News

The Rhode Island Senate has approved legislation that hikes the state’s minimum wage to $8 an hour.

When Rhode Island’s minimum wage jumped from to $7.40 to $7.75 on January 1st, it was the first raise the state had given minimum wage workers in five years. Now lawmakers are looking at bumping it up again to $8 an hour.

That would match Massachusetts’ minimum wage but come under Vermont’s at $8.60 an hour.

Lawyers for the defunct 38 Studios video game company were back in court Wednesday, asking a judge to dismiss a lawsuit brought against them by the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation. The suit alleges that executives of the defunct Curt Schilling enterprise deliberately misled state officials about the financial viability of the company to gain a $75 million state-backed loan. 

The state’s largest hospital network is making another attempt to trim nearly $150 million in expenses over the next two years. Lifespan has announced another round of layoffs.

Five days after the train derailment accident in Connecticut, Amtrak travelers at the Providence train station say they remain confident about train travel through Amtrak.  One traveler named Paul Murphy, who was headed to Washington DC, says he’s a veteran of train travel.

Dozens of bills have been introduced in the General Assembly this session that, if passed, could affect your health, your family's health, or the state's health care system.

On today's podcast, Brown University students speak to the Corporation about divesting from fossil fuels, and Education Commissioner Deborah Gist responds to her vocal critics.

Plus on This I Believe Rhode Island, a young woman muses on the ways in which we remember each other.

There’s a meaty agenda on tap this week at the State Board of Education. The group is scheduled to vote Thursday on a controversial proposal to allow police to carry guns on state college campuses. The board is also scheduled to vote on adopting new science standards and consider a contract extension for Education Commissioner Deborah Gist.

It’s hard not to be moved by the plight of Moore, Oklahoma which was hit by a catastrophic tornado Monday.  Hundreds of buildings were flattened and at least 24 people, including nine children, were killed.

Experts say New England is less likely to be hit by a tornado than anywhere else east of the Rocky Mountains.  New England averages eight tornadoes a year, but they tend to be weak events – on the scale of EF0 or EF1.  The storm that hit Moore, Oklahoma has been categorized an EF5.

A student-led protest group at Brown University will attend the Corporation’s annual meeting Thursday to answer questions about climate change.  The group wants the university to divest from fossil fuel companies.

Moderate Party founder Ken Block has announced that he’ll be a candidate for governor next year. Block calls himself a problem-solver who can move the state forward.

Block thinks he can significantly improve on his showing in 2010, when he got six and a half percent of the vote for governor. He says he’s running because Rhode Island’s problems are abundantly clear.