Fourteen Rhode Island municipalities are planning to sue the state over laws designed to make it easier to build housing

Charlestown is NOT suing, at least for now

Steve Ahlquist

Charlestown Town Council gave its OK to converting
this derelict motel on Route 1 into affordable housing.
The ONLY dissenting vote was Charlestown Citizens Alliance
(CCA) rep Bonnita Van Slyke

Over the last three years or so, under the leadership of former Speaker of the House K. Joseph Shekarchi, the Rhode Island General Assembly passed legislation designed to make it easier for developers to build housing. 

Given the massive shortage of available housing, rapidly escalating rents that harm low- and middle-income families, and a more than 400% increase in homelessness across the state, these measures, though not sufficient, are a necessary stab at mitigating Rhode Island’s housing apocalypse.

The legislation, among other things, reformed the comprehensive permitting process to better enable affordable housing development and streamlined zoning and land-use regulations. These aren’t exactly the sexiest bills; we’re talking about things like density bonuses for building near transit, adding homes in commercial lots, or infilling non-conforming lots (think weird-shaped lots that require some creative designs).

The goal of these reforms is to reduce costs and accelerate the construction of new homes. Given that Rhode Island has long been last in the nation for building homes (on a per capita basis, not because of our size), and it is estimated that the state needs to build between 15,000 and 24,000 new units to get the situation under control, it is right to ask if the state is doing enough. That said, permitting for new housing is trending up, as shown in the 2025 Integrated Housing Report from the Rhode Island Executive Office of Housing, but at our current rate of development, we are over a decade from seeing the housing market stabilize.

As Rhode Island families suffer, you’d think that local municipalities would be all in on these reforms, but of course, that’s not the case. Instead, around 14 municipalities, including Portsmouth, Tiverton, Hopkinton, Burrillville, Bristol, Smithfield, West Greenwich, East Greenwich, Lincoln, Middletown, Charlestown, and Westerly, have signed onto a Joint Municipal Statement¹ opposing the state’s efforts. The statement appears to be the brainchild of Larry Fitzmorris, President of the conservative Portsmouth Concerned Citizens, and Mark Brady, former Narragansett Planning Board Chair.

EDITOR'S NOTE: When I saw that Steve listed Charlestown among the towns planning to sue, I asked Charlestown Council President if this was true. It's not. This is what Deb said:

"My concern is the one size fits all approach to solve the housing problem.  Charlestown relies on private wells and septic systems which makes our situation different from those cities and town with public water and sewer.  Charlestown did not vote to join the lawsuit at this time. Based on the information presented at the May Town Council meeting,  it does not seem as though this lawsuit has a likely chance of success.  The Town Council will revisit the matter once new information is available."

- Will Collette

Dear Leader knows how to put on a show

Winning!

House approves Fogarty bill to authorize state to enter international public health collaboration

Trump pulled U.S. out of World Health Organization. Kathy's bill would allow Rhode to get back in

Idiot

The House of Representatives passed legislation sponsored by Rep. Kathleen A. Fogarty (D-Dist. 35, South Kingstown) that would authorize the Department of Health to participate in international public health collaboration networks.

Under the terms of the bill (2026-H 8365A), the department would be authorized to participate in a Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, which is an international collaboration coordinated by the World Health Organization for the purpose of disease surveillance and outbreak response.

“The U.S. officially withdrew from the World Health Organization on Jan. 22, 2026 because of an executive order from the president, which I found to be reprehensible,” said Representative Fogarty. “The impact of this withdrawal has repercussions on infectious disease surveillance, pandemic planning and vaccine initiatives. This bill would allow the Department of Health to participate in international public health collaboration networks for the safety and welfare of all Rhode Islanders.”

The department would also be permitted to enter into agreements with federal agencies, international organizations, academic institutions and public health authorities, as well as participate in training programs, data-sharing initiatives and technical assistance programs.

Dr. Jerome M. Larkin, director of the Department of Health, testified in support of the legislation, telling the House Committee on Health and Human Services, “The Rhode Island Department of Health does not already engage in these activities because the United States is no longer a member of the World Health Organization, so participating in GOARN allows the department to have better visibility of what is happening globally with infectious disease so we can continue to help keep Rhode Islanders safe.”

The measure now moves to the Senate for consideration.

Fourth of July Tomato is URI Cooperative Extension’s Plant of the Year, producing delicious vine-ripened tomatoes as early as Independence Day

Would love to get some

 Kristen Curry 

The Fourth of July Tomato is URI Cooperative Extension’s Plant of the Year, producing delicious vine-ripened tomatoes as early as Independence Day. (Stock Photo / URI Cooperative Extension)

Although Independence Day is fast approaching, the University of Rhode Island Cooperative Extension program says there’s still time to get plants in the ground and growing for later summer cook-outs and gatherings. URI Extension is putting a spotlight on tomatoes this year, highlighting the Fourth of July Tomato as a solid choice for new gardeners looking to impress at annual summer celebrations.

URI Master Gardeners say it takes about seven weeks to produce this easy-growing variety for your plate. While it’s too late to start from seed, starter plants can now be found at local garden centers or farm stands for purchase.

According to Program Administrator Kate Hardesty, URI Cooperative Extension’s annual Plant of the Year is chosen each year based on good trial performance and reviews. The University’s Extension program has been picking a winning plant for many years, often choosing plants that inspire beginning gardeners. Staff say they bounce back and forth between vegetables and pollinator-supporting flowers. Last year, the plant of the year was Penstemon hirsutus (or hairy beardtongue), a purple perennial native to eastern North America.

Hardesty said that the Fourth of July Tomato, this year’s Plant of the Year, grows to 55 inches tall and is an early-maturing slicer tomato. It’s great for fresh eating and is an indeterminate variety, meaning it will continue to grow and produce, with proper maintenance, until the fall frost. The Fourth of July requires full sun and can be transplanted after the last frost in the spring. Its good flavor only improves as the season warms up.

When a president settles his own lawsuit to create a fund for allies, fundamental questions about justice arise

"No one should be the judge in their own case"

Austin Sarat, Amherst College

Thomas Hobbes took a very dim view of rebels and insurrectionists. He believed that insurrectionists relinquish their status as citizens the moment they seek to overthrow the government and should never be rewarded for doing so.

Hobbes, one of the finest political theorists of his time, said this in his great political treatise, “Leviathan,” published in 1651 during a civil war in England and Scotland.

Hobbes would likely also take a dim view of a major development announced by the Trump administration on May 20, 2026.

The U.S. Department of Justice has established a US$1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” to be used, the AP reports, to “allow people who believe they were targeted for prosecution for political purposes, including by the Biden administration Justice Department, to apply for payouts.”

The fund, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said, offers “a lawful process for victims of lawfare and weaponization to be heard and seek redress.”

Critics immediately charged that it might be used to compensate people involved in – some even convicted for – the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Blanche has not ruled out that possibility.

The establishment of the fund is part of a settlement agreement, in response to which President Donald Trump dropped his $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service for damages stemming from the leak of his tax returns. Those leaks, the lawsuit alleged, “caused Plaintiffs reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, unfairly tarnished their business reputations, portrayed them in a false light, and negatively affected President Trump.”

When ICE ramped up enforcement, US‑born workers didn’t see any economic gains

US workers don't want or get jobs done by deported workers

Chloe N. East, University of Colorado Boulder and Elizabeth Cox, University of Colorado Boulder

Donald Trump campaigned on a promise to strengthen the labor market. His immigration platform – including a pledge to conduct the largest deportation campaign in U.S. history – was central to that promise.

“For too long, Washington ignored how mass illegal immigration artificially suppressed wages, hurting working-class Americans – especially young men,” wrote Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on X in July 2025. “But under President Trump, we now have a secure border, a blue-collar wage boom, and major investments from trade deals.”

The labor market tells a different story. In the first year of Trump’s second term, unemployment rose, hiring slowed and wage growth stagnated. The construction sector was hit particularly hard.

We’re scholars of labor markets, immigration and public environmental policy who have examined how these economic trends can be traced to the mass deportation campaign of Trump’s second term. Notably, while areas with heavier ICE enforcement saw a drop in employment among immigrants, there was no increase in either employment or wages among U.S. citizens.

This is not a joke: New troop deployment ordered

THANK YOU to all those brave Antifa soldiers who stormed the beaches at Normandy 82 years ago in the fight against fascism

Senate passes Sen. Gu bill to modernize identity theft protection laws

Victoria's bill to protect consumers advances and, hopefully will pass before General Assembly adjourns

The Senate voted to approve legislation from Sen. Victoria Gu that aims to modernize cybersecurity laws to better protect the personally identifiable information of Rhode Islanders.

“In the wake of the RIBridges cyberattack, it’s important to set clear expectations that state agencies, municipalities and companies should be meeting current best practices of an industry-recognized cybersecurity framework, such as NIST Cybersecurity Framework, to protect the personally identifiable information of Rhode Islanders,” said Senator Gu (D-Dist. 38, Westerly, Charlestown, South Kingstown) who chairs the Senate Committee on Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies. “Our current laws governing the protection of this information need updating to match the reality of our increasingly digital world and its threats.”

The December 2024 breach of RIBridges, Rhode Island’s online portal for social services, affected around 650,000 people in total, releasing Social Security numbers, employment details, financial data and other personal information to the dark web. Senator Gu and Representative Carson saw this as a clear sign that Rhode Island needed to update its cybersecurity standards.

The bill (2026-S 2638Aaa) now goes the House, where Lauren H. Carson (D-Dist. 75, Newport) has introduced similar legislation (2026-H 7509).

URI researcher aids the fight against bird flu

Identifying data gaps in bird flu host dynamics to help conserve vulnerable species

Kristen Curry

Johanna Harvey, an assistant professor of wildlife disease wildlife ecology at the University of Rhode Island, has described bird flu in public presentations as a quiet virus with loud consequences.

Now she’s published a new paper in Wildlife Monographs, describing how circulating avian influenza viruses (HPAIV) show an expanded set of susceptible hosts, including many migratory wild birds, and higher transmission rates. In the paper, Harvey examines data gaps in avian influenza host dynamics to prioritize wildlife conservation — and protect human health.

Johanna Harvey’s new paper in Wildlife Monographs describes how circulating avian influenza viruses show an expanded set of susceptible hosts and higher transmission rates.

South County air is unhealthy today

Air Quality Forecast | Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management

This is one of the main reasons why our air quality has gotten so bad...

Wildfires are reversing America’s progress on ozone pollution, the main ingredient in smog

Weizhi Deng, University of Iowa; Jun Wang, University of Iowa, and Meng Zhou, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

For decades, the United States made steady progress in reducing surface ozone pollution, the main ingredient in smog. But that progress – achieved as vehicles, industries and power sources became cleaner – is increasingly being overshadowed by a different and growing source of ozone pollution: wildfires.

Our team of atmospheric and wildfire scientists analyzed wildfires’ contribution to surface ozone levels from 2003 to 2024 across the United States.

We found that the gases in wildfire smoke have reversed the national ozone trend, forcing a shift from declining ozone levels prior to 2015 to increasing ozone levels after 2015. We also found that the number of ozone-related premature deaths due to wildfires has been increasing by about 300 deaths per year since then.

Trump Official Tells Millions Kicked Off Food Aid That They’re ‘Moving Into the American Dream’

This is how Republicans dealt with the Great Depression

Jake Johnson for Common Dreams

The head of the US Agriculture Department celebrated that millions of people have lost federal nutrition assistance under the second Trump administration, declaring that families who have seen their modest aid disappear are closer to realizing “the American dream.”

Speaking at an event in Arizona, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins—who has an estimated net worth of around $15 million—said that the Trump administration has “moved about 4 million off of SNAP,” referring to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Rollins suggested, without evidence, that some of those who have lost SNAP benefits were receiving them fraudulently.

But others, claimed Rollins, are “moving into the American dream and off of welfare.”

Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), wrote in response that “unless the Trump administration has redefined ‘the American dream’ to mean ‘losing the help your family needs to afford groceries because of federal cuts,’ I have some bad news for Secretary Rollins.”

Watch Rollins’ remarks: https://twitter.com/i/status/2060055304423756173

Trump administration officials, including Donald Trump himself, have repeatedly used euphemistic language to describe the large-scale loss of food aid following passage of the Republican budget reconciliation package last summer. That measure contains $186 billion in SNAP cuts over the next decade—the largest in the program’s history.

During his State of the Union address in February, Trump boasted that his administration has “lifted” millions of Americans off SNAP, falsely suggesting that the mass loss of benefits was attributable to stronger economic conditions rather than deliberate policy changes designed to boot people from the program.

Presidential moments

Trump posts his plan to annex Iran.

Countries and territories that Trump has said should be taken by the US:

Canada
Greenland
Cuba
Venezuela
Panama
Gaza

And, speaking of Greenland, Trump also posted this: