NEW: Raimondo Mentee Running for State Senate
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
A former EngageRI consultant who considers General Treasurer Gina Raimondo a mentor says she will challenge longtime State Senator Paul Jabour in a Democratic primary in District 5.
“I am running for State Senate because I think that the General Assembly needs new energy and new ideas,” Kelly said. “I believe that too many parents and students in Providence are dissatisfied with our public schools. Small businesses and working families in our district are struggling. Like many states and cities, we are in fiscal crisis. Providence needs strong advocates for our city at the statehouse. I have a passion to connect with constituents in my district and represent them in tackling these difficult issues in state government.
Records show Kelly, who has a Bachelor’s Degree from Notre Dame and a Master’s from Princeton, made $15,685 between October and December of 2011 as a consultant for EngageRI, the pro-pension reform group which supported Raimondo’s efforts to reform the state’s struggling pension system last year.
Despite their personal relationship, Kelly said she expects Raimondo to follow through on pledge made last year to support General Assembly members who voted in favor of pension reform. Jabour and all but two of his Senate colleagues voted in favor of the legislation.
“I consider the General Treasurer a personal friend and an inspiration for putting aside her professional life to go into public service,” Kelly said. “However I understand that I am in a competitive Democratic primary and I do not anticipate that she will endorse my candidacy.”
Kelly said her current focus is to earn the support of voters in her district.
“The support I care about most is from my neighbors in the 5th District,” Kelly said. “I will be happy to discuss my views and experience with Engage RI or any other group, and they can each decide to support me if they choose. Right now I am most focused on listening to concerns of the people in my district.”
Comments:
john paycheck
2:00pm on Tuesday, April 24, 2012
the senate needs some new faces....
dis gusted
6:37pm on Tuesday, April 24, 2012
so will this Engageri, RIDE employed woman recuse herself from voting on educational issues since it would be a conflict of interest?
Michael Trenn
10:17pm on Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Do union guys recuse when voting on union issues? No, they do not.
Providence Taxpayer
11:22pm on Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Umm. Maura Kelly has lived in District 5 and in RI for only 7 or 8 months. Before that she lived in Chicago. Maura has great "new energy," perhaps, but her "new ideas" are not her own.
She is a board member of RI-CAN, a corporate-funded nonprofit organization that is trying to impose corporate charter schools on citizens who don't want them. This organization represents corporate interests disguised as "education reform."
She is an employee of RIDE, hand-picked by the neo-liberals pushing a top-down ed reform agenda that flies in the face of what people really want and that is singlehandedly destroying democracy and equity nationwide.
She is a former EngageRI consultant who helped to pass pension reform which, needed or not, has changed the face of retirement for many union employees.
All 3 of these positions have agendas that are NOT mine or hers. She will not work for the citizens of District 5, she will work for corporate interests, and for the agenda of RI-CAN and Gist.
Guess who does work for the citizens of District 5? Senator Jabour. He is an independent thinker and has supported countless initiatives to improve our neighborhood, brought significant amounts of money into our District, fields calls about issues big and small. He is a tremendous and effective advocate for the interests of District 5 - tried and true! It offends me that this person thinks she knows our district. The fact that she is running proves to me how little she knows about her new neighborhood and those living in it.
BTW I'm not a teacher, not in a union, and not an old-school Federal Hill kind of a guy. I am what the old school people here view as a new blood, an import. In my 7 years I have Senator Jabour in action and he is the REAL DEAL.
Maura, not so much.
louis rizzo
11:31pm on Tuesday, April 24, 2012
GINA the manipulator..learning very quick to enunciate from left & speak from right...SHE'S A POLITICIAN....NOTHING LESS
guy smily
8:47am on Wednesday, April 25, 2012
This is news why? Oh, because she is a DEMOCRAT.
Blow Me
12:41pm on Wednesday, April 25, 2012
This is news because it is golocalprov.com not the Wall Street Journal.