In Your Neighborhood
Elections have consequences
The importance of being earnest when you vote
Photo by Richard Asinof
Mayor Brett Smiley
By Richard Asinof
Posted 7/20/26
A cold call using voting lists leads to an interview with Mayor Brett Smiley, who is running for re-election against challenger state Rep. David Morales.
What is the likelihood that some form of rent control or stabilization will be enacted by the Providence City Council by a veto-proof margin? How important will the turnout in South Providence prove to the election’s outcome? Is Providence on the cusp of a realignment of political forces?
One of the ongoing issues in regard to the future health of the health care delivery system in Rhode Island is the financial health of federally qualified community health centers. Dr. Andrew Saal, the former chief medical officer of the Providence Community Health Centers, recently gave a national presentation about the future of community health centers. See link to slide show below. It is a thoughtful approach to the future of community health centers.
PROVIDENCE — Imagine the scene: It is the middle of March in 1993, and Providence Mayor Buddy Cianci is holding court — and the microphone — standing on stage at the Trinity Repertory Theatre.
The event is the annual meeting of United Way of Southern New England, and Cianci is serving as the emcee, introducing the new President of United Way of America, Elaine Chao, who is making her first visit to Providence in her new capacity.
Chao had succeeded a corrupt William Aramony, who was to be charged and convicted of federal financial crimes — allegedly for traveling with his mistresses and staying at high-priced hotels, all on the United Way’s tab. (He had the onus of publishing a book that preceded his downfall: “United Way: The Next 100 years.”)
Cianci was more than a little bit “lit." In his speech welcoming Chao, he slurs the 1976 lyrics from Tom Waits about the Kentucky Derby being home to “fast women and slow horses.” He repeats the line, to make sure that President Chao gets the reference. She smiles and nods her head, appreciatively. Chao is no doubt familiar with the strong effects of Kentucky bourbon, if not Tom Waits’ lyrics.
Mayor Cianci had also been tasked with presenting the inaugural award recognizing a labor leader. He calls out the name on the award, asking that the person come collect his “trophy.”
Unfortunately, because Cianci has refused to be briefed and is feeling no pain, he ad libs. When the person in whose name the award is being given doesn’t appear on stage, after Cianci asks him to step forward for a third time, Cianci says something like: “Well, if he couldn’t show up to collect his own award…”
Someone jumps up and stage whispers that the person is dead and his wife is there to receive the award. There is an awkward moment of dead air as a number of trucks roar through the script.
Today, Elaine Chao is better known as the dutiful wife of Sen. Mitch McConnell, as rumors swirl about whether or not Sen. McConnell is still alive. The Governor of Kentucky has apparently asked for a video to be produced showing “proof of life” that McConnell is still breathing.
Fast forward 33 years to 2026; the phone rings last week and it is Providence Mayor Brett Smiley calling me up; he is cold-calling potential voters. We chat briefly and I ask if we can set up a time for an interview; Smiley agrees.
In my head the lyrics from an old Bob Dylan song keep playing in my head:
“The telephone is ringing;
it would not stop.
It’s President Kennedy calling me up.
“My friend Bob,
what do we need
to make the country grow?
I said: “My friend John,
Sophia Loren,
Anita Ekberg, Brigitte Bardot;
put them all in a room
with Ernest Borgnine;
country will grow…”
Mining the voting lists
On Wednesday morning, Mayor Brett Smiley calls me up, as promised.
SMILEY: Hi, there, Richard!
ConvergenceRI: Hello, Mayor. How are you?
SMILEY: I’m fine. How are you today?
ConvergenceRI: I’m surviving, which is always a good thing. And I’m delighted to have an opportunity to chat with you.
SMILEY: Me, too.
ConvergenceRI: I consider it serendipity that somehow I made it onto your list as you were cold-calling voters the other day.
SMILEY: It’s not just serendipity; it’s also a testament to how good a voter you are. That means that you are a regular voter, which we appreciate.
ConvergenceRI: I try to do my duty. Voting is a sacred trust that people have with our government. Let me ask you: What messaging seems to resonate with voters in this election?
SMILEY: I think there are a couple of pressing concerns for our city and for our residents. First, obviously, everyone is concerned about affordability. And, I find that with a household's budget, it doesn’t matter where the pain points are. It's whether the ends meet at the end of the month.
I hear concerns about the cost of groceries and the cost of gas. That’s not something the city can do a lot about.
But the cost of housing is something that we can do something about. And, so, I find myself talking to voters a lot about our strategies to bring down housing costs in the city and to offer assistance.
Similarly, most residents have concerns about the state of affairs around public schools and the quality of education that their kids are receiving.
And, I take heart in this; I find residents concerned about the schools even if they don’t have kids in the schools, because they know how important it is to our community and to the health and success of our community.
And, it is sort of foundational, but everyone wants to feel safe in their home. And so, public safety issues come up regularly.
And, that is everything from violence to quality of life issues, things like loud music and loud vehicles — and then everything in between.
So, those are really the big areas that I hear from voters on and the things I try to stay focused on.
ConvergenceRI: When it comes to a sense of safety in our community, do you think that the shooting that occurred in December reset the community’s and the neighbors’ concerns about safety?
SMILEY: It certainly was shocking to all of us. You know, I think, intellectually, probably people understood that some of these mass shootings could happen anywhere, but we still never felt that it would happen here.
Most people think of Providence and Rhode Island as a safe place. And, to date, we had never had something like that occur. It shook us, in a real and meaningful way. And, in that sense, I suppose, it shook people’s sense of safety.
Now, six months or so on the other side of this, I also think people were proud of their city and proud of their police department for how they responded and how they were able to show who we are on the national and even international stage in that moment.
ConvergenceRI: How would you define the concept of “neighborhood “ in Providence?
SMILEY: Neighborhood is one of the components of identity, I think, for our residents. People know what neighborhood they live in; they are proud of that.
These are certainly universal themes citywide. But there are also unique chacteristics, or traits, to our individual neighborhoods. And so, I think people take a certain pride in that.
Whether it is the heart of the Dominican community, or an original spot for Italian Americans, or Cape Verdeans in Fox Point. There is a sense of history and a sense of pride. But there is also a sense of community that comes with that neighborhood. I think one of the things that makes Providence different than many other places is that people know their neighbors, and that there is a sense that we look out for one another. I was recently listening to a clip online of a New Yorker, saying how she didn’t know her neighbors; she didn’t want to know her neighbors. All she wants is to make a respectful head nod in the hallway and that’s it.
That’s not Providence; Providence is quite the opposite. Where we are pretty close knit, even with a lot of new people, we are pretty close knit. We look out for one another; we know one another. And, in many cases, we have connections with one another. And, I think that is part of what makes this place special.
ConvergenceRI: In terms of the challenges ahead, now that the city is going to be taking over control of the schools, what do you see as the biggest challenges with the city reasserting itself in terms of control of the public school system in Providence?
SMILEY: We have been preparing for this for at least two years. And so, we have a detailed plan on how that reintegration is going to happen. And so, I am not too worried about how that is going to go.
But, it has been seven years of a totally different governing structure, of a different reporting structure. And, because it was run by the state, one that was a little bit less connected to parents and families in the city.
One of the things that I am most excited about now is that parents have local officials who are accountable to them — the mayor, their city council person, and the school board member — half of whom are now elected.
We are much better and much more closely connected to those families, to our families, and so, we hope to be able to incorporate their feedback and experiences a little bit better into what is happening in the classroom and in the school building.
I also know that there are some challenging days ahead. The district is experiencing declining enrollment; which will mean decreased funding.
And so, we are going to have to problem solve in the years to come how to continue to provide the resources necessary for us to succeed.
And, it’s good that we brought the schools back under community control for when that happens. Because it’s the city doing more, or the state doing more, there are hard choices that are going to need to be made, we can make those choices now in conjunction with our school board and with our families, so that it is not decisions being made by a state bureaucrat who is not accountable to the community.
ConvergenceRI: Do you think the plan offered by the Rhode Island Foundation for public financing of the schools is a good step forward?
SMILEY: Absolutely. I think the Foundation did an excellent job of convening a broad group of stakeholders and coming up with recommendations. And, as like any compromise, not everyone loved every piece of it. But everyone bought into the whole package.
And, that to me is good work. And, that is an important step forward, not just for Providence but for the whole state. We have a school funding formula that is unique in the country. And that is not an area where uniqueness is an asset.
Uniqueness means that everyone else is doing this in a more logical, rational, and sustainable way, and we need to catch up.
I hope the Legislature takes action next year in the upcoming session. And, I think the Foundation and its proponents knew that this might be a multi-year effort. And the city is certainly a vocal advocate for it this year: we will definitely do the same next year.
ConvergenceRI: Do you think that people are responsive to the demands that more money needs to be spent on the schools? And, a sense that it is unclear where that money will come from?
SMILEY: Yes, I think that generally, there has been support for increased funding. And, to be fair, both the city and the state have increased funding. But, what I hear from parents — and from business leaders and others — is they also want improved results in conjunction with more funding. So, it’s not just about the dollar amount; it is about accountability. And, there are accountability components built into the Rhode Island Foundation’s proposal.
Which, I think, would be very helpful for progress, once again, because it is a statewide proposal, not just in Providence, but statewide.
ConvergenceRI: Do you have particular metrics that you think are important, setting the benchmarks, moving forward?
SMILEY: There are quite a few metrics that are important. During the state takeover, we had a thing called the “turnaround plan,” referred to as the “TAP.”
And, the “TAP” had a couple dozen metrics that are all good and meaningful and good ways to measure progress in a real, accountable way.
And so, we support those metrics. We need to focus in on a couple of key places. Third-grade reading proficiency is a critical metric. Up until third grade, students are learning to read. After third grade, students are reading to learn.
And so, if you are not proficient in reading by third grade, you are never going to be able to catch up for the rest of your time in school. So, I think that is a key metric.
(Editor’s Note: The direct connection between childhood lead poisoning and the deficiencies in third-grade reading proficiency — as well as increased behavioral problems — point to the importance of addressing lead as key health metric.)
I think it is also important to continue to test progress at the high school level, and PSAT and SAT performance matters.
The Governor was right to focus on attendance. Attendance matters. If students are not in the classroom, they are not learning. It is not any more complicated than that.
Attendance fell precipitously during the pandemic and we are still building back from that.
A quotient of nastiness
With primary day on Sept. 9 rapidly approaching, the tone of the campaign between Mayor Brett Smiley and challenger state Rep. David Morales has turned rather vicious and nasty.
A recent mailer by the Smiley campaign repeated charges that Morales was seeking to defund the police, claiming that Morales “won’t keep our city safe.” The mailer continued: “We just can’t trust ‘defunding David’ to keep us safe.
In turn, the Morales campaign claimed that the skin tone used in photographs of Morales depicted him with skin tones that were much darker than in reality.
The outcome will no doubt turn on turn out: which candidate can mobilize their voters to get to the polls on primary day.
For ConvergenceRI, the opportunity to interview Mayor Smiley was too good not to take him up on his offer to chat. If only all candidates were that accessible.
