PROVIDENCE – Picture the scene: Pastors and rabbis on one side of the Rhode Island State House praying for Senate passage of the assault weapons ban .
Tenant advocates on the other side denouncing legislative efforts to, as they see it, gut the lead reporting requirements in the state's "Rental Registry."
And advocates for homeless Rhode Islanders, in their turn on the front steps, pleading for more shelter money in the state budget headed for a House vote on June 17.
In a sure sign that the end of the 2025 legislative session is near, advocacy groups clamoring for attention for what they consider the best and worst bills of the year rallied on June 12 at the capitol.
Assault weapons ban
The campaign to bring the assault weapons ban to a Senate vote played out in two venues.
In the Senate, Sen. Pamela Lauria asked Senate President Valarie Lawson to transfer the House-passed ban from the Senate Judiciary Committee, where Lawson sent it on June 11, to the Senate Finance Committee, where it is believed to have a better chance of passage.
Though Lawson is a co-sponsor of the Senate version of the bill, she ruled Lauria's request out of order for reasons that were not fully clear.
Former Senate Majority Leader Ryan Pearson appealed Lawson's ruling, citing the Senate's own "Rule 7.9," which says:
"Any senator may object to the committee assignment for any transmittal received during the previous legislative day. Upon objection being made, the presiding officer shall assign the transmittal to the committee requested by the senator making the objection," unless another senator objects. In that case, "the presiding officer shall call for a vote of the Senate on any motion for assignment."
That didn't happen.
What happened instead was a vote to uphold Lawson's ruling, which passed 20-17, after Senate Republican Leader Jessica de la Cruz argued that another rule requires all bills involving the "penal code" go to Judiciary.
Beneath the process and drama is the fact that the Senate president did not take an action that would undoubtedly have made it easier to pass a bill co-sponsored by a majority in the Senate, which she says she supports.
Before that happened, faith leaders gathered outside the Rhode Island State House to implore the Senate to pass the assault weapons ban.
"As religious leaders, we are in the business of life," said the Rev. Jamie Washam of the First Baptist Church in America . "We [also] sit with people mourning loved ones."
"So much suffering is beyond our control, but suffering due to gun violence is within our power to curb. This is preventable grief," she said. "Shame on us if we do not do everything in our power to safeguard life and our freedom to live without the fear" of being gunned down by an assault weapon.
"We don't have to wait for God's help to make a difference. We could do it ourselves by passing this bill," echoed Rabbi Howard Voss-Altman of Temple Habonim in Barrington, after recounting the death, in a mass shooting on July 4, 2022, of his daughter's preschool teacher in Highland Park, Chicago .
"She was murdered because she went to watch a parade, a small-town parade, a Fourth of July parade," the rabbi said.
Lead-safe apartment registry
At the same time, the Childhood Lead Action Project and Reclaim RI held their own rally to draw attention to multiple bills introduced this year to "weaken and delay" the lead-safe apartment registry law by limiting the law to pre-1978 construction.
A Journal analysis in March found the compliance of property-owning lawmakers was spotty . Rep. Stephen Casey, the lead sponsor of one of the bills to roll back the law, was among them. He told The Journal in March that neither property he owned was registered because he was still waiting for a lead inspector to send him a certificate.
"I had a difficult time finding someone, and then it was about a three-month to four-month wait," Casey said about getting the inspection.
Backed by tenants-rights advocates, DeeAnn Guo, an organizer with Childhood Lead Action Project , urged lawmakers on June 12 not to pass legislation she said would gut the state's rental apartment registry.
The bills, from Sen. Peter Appollonio and Casey, would exempt properties built after 1978 from the statewide apartment registry, relieve those who do have to register from providing a home address, and delete the rule that bars landlords from evicting tenants from apartments that do not comply with the lead law.
Guo said mandatory apartment registration is the best tool the state has to get the number of children poisoned by lead "down to zero."
"More lead certificates means more lead-safe homes, and more lead-safe means less lead exposure for young children," she said. "So first and foremost, this is a safety measure. If there had been no rental registry, many landlords would not have had a reason to get their inspections."
Homeless shelter beds
Sen. Tiara Mack of Providence was among the leaders of a rally calling on legislators to put more money in the proposed 2025-26 budget to avoid the loss of shelter beds, including a boost in the real estate conveyance tax for properties valued at more than $800,000.
Legislative leaders have spelled out new revenue streams to pay for shelter beds in the future.
Mack, D-Providence, said an additional $17.3 million is needed to sustain the current number of shelter beds, but the proposed budget only earmarks $4 million in new dollars to shelter beds.
"We've known for years that we were using one-time [money for the] shelter system. We expanded beds, which was great in 2023 and '24. ... We stabilized them last year. ... And now we're going to cut back?" she asked rhetorically.
She said the shelter system is not getting the money it needs. "Our hospital system [is] not getting the money that they need. ... It doesn't feel like many folks are fighting for the resources that we know we're going to need," said Mack, a backer of a long-sought income tax hike for high-earners known as the "millionaires tax."
Other developments on June 12
- Without a financial analysis from the state's Department of Labor and Training, the Senate passed a bill sponsored by Lawson to increase benefits and the duration of paid time off under the state's Temporary Caregivers Insurance program for new mothers and others caring for ailing relatives from seven weeks now to 12 weeks by 2028.
- The House and Senate each passed their own version of a bill to allow the fire-damaged Matunuck Oyster Bar to reopen temporarily for outdoor dining.
- The House approved a minimum wage hike from $15 an hour now to $16 an hour on Jan.1, 2026, and $17 on Jan. 1, 2027.
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Senate president thwarts bid to move assault weapons ban to friendlier committee. What to know
