Leadership experience key to results

PAYING FOR IT: Angel Taveras is the only Democrat running for governor who lists government spending cuts among the ways he would fund his spending priorities. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO
PAYING FOR IT: Angel Taveras is the only Democrat running for governor who lists government spending cuts among the ways he would fund his spending priorities. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO

(Editor’s note: This is the fourth in a series of articles focused on the 2014 gubernatorial candidates and their plans for economic development.)
At 43 years old and with one term as an elected official under his belt, Providence Mayor Angel Taveras might be an unlikely candidate to campaign on experience.
But in a Democratic gubernatorial primary field that includes among major candidates a one-term treasurer and political neophyte in his first bid for public office, Taveras’ backers believe his experience running Providence stands out.
In explaining his economic platform for the state, Taveras returns on most points to his three-and-a-half-year record in Providence for evidence of how he will carry out priorities he shares with his opponents better than they will.
“I have experience actually executing this on a local level,” Taveras said in a recent interview at Providence Business News on his economic plan, “whether it be the infrastructure bond we approved in Providence with support from 89 percent of voters, or putting permitting online and consolidating planning and development.”
And Taveras also takes on his primary opponents, especially General Treasurer Gina M. Raimondo, for not being specific enough about what they would do if elected, or how they would pay for it.
“I have details, and I at least attempt to explain how I would pay for them,” Taveras said. “Being a chief executive, I know the challenge of executing a lot of great ideas is how you make it happen. At the very least, as candidates we owe it to the public to at least give estimates.”
So what would Taveras do to improve Rhode Island’s sluggish economy if elected, and how much would it cost?
The lack of dollar estimates in Raimondo’s plan makes direct comparisons difficult, but Taveras’ plan appears more aggressive on total spending and comes out similar to the plan put out by Clay Pell.
The Taveras education, workforce-training and tourism proposals alone would add $32 million annually to the budget by the end of his first term. Annual debt service on a $100 million infrastructure bond would be about $8 million, though some of that would be offset from the interest paid by municipalities borrowing the money. Taveras’ signature proposal is to expand access to public-school pre-kindergarten classes, now offered to roughly 250 students in the state.
Starting in fiscal 2016, Taveras would boost pre-K spending from $2.4 million in the current budget to $6.5 million and then over the next three years to $24.6 million.
By fiscal 2019, the Taveras plan would have dedicated a combined $62 million to public pre-K and opened up slots for 2,650 students annually, making it available to an estimated 76 percent of the specific age group.
On a smaller scale, Taveras’ job-training program, which would pay for the Community College of Rhode Island to teach skills specifically sought by local employers, would ramp up to $2.2 million by fiscal 2019. Combined cost from fiscal 2016 to fiscal 2019 would be $4.4 million.
The Taveras workforce-training program would include slots for 2,000 people annually starting in fiscal 2019.
All three Democratic contenders have proposed job-training programs, with Raimondo also featuring CCRI and Pell focusing on internships, and reducing wait times for adult-education classes.
On tourism, Taveras’ plan is the most aggressive, calling for the state tourism division’s slim $500,000 annual budget to be boosted to $5 million.
All three Democrats would create a new state fund to finance infrastructure spending, especially road and bridge maintenance, through future borrowing.
Taveras would seed his Ocean State Infrastructure Trust with a $100 million bond and then supplement it with $40 million annually he believes can be saved by eliminating current government waste.
Raimondo would build on the existing Municipal Road and Bridge Revolving Fund she helped create last year through the R.I. Clean Water Finance Agency, but does not specify how much she would add.
Pell would issue two $100 million state bonds for his Rhode Island Infrastructure Rehabilitation and Replacement Program, one in fiscal 2017 and one in fiscal 2019. Both of those bonds, like those proposed by Taveras, would be subject to voter approval. The $40 million in savings going into Taveras’ Infrastructure Trust, like other funding streams for his proposals, are the more difficult parts of his plan to pin down.
While he follows a Democrat’s agenda, Taveras is the party’s only candidate who lists government spending cuts among the ways he would fund his spending priorities.
In fact, Taveras calls out two programs, temporary disability insurance and unemployment insurance, long targeted by Republican candidate Ken Block, as areas that may need to be reformed.
Pressed on whether he thinks fraud is currently a problem with either of those programs, Taveras is less specific.
“When I first became mayor, I said the right answer is never ‘This is the way it has always been.’ You often need a fresh set of eyes to question the way things have always been done,” Taveras said. “I look at these programs and say ‘Where can we save 3 percent or 5 percent? The whole state government is an area we need to examine top to bottom.”
Despite highlighting TDI and UI, Taveras does not accept the characterization of agreeing with Block, whom he accused of blaming the less fortunate for the state’s problems.
To pay for expanded pre-kindergarten, Taveras said he would repurpose some federal Title 1 funds for low-income students.
On workforce training, Taveras estimates his program would create 1,875 new jobs by fiscal 2020, which in turn would generate $2.5 million in additional tax revenue annually. Another economic downturn could throw off those assumptions.
For other savings, including some of the $40 million in the Infrastructure Trust, Taveras said he would look to better manage the state workforce to reduce overtime spending, as he did in Providence, and re-examine how the state services its vehicle fleet.
At least for the primary campaign Taveras, like the other Democrats, is steering clear of suggesting any new taxes to pay for his agenda and in general steers clear of any tax-policy prescriptions. “We need a comprehensive review of the tax system,” Taveras said. “The Republicans want to cut here and cut there and they don’t really tell you where they are going to make up the revenue or what they are going to do otherwise. I believe in a progressive tax system where those who make more pay more.”
If forced to pick one tax he would like to try to cut, Taveras offered the motor vehicle excise tax, but said any proposal would need to make up the lost revenue for cities and towns.
As Gov. Lincoln D. Chafee has discovered during his term in office, tax policy has been one of the most difficult areas to steer the General Assembly.
As mayor, Taveras has pushed development of a Providence streetcar system, but bumped up against the Chafee administration over the federal grant funding the plan would rely on. Chafee has prioritized highway projects and questioned the readiness of the streetcar plan.
As governor, Taveras would have much greater ability to put the streetcar on the path to funding, but has neither included it in his economic plan nor committed to pushing it as governor.
Taveras’ infrastructure plan, like the other transportation funds proposed by his Democratic opponents, is tailored to local projects like the streetcar, rather than major state highway and bridge repairs. The fund he proposes would make low-interest loans to local communities and offset some of the cost of the bond through those interest payments.
Like all of the other candidates in the race, Democrat and Republican, Taveras supported the decision to kill tolls on the Sakonnet River Bridge, which House and Senate leaders have promised to do in next year’s budget.
“We have enough user fees already, license fees, registration fees – the question is where does it end?” Taveras said. “I am not a big fan of tolling. The most expensive bridges are in Providence County. Are they going to be next?” •

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