- But this is the movie we saw eight years ago.

He had the House, the Senate, and he got the tax cuts through.

But I think he realizes the clock is ticking from January 20th.

- Yeah, I think he's better prepared this time around.

I think he learned a lot.

You know, he relied on a lot of Washington insiders last time.

I think he's, obviously from his picks, he's not picking a lot of Washington insiders people that are beholden to the lobbyist.

He's gone in a different route.

So let's see if he's successful with the way that he's picked.

- That's a charitable way of saying it, a different route.

Matt Gaetz for Attorney General.

- I mean, it's unbelievable.

I mean, when we look at some of these picks, I mean, we have a massive problem in this country, and I wanna speak on, from the perspective of the Democratic Party, in which, walked around, and decided that they were gonna pay Oprah Winfrey, Megan Thee Stallion, you know, some of these people that listeners on this show have never heard of, to encourage people to come out when people are struggling to pay the bills.

And it's a huge disconnect between the party elites and what's actually going on.

And we saw, even at a local level here, the amount of people that just had their head in the clouds, there's no way that Kamala Harris could have lost, there's no way that it would be possible, when the reality is is that most voters in America have saw what has happened over the last four years.

And instead of the Democratic party saying we need to shift to actually talking about the fact that people are struggling, talking about the fact that we have a person who's running for president, who is now going to be president, that is going to threaten our democracy, and is actively destroying every single institution that we have in this country.

There is absolutely nothing good that is going to come out of the next four years.

Rhode Island is going to be financially strapped more than they already are.

They're going to, we're gonna have to raise taxes, and I know, it's scary, but we're gonna have to raise taxes on our most wealthy in Rhode Island, because the fact is is that Trump is gonna cut every last bit of social net that people in this state rely on.

And that's how it impacts here in Rhode Island.

- How'd that work out for Massachusetts?

They left.

You tax the wealthiest, they have portable- - They vote with their feet.

- They vote with their feet, and they leave.

It doesn't work out, and the amount of money that you're gonna get is insignificant.

I agree with you.

They raised 1 billion, Vice President Harris raised $1 billion in a short period of time, and she ended up $20 million in debt because she was paying, it was professional gigs for these people.

It wasn't really endorsements.

And if that was any indication of what she would do with the economy, that in itself is scary.

- How you govern and how you campaign, though, are two different things.

So we'll see when he gets to the White House, what happens, right?

- Yeah, there's so many things my two panelists just said that I would like to respond to.

And I'm- (all chuckling) And I'm not sure I can do all of them.

But to Sue's point about, yeah, how is he gonna govern with a unified control in Congress and the presidency?

I mean, it's important to point out, of course, the Republican majorities in the house, the Republican majority in the house is razor thin.

We don't know exactly how thin it's gonna be, but it's looking like three or four seats.

The Republican majority in the Senate is not very large, either.

And, of course, it's not filibuster proof.

They, being the Republicans, are going to have to hang together nearly completely to get anything done legislatively.

And as you pointed out, last time Trump was president, he had really one major legislative accomplishment, which was the tax cut.

That was the one area in which the Republicans back then were able to hang together.

I know they have grand plans for this Trump term.

I'm not sure how successful they will be in implementing those plans.

Where Trump will be able to make a lot of policy changes is via executive orders.

And then the other thing I would point out is, you know, as tends to happen very, very quickly in American politics, majority coalitions that come to power start to break apart.

And we're already seeing Republican divisions over some of these cabinet picks, Matt Gaetz being the most prominent example.

So, you know, things are very early.

But in the broad scope, the dominant pattern we see in American politics today is that no party hangs onto power for very long.

And I fully expect that Democrats will be able to exploit divisions within the GOP and come back to power nationally in the relatively near future.

- Yeah, you've gotta look specifically in the New England area, who is the representative that is a Republican, is Susan Collins.

She is up for election in 2026.

She is a moderate Republican.

- Yup.

- Is she going to go along with some of the things that President Trump wants to do?

- And Lisa Murkowski.

- And Lisa Murkowski.

- It was like the old gang of eight with Olympia Snowe and Linc Chafee and those moderates, a lot of those don't exist anymore.

- And you look at Mitch McConnell.

Is he going to go along?

- Yeah.

- So if you have 53 senators, how do you hold onto that coalition, and what do you promise these people?

So it will be an interesting couple of weeks to see what happens.

I think that his pick for HHS, RFK Jr., is interesting.

Obama had brought him in, he wanted to put him in a role.

So it's gonna be interesting.

And Tulsi Gabbard, that's also interesting.

So he's got a really interesting coalition of some of the people that he has picked.

- I think the thing to look at, like you said, is there's some old time senators who've been there a long time, the guard, that I think do not want to cede their review power, that's what the Senate does.

It's advice and consent.

The question is, is Trump gonna flip 'em all and just say let's go through?

- Well, it would be historically accurate to look at the fact that the folks that have opposed Donald Trump in the past have come around and support him.

- Including Marco Rubio, his Secretary of State nominee.

- So we have a situation here now where Donald Trump is one of the most powerful men in the country, not only as president, but also over his own party, seemingly without any checks and balances through the party.

I mean, name one Republican that has the power to challenge Donald Trump.

And there was one thing that you mentioned regarding the tax raises.

I don't know, not one person that is struggling right now that would oppose raising taxes and having people pay their fair share.

You talk about- - Yeah, but the wealthy do already pay 54% of taxes, so let's talk about that.

They already pay more than their fair share.

I think that the tax code, that's a whole nother show of what we can do for it.

- All right.

- It really is.

- That's gonna have to be for after the show, because we only have a couple minutes left for outrages and/or kudos.

So let's begin with you, Sue.

- Outrage and kudos.

Well, it's not really an outrage.

It's really more of a sad thing about the Providence Place Mall that is now in receivership, and you're talking about Macy's leaving.

That's a sad moment for Rhode Island, 'cause yet it's another fiasco.

You know, you have the Washington Bridge.

We talk about these fiascos.

I think this is a great state.

We have so much to offer, and yet we can't seem to get out of our own way.

It's a bad economic forecast for us.

- But I also think that's reflective of brick and mortar across the country.

- It is reflective, but we don't, we're not flexible and adaptable enough to take advantage of some of these things, you know?

So that's the sad part.

- [Jim] Adam, what do you have?

- I was actually gonna say the same thing, and I was gonna link it- - Oh, I'm sorry.

(all laughing) - Oh, you stole it.

You stole it.

- I used to say that to Bob Walsh.

She stole my idea.

- Well, you you got it- - But I was gonna link it to the whole- - The veteran panelists have three or four in their back pocket.

- Right, right, right.

Well, the last few times I've been on this show, we haven't even gotten to the outrage and kudos.

- [Jim] Yeah, I know, really, so.

- You know, but I was, the economic climate of the state, the broader issue of the fact that Hasbro might be leaving, all of these things, you know, it does not look good.

And it's not entirely clear to me what Rhode Island is doing wrong here.

I mean, Sue might talk about the business climate here.

I don't think the business climate in Massachusetts is that much better, and they're doing much better, so.

- You get the last minute.

- And I was just gonna say, my outrage is always the wind turbine, so I have to say that.

It's outrage we're killing the oceans.

- [Jim] Well, we'll see what happens in the Trump administration.

You have 45 seconds now, Mr. Tuttle.

- Sorry.

- Outrage, Senate president fight that's going on right now in the Rhode Island General Assembly.

We have someone who the caucus has seemingly lost faith in his ability to govern.

And by January, we need to have some real concrete solutions in order to solve some of the issues that we've been talking about today.

- Do you think he's gonna, how do you think this session's gonna play out with Dominick Ruggerio as Senate president?

- We'll wait and see.

- Oh, there it is.

- I don't think they've lost confidence in him.

23 senators voted for him, so there's confidence, but there is rumblings underneath.

- Yeah.

- That some of the senators want some significant change.

- Alright, folks, it is a quick half hour.

We appreciate your spending it with us.

Adam, good to see you.

We promise to talk about the Washington Bridge next time you come.

(all laughing) It'll be here.

Sue and Harrison, thank you.

And folks, thank you for joining us.

We appreciate your loyalty to this show.

If you can't catch us Friday at seven or Sunday at noon, we archive all of our shows at our ripbs.org/lively.

Come back here next week, we'll have a full analysis and recap of everything going on here and nationally.

It's a moving target every day.

Join us next week as "A Lively Experiment" continues.

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