Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 24

Monday, August 17, 2015

H. Philip West Jr.

Between 1986 and 2006, Rhode Island ran a gauntlet of scandals that exposed corruption and aroused public rage. Protesters marched on the State House. Coalitions formed to fight for systemic changes. Under intense public pressure, lawmakers enacted historic laws and allowed voters to amend defects in the state’s constitution.

Since colonial times, the legislature had controlled state government. Governors were barred from making many executive appointments, and judges could never forget that on a single day in 1935 the General Assembly sacked the entire Supreme Court.

Without constitutional checks and balances, citizens suffered under single party control. Republicans ruled during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; Democrats held sway from the 1930s into the twenty-first century. In their eras of unchecked control, both parties became corrupt.

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H Philip West's SECRETS & SCANDALS tells the inside story of events that shook Rhode Island’s culture of corruption, gave birth to the nation’s strongest ethics commission, and finally brought separation of powers in 2004. No single leader, no political party, no organization could have converted betrayals of public trust into historic reforms. But when citizen coalitions worked with dedicated public officials to address systemic failures, government changed.

Three times—in 2002, 2008, and 2013—Chicago’s Better Government Association has scored state laws that promote integrity, accountability, and government transparency. In 50-state rankings, Rhode Island ranked second twice and first in 2013—largely because of reforms reported in SECRETS & SCANDALS.

Each week, GoLocalProv will be running a chapter from SECRETS & SCANDALS: Reforming Rhode Island, 1986-2006, which chronicles major government reforms that took place during H. Philip West's years as executive director of Common Cause of Rhode Island. The book is available from the local bookstores found HERE.

Part 2
JUDGES AND LAWMAKERS
24 

Electronic Access (1993–94) 

In 1993, I received one of ten Macintosh laptops in a nationwide Apple Computer contest. In a row of ports along the computer’s spine I recognized a telephone receptacle. I plugged in a phone cord but had no idea what to do next. 

Michael C. Cerullo, a member of our board, laughed. “You can’t just plug in and use it like a phone,” he said. He searched through my software and punched in a series of numbers. This time, I heard a dial tone and what started like a ring but turned into a fax-like squawk. “You’ll love this,” he enthused. “You’ll be able to connect with computer libraries and send electronic mail. The World Wide Web will change your life.” 

Cerullo had been helping to create the Ocean State Free-Net, a system that would allow computers to connect through ordinary phone lines. We hoped the Free-Net would open vast mines of government data to ordinary citizens. As part of this task he had pulled together what we called the telecommunications committee, people from universities and tech companies. Members shared an infectious excitement about getting government documents. We knew that legislative leaders had instant access to computerized drafts of bills and committee schedules, and our goal was to open those data deposits to ordinary citizens. 

Most mornings throughout legislative sessions I went to the State House, notebook in hand, to gather data from printouts: agendas posted late at night on bulletin boards outside the library and on the doors of committee rooms. I often met junior employees of law firms on the same quest. We searched for the printed bills heaped up on industrial shelving in a musty basement room, but those we found were often days or weeks out of date. 

Since before the RISDIC collapse, leaders of various reform groups had made polite requests for public terminals at the State House where ordinary citizens could gain access to the electronic legislative data. General Assembly leaders always maintained that it could not be done. “Hackers would get into our mainframe,” Jeff Teitz had told me. “They’d destroy the legislature’s data, and we can’t risk that.” 

Our committee intended to crack that nut. One afternoon in October 1993, Cerullo triumphantly described a new technology from Silicon Valley. “It’s called a firewall,” he announced. “They download data onto a firewall computer that’s connected to a phone line. There’s no link back into the mainframe. Anybody with a computer can dial in and download documents. Hackers can’t get back into the original data.” He had learned about a system installed only months earlier in the California legislature. 

I stepped into another room and phoned California Common Cause. “That’s right,” said my counterpart in Sacramento. “We wrote the bill that made them put it all online. Would you like me to fax it?” Fifteen minutes later, we were drafting Rhode Island legislation based on the California model. Our bill would require the General Assembly to make all of its bills, committee calendars, House and Senate journals, and the state’s General Laws accessible via telephone lines. 

With shoulder-length hair, bow tie, and geeky glasses, Kevin Grau brought political savvy and technical expertise to the committee. “We’ll need to keep reminding legislators that we’re not asking for any new disclosures,” he said. “They already publish all those data on paper. We’re just asking for the same materials in electronic formats.” 

“Which they already have on their mainframe,” Cerullo added.

“What will it cost?” someone asked. “Do we know?”

“Only ballpark,” Cerullo said. “The actual firewall computer would be way less than twenty thousand dollars. The real costs would be for a distributed network of PCs, storage units, and software. Installation and training would add more. There’s no way to know how much more till they bring in a consultant to analyze what they already have.” 

Grau added that legislative leaders knew their old IBM mainframe was obsolete. “That they’ve kept it operational without a catastrophic crash is testimony to skilled staff, but everybody knows they’re overdue for a new system.” 

I asked if the General Assembly could charge for the data. 

“They might try,” Cerullo said, “but we would stand on the principle that citizens have already paid for this information. Taxpayers paid to compile the legislative data and maintain it. It belongs to the people.” 

“And there’s an analogy,” Grau added. “They already provide television feeds of legislative sessions to cable subscribers without charge. Computer access only expands that paradigm to the release of digital data.” 

No one knew how soon any of this could be done, but we prepared a draft for the board and legislative sponsors. 

 

During five years of lobbying at the State House I had learned vital lessons about sponsors. We needed legislators who would stake their reputations on challenging the status quo. Those who sponsored our bill for online access to legislative data would need to expose problems with the General Assembly’s old mainframe and defend the costs of a new system. 

I approached the chairs of the two finance committees, Sen. J. Michael Lenihan and Rep. Antonio J. Pires. As the House prepared the state budget, House Finance logged more hours under greater pressure than any other legislative committee. Tony Pires had large brown eyes and an earnest expression. He engaged all kinds of witnesses with gracious respect. On a walk with him from his committee to the House chamber, I outlined our proposal and he asked me to schedule an appointment at his office on the third floor. The next day he waved me to a chair by his desk. “You’re right that we need to retire our cranky old mainframe,” he chuckled. “I’ve never actually seen the thing, but it’s ancient. I don’t know how you’ve learned so many of its secrets.” 

I told him members of our committee had done the research. “They tell me we’re at the dawn of a whole new approach to interconnected computing,” I said. “Most of it’s above my pay grade.” 

“Mine, too,” Pires laughed. “I can just about log onto my own PC. I got a modem but haven’t figured out how to use it yet.” 

I said I was just learning. I pulled out my new Macintosh laptop. “Here’s the port for a phone-line. The modem’s built-in.” 

“And isn’t your Blue Ribbon Commission recommending that we get laptops for each member of the House and Senate?” 

“We are,” I said, “but this legislation only deals with access to legislative data.” I explained how a firewall computer had allowed California’s legislature to release electronic data to its members and the public while protecting against hackers. 

He liked the idea. “Our clerks already order bills and committee calendars printed every day. I assume you’re saying we could dump those same data into a firewall computer.” 

I nodded. “People could retrieve the data from any computer connected to a phone line — whether in their homes, offices, or local libraries. It would save countless hours and deliver reliable data.” 

“And if we bought laptops for reps and senators, would we need to order them with special online capacity?” 

“Built-in modems are becoming standard equipment,” I said. 

He reviewed our draft and said he would be glad to sponsor it. “I’ll have to get a fiscal note on what the costs would be. In all candor, cost may not be the primary obstacle.” 

“You mean there’s other resistance.” 

“I want to hope there’s not,” he shrugged. “I see this as a genuinely democratic technology. But we’ve both been around long enough to know that even the least controversial changes can take years.” 

A close ally of Senate Majority Leader Paul S. Kelly, Sen. J. Michael Lenihan of East Greenwich had become chair of the powerful Senate Finance Committee at the start of only his second term. He drew me from his committee room through a tall oak door into his office. As with the House Judiciary office, the ceiling looked higher than the room was wide. Lenihan needed no convincing to sponsor our online access bill. “We’re committed to opening up the process in every way that’s technologically feasible,” he said. “I have no idea whether this firewall technology you describe is compatible with the Assembly’s old mainframe, but I’ll find out and get back to you.” 

On his desk lay a two-by-four with letters painted in broad green strokes: VOTER. Lenihan had carried it into the Senate chamber during the RISDIC crisis and lifted it high for all to read — a symbolic warning, as he told his colleagues. He brought it down on his desk with a whack that reverberated like a gunshot. With Bevilacqua’s majority swept away in the 1992 election, Lenihan now bore the weight of leadership, and no one who sat across his desk could forget the message of his two-by-four. 

No one quarreled with the need to get legislative data online. The Blue Ribbon Commission had recommended that legislators and members of the public be given access to the General Assembly’s database. In the 1994 legislative session Pires and Lenihan sponsored identical bills to ensure online access to the proceedings of the General Assembly. They told reporters that online access to legislative data — bills, amended bills, committee agendas, calendars, journals, and the Rhode Island General Laws — was a top priority. 

In committee hearings no one testified against his legislation, but Lenihan told me privately that the publisher of Rhode Island’s emerald-green law books was determined to kill the bill unless his committee deleted the requirement that the General Laws become available electronically. The printed version was a significant source of income, since law firms across the state and libraries across the country purchased each biennial set for over $2,000. 

As Pires adjourned a hearing of the House Finance Committee, he waved me to the dais. “The publisher’s making the case,” he said, one hand covering his microphone, “that electronic versions will undercut the printed versions of the General Laws. They say it won’t be worth their while to publish.” 

“That’s a huge carve-out,” I said. “What can we do?” 

Pires pursed his lips. “They’re making their case directly to John Harwood and George Caruolo. I’m trying to persuade them. Maybe you should do the same.” 

The next afternoon, I waited in a red-carpeted House aisle while George Caruolo dealt with representatives. The majority leader was visibly weary and irritated, but I had to talk with him or risk not getting another chance. Finally, I shook his hand and mentioned Pires’s electronic public access bill. 

“Jesus H. Christ,” Caruolo roared. “Look how much you get if we move this bill — even without putting the General Laws online!” His jaw clenched. “If you think I’m going to make all this available for free to those bastards at Edwards & Angell, you are out of your fucking mind! They can pay.” 

His vehemence jolted me, but I forced a smile. “Of course they could pay, and maybe you could find a way to put a meter on legislative data. But you created it in electronic form at taxpayer expense. How can you provide it free for lawmakers and the public, but then turn on a meter for downtown law firms? And in technical terms, how would you do that?” 

Caruolo scowled. “Have you talked with Kilmartin?” Michael Kilmartin was the executive director of the Office of Legislative Data Systems. 

“Several times,” I said. “He sees other states starting to put their legislative data online.” 

Kilmartin and his staff occupied a warren of tiny offices in the northwest corner of the State House basement. A raised floor left room for bundles of cables that connected PCs to mainframe terminals. Banks of bulky units occupied closets and entire rooms. Relentlessly cheerful, Kilmartin spoke candidly about technical problems but never revealed political secrets. His electronic lair operated under the aegis of the Joint Committee on Legislative Services, a powerful but little known administrative body called by its initials, JCLS. It was made up of five members: the speaker of the House, the majority and minority leaders of the House, and the majority and minority leaders of the Senate. 

Our bill assigned responsibility for online disclosure to the JCLS. Kilmartin and I worked through the latest draft. “We still have a technical problem,” he said. “We can’t mount all the data as quickly as your legislation requires. I’d feel better if we could say we would make the information ‘incrementally accessible,’ as we install and configure new equipment.” 

I suggested that the text read “as quickly as possible.” 

“How about ‘in a timely manner on a current basis’?” he countered. “I think we can get some items online for next year’s session, but I wouldn’t want a date certain in the law until we know.” 

We agreed to that wording. Farther down, we finalized new language that would make available the original bills, substitute versions, and final texts of every bill enacted. “I actually think that will help us in the future,” Kilmartin said. “I can envision a time when we stop passing out reams of paper and let senators and reps read legislation on their laptops.” 

I asked if he had any insight on the resistance from West Publishing, which produced the green-bound editions of the Rhode Island General Laws.

“I don’t,” Kilmartin said. “I understand they’re afraid of losing sales. The truth is we can’t possibly publish the legislative history that they present for each section. I really don’t think we would undercut their market.” 

We marked up what would become Substitute A/3 of the legislation. Kilmartin agreed to review our revisions with Caruolo while I cleared them with Mike Lenihan, Tony Pires, and the Common Cause committee. 

A few days later, I sat on a bench behind members of the Senate Finance Committee while Lenihan explained his bill to them. All were weary and eager for the session to end. Few seemed enthusiastic about anything, but they voted unanimously to move the bill to the Senate floor. Passage would benefit many, a win-win for all but the publishers of green law books. 

Support for online access came from unexpected voices. Rep. Eileen Naughton, a former librarian, told reporters that she had begun doing legislative research from her home computer. “If you know how to search, there’s a huge amount of information available. But when I go to the State House, I go into the Dark Ages.” 

 

Several years earlier I often welcomed help in getting legislative data, but never recognized the risk I was taking. My mistake became clear on a bright day as I walked toward the State House. A red Mitsubishi sports car slowed to a stop, and its window buzzed down. A young woman at the wheel called a cheery greeting. 

I waved and said I remembered her face but not her name. She reminded me, then added, “My uncle says hello.” 

“Oh? Who’s your uncle?”

“John Bevilacqua.” 

I caught my breath. “How is he?” 

“Fine,” she said with a grin. We chatted briefly, and she drove away, her hot red car disappearing in traffic. 

I continued toward the State House, remembering an unusual call I had received from an alternative high school before the RISDIC crisis. A guidance counselor at School One said a student had asked about an internship with Common Cause. Melissa Menard had come for an interview, and I put her to work a few hours a week answering the phone, searching agendas at the State House, finding copies of legislation, and maintaining a database. Each week we met to discuss her work, and she asked good questions. She had never mentioned — and I never guessed — that her uncle was the powerful Senate majority leader. She never had our office key and would not have found much to report. Had she been sent as a spy? Was her uncle trying to get names of people who called Common Cause? Some impropriety to discredit me?

 

The SubA/3 of Sen. Mike Lenihan’s bill appeared on the Senate’s calendar for June 30. Exhausted senators droned through until its number appeared on the electronic board. Lenihan rose, a copy in hand. He explained that senators and the public would soon find vast amounts of legislative data at their fingertips. His colleagues hit their green buttons, and the tote board registered 38–0. Moments later a motion of unanimous consent dispatched a load of bills across to the House. 

The humidity was thick enough to be visible in the House chamber. I watched from the gallery as Tony Pires explained the bill and offered to answer any questions. As in the Senate, the board lit up with rows of green lights, 81–0. 

From a coin phone in the basement, I called Mike Cerullo to congratulate him and added that I could not remember any of our bills passing in its first year. “It’s also our first to win unanimous passage in both chambers.” 

“Thank Jim Warren for creating the firewall,” Cerullo replied. “Without that technology, you never know how long this would have taken.” 

 

H. Philip West Jr. served from 1988 to 2006 as executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island. SECRETS & SCANDALS: Reforming Rhode Island, 1986-2006, chronicles major government reforms during those years.

He helped organize coalitions that led in passage of dozens of ethics and open government laws and five major amendments to the Rhode Island Constitution, including the 2004 Separation of Powers Amendment.

West hosted many delegations from the U.S. State Department’s International Visitor Leadership Program that came to learn about ethics and separation of powers. In 2000, he addressed a conference on government ethics laws in Tver, Russia. After retiring from Common Cause, he taught Ethics in Public Administration to graduate students at the University of Rhode Island.

Previously, West served as pastor of United Methodist churches and ran a settlement house on the Bowery in New York City. He helped with the delivery of medicines to victims of the South African-sponsored civil war in Mozambique and later assisted people displaced by Liberia’s civil war. He has been involved in developing affordable housing, day care centers, and other community services in New York, Connecticut, and Rhode Island.

West graduated, Phi Beta Kappa, from Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., received his masters degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and published biblical research he completed at Cambridge University in England. In 2007, he received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Rhode Island College.

Since 1965 he has been married to Anne Grant, an Emmy Award-winning writer, a nonprofit executive, and retired United Methodist pastor. They live in Providence and have two grown sons, including cover illustrator Lars Grant-West. 

This electronic version of SECRETS & SCANDALS: Reforming Rhode Island, 1986-2006 omits notes, which fill 92 pages in the printed text.

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Related Slideshow: Rhode Island’s History of Political Corruption

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• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter One
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Two
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Three
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Four
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Five
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Six
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Seven
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Eight
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Nine
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Nine
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Ten
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Eleven
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Twelve
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Thirteen
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter Fourteen
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 15
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 16
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 17
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• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 20
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 21
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 22
• Secrets and Scandals - Reforming Rhode Island 1986-2006, Chapter 23

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