Environmental Council of Rhode Island issues biennial legislative scorecard.
By Will Collette
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| Morgan and Filippi photo op shows where they stand on the environment |
You can read the full report to understand ECRI's ranking criteria. They used a broad range of energy and environmental legislation and ranked legislators based on only on their votes, but whether they sponsored or co-sponsored legislation.
For example, Sen. Sue Sosnowski of South Kingstown received several credits in the report for her frequent leadership on environmental legislation. Others singled out for praise were Rep. Deb Ruggiero who is running in the September 13 Democratic primary for Lieutenant General, and Reps. Teresa Tanzi and Carol Hagan McEntee, and Sens. Bridget Valverde and Alana DiMario, all of South Kingstown.
By contrast, Charlestown's General Assembly delegation were among the very worst. Sen. Elaine Morgan ranked LAST in 37th place. Retiring Sen. Dennis Algiere eked out a 31st place finish in his final year in the state Senate.
Rep. Blake "Flip" Filippi, who is also retiring, came in near the very bottom in the House rankings, just one slot above the embarrassing right-wing nut Rep. Justin Price (R-Richmond) who tied for 4th from the bottom.
The Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA) continually points to the recent Community Survey done in the town and the top ranking given to the environment by respondents. Yet Charlestown has been represented in the General Assembly for the past eight years by perhaps the worst bunch of anti-environmental senators and representatives of any town in the state.
Throughout those eight years, the CCA has supported them all! And admit it: you only trot out cherry-picked parts of the survey when it supports your agenda of making irresponsible bad land deals.
Here are the complete ECRI rankings tables:
