Adjustments to State Aid to Providence

And we do not need to single out Providence for this treatment. Certainly the aid to any other municipality that has budgeted unreasonable expenditures should be adjusted accordingly.

But taxpayers from other cities and towns have no obligation to fund the extravagance, not to say folly, of public officials, whether past or current, whom they had no say in electing. Accordingly, I propose that, once the General Assembly settles on an amount - almost certain to be less than the $65,000,000 of FY2008 - of state aid to be given to Providence, the following sums should be deducted.

> Whatever the city pays out, above and beyond a reasonable baseline, for disability pensions which compound and, therefore, double every eleven years. Rough figures:

Assuming an average of $132,000 annually X 108 such retirees: $14,256,000

What the average should be ($60,000 annually?) X 108: $6,480,000

Amound to be deducted from state aid: $7,776,000

> The total number above the national average of disability pensions handed out in Providence during the bounteous early 1990's. It is extremely difficult to believe that 88% of all police and fire retirees during that period were truly disabled. [Amount to be calculated.]

- The total amount paid by the city to able bodied people receiving a disability pension. [Amount to be calculated.]

If Providence voters deemed it in their best interest, whether now or eighteen years ago, to elect officials who chose to be guided by a very loose definition of "disabled", the resultant cost of that decision must be for the exclusive account of Providence.

[All data from investigative reporter Tim White's excellent expose on WPRI 12 Eyewitness News.]