“NO” HPV MANDATE PRESS CONFERENCE & RALLY – Tonight – NEW 1-PAGER

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 17, 2015

Multiple Speakers to Address Numerous Concerns Over Mandate
RI ACLU Statement; RI DOH Backing Away from School Exclusion Penalty
Center Publishes New 1-Page Summary Sheet

Cumberland, RI – A large crowd is anticipated to attend a press conference and protest rally – calling on Governor Raimondo to halt the State’s mandate of the controversial HPV vaccine for all 7th graders – that will be held this evening at the

Cumberland public library by the nonpartisan Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity, in association with Rhode Islanders Against Mandated HPV Vaccinations, a parents group which has attracted over 2300 members in the past two weeks.

NO HPV VACCINE MANDATEAmong those expected to speak at the event are concerned parents, physicians, legal experts, and families that claim to have suffered adverse side-effects from the vaccine. Numerous concerns about the mandate will be covered by the speakers ranging from public health policy, parental rights, medical research and side-effects, government transparency, and ethics, to constitutional questions. These concerns have been summarized in an HPV one-pager published today by the Center.

Further, with IndependentRI.com reporting that the Department Of Health has backtracked on enforcing the school exclusion penalty, the Center also calls on the DOH to officially recommend ending its controversial mandate, which was implemented without rigorous public debate and without direct legislative oversight.

“A mandate is useless if there is no longer any penalty or enforcement mechanism,” commented Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “Let’s end the charade and end this unpopular mandate once and for all.” In a statement to the Center, the RI -ACLU argues that the school exclusion penalty is “extremely severe” and “unfitting and disproportionate.”

The event will be held prior to the last of five pre-scheduled public forums orchestrated by the RI Department of Health.

The Center strongly recommends that any parent uncomfortable with this vaccine for their children should claim a ‘religious medical exemption’, which can be executed via a simple form that can be downloaded from the health.ri.gov website.

The Center’s home page for the HPV issue is RIFreedom.org/HPV.
The parents group website is VaccineChoiceRI.com.

WHAT: Press Conference & Protest Rally Against Mandated HPV Vaccine

WHEN: Monday, August 17; 5:40 pm rally; 6:10 pm press conference

WHERE: Cumberland Public Library, back entrance by Hayden Meeting Center; 1464 Diamond Hill Road, Cumberland, RI 02864

WHO: In addition to Stenhouse from the Center, statements are expected to be made at the event by:
Shawna Lawton and Aimee Gardiner; parent advocates from RIers Against Mandated HPV Vaccine
Dr. Mark Brady and Dr. Christopher Black; physicians
Justin Price; House of Representatives, RI-D39
Giovanni Cicione; lawyer for Stephen Hopkins Center for Civil Rights

Media Contacts:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO, RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

Shawna Lawton: RIers Against Mandated HPV Vaccinations
401.339.9226 | sllawton40@gmail.com

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

Rhode Island ACLU Offers Statement on HPV

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ACLU Statement on HPV:

“The ACLU of Rhode Island recognizes the Department of Health’s legitimate interest in promoting the HPV vaccine for both boys and girls. We also appreciate that there are some illnesses that warrant imposition of mandatory vaccinations in order to protect children attending school. However, excluding middle and high school students from school for being unvaccinated against HPV strikes us as an unfitting and disproportionate remedy.

Exclusion from school is an extremely severe penalty that should be used only when truly necessary, and not as a stick to promote more generalized public health goals.  We believe the state’s efforts would be much better spent on educating parents and students on the importance of the HPV vaccine rather than using a punitive approach that deprives children of a public education. Rhode Island’s record, prior to implementation of this mandate, of leading the nation in HPV vaccination rates supports this notion.

Encouraging preventive measures to protect children’s health is extremely important, but so is a child’s right to an education. In light of the concerns that have been expressed regarding the requirement, we encourage the Department of Health to formally clarify that school districts should not exclude children from school solely because they do not receive the HPV vaccine, and that the law’s “religious” exemption broadly encompasses objections of conscience as well.”

Hillary Davis
Policy Associate
ACLU of Rhode Island
128 Dorrance Street, Suite 220
Providence, RI 02903
P – (401) 831-7171
F – (401) 831-7175
www.riaclu.org

MEDIA ADVISORY: August 17 Press Conference & Protest Rally Against Mandated HPV Vaccine

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 13, 2015
Press Conference & Protest Rally
Monday, August 17, 6:00 pm, Cumberland Public Library

ADVISORY: A press conference and protest rally calling on Governor Raimondo to
halt the State’s mandate of the controversial HPV vaccine for all 7th grade boys and girls as a condition to attend school will be held this coming Monday evening by the nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity, in association with Rhode Islanders Against Mandated HPV Vaccinations, a parents group which has attracted over 2100 members in the past two weeks.

Multiple statements from state legislators and former state health officials as well as spokespersons from various parents groups, physicians groups, legal organizations, and good government groups, are expected to highlight various civil rights, public policy, transparency, legal, medical, and cronyism concerns over this coercive government edict. Also expected to participate are families who have suffered adverse side-effects from the vaccine.

The event will be held prior to the last of five pre-scheduled public forums orchestrated by the RI Department of Health.

The Center’s home page for the HPV issue is www.RIFreedom.org/HPV.
The parents group website is VaccineChoiceRI.com.

WHAT: Press Conference & Protest Rally Against Mandated HPV Vaccine

WHEN: Monday, August 17; 5:40 pm rally; 6:10 pm press conference

WHERE: Cumberland Public Library, back entrance by Hayden Meeting Center; 1464 Diamond Hill Road, Cumberland, RI 02864

WHO: RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity, parents group spokesperson, state lawmaker, Stephen Hopkins Center for Civil Rights, more

Media Contacts:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO, RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org
Shawna Lawton: RIers Against Mandated HPV Vaccinations
401.339.9226 | sllawton40@gmail.com

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

MEDIA RELASE: Governor’s Response Not Sufficient to Quell Growing Controversy to HPV Vaccine Mandate; Public Hearings Begin Tonight

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 5, 2015

Grassroots Opposition Grows to Controversial HPV Vaccine Mandate
Governor Called Upon to Take More Informed Position

Providence, RI — The perfunctory response by Governor Raimondo’s office in supporting the controversial HPV mandate imposed last year on Rhode Island families is not sufficient to address the many questions and growing public opposition to the edict by the state’s Department of Health, according to the nonpartisan Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity, which calls upon the Governor to take a more studied look at the issue.

“The Governor does not have any political capital invested in this bureaucratic mandate, as it was implement by the prior administration under a prior health director,” commented Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “She should be able to take a step back and take a thorough and objective in evaluating this very controversial government action.”

With the mandate scheduled to be implemented next month as a requirement to attend school for all 7th grade boys and girls, and with a series of public forums orchestrated by the Department of Health beginning this evening in Barrington, the Center urges all concerned parents and middle-schoolers to attend one of the forums and voice their opinions.

The Center expects to announce later this week plans for a press conference and opposition rally. Potential participants include parental opposition groups, concerned physicians, state legislators, professed victims of the vaccine, former state health department officials, and other good government groups.

There are a number of legitimate questions and facts that could cause the Governor to be concerned about continued support of this forced immunization:

  • Voters and parents are outraged. A Facebook group has exploded from just a few hundred members to almost two thousand in less than a week since this controversy became public.
  • A parental rights infringement. Parents are outraged that the government is forcing itself into the middle of their relationship with their children and their doctors.
  • Not a public health or school issue. The HPV virus is not communicable in a classroom or other public environment and is transmitted via sexual activity. HPV is a private, family issue that should be handled by parents, not the state government.
  • A special-interest handout? Big money from Merck, the pharmaceutical giant pushing the Gardasil vaccine, has been prevalent at both the national CDC level and in lobbying activities and a vendor relationship in the Ocean State. Such payouts raise serious questions about the validity of the CDC claims.
  • Medical questions: a local physicians group that contacted the Center questions the effectiveness of the vaccine and whether or not its documented side effects are more dangerous to children than the disease itself … and is preparing to cite its research.
  • Lack of governmental transparency. The Center questions how such a controversial public policy can be implemented without any legitimate legislative or public debate and will push for legislation to amend this process.

The Center’s home page for this issue is RIFreedom.org/HPV. The Center strongly recommends that any parent uncomfortable with this vaccine for their children should claim a ‘religious medical exemption’, which can be executed via a simple form that can be downloaded from the health.ri.gov website.

Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise research and advocacy organization. The mission of the 501-C-3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

Milton Friedman Legacy Day Celebration 2015!

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The Center is joining with other across the country to honor the life and legacy of the esteemed economist Milton Friedman!

To celebrate, the Center participated in an event at Rocky Point State Park to introduce hundreds of Rhode Islanders to the idea of School Choice. We told real families about the most promising education reform in the Ocean State and around the country. More and more families are learning that Bright Today scholarships will mean a more accountable and effective school system for every single child. Every child, no matter their zip code, deserves access to an education of their parent’s choice. School Choice moves dollars and decision-making closer to the student.

In the words of Friedman, “Our goal is to have a system in which every family in the U.S. will be able to choose for itself the school to which its children go. We are far from that ultimate result. If we had that – a system of free choice – we would also have a system of competition, innovation, which would change the character of education.”

Please Sign The Petition Now!

 

MEDIA RELASE: Center Calls on Governor Raimondo to Halt Controversial HPV Vaccine Mandate

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 30, 2015
Controversial Vaccine Mandated by Regulatory Fiat

Center Recommends Parents Claim a Religious Exemption to Maintain Rights
Calls on Governor to Delay the Mandate and Lawmakers to Overturn the Edict

Providence, RI — In a stunning revelation made public in a Providence Journal article yesterday, all Rhode Island 7th graders will be mandated to receive a controversial HPV vaccination that infringes on parental rights and has been subject of national scorn in recent years.

The Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity finds it even more troubling that Rhode Island will become just the second state to mandate the vaccine … and the only state to do so by regulatory fiat, without public debate, and without consideration from the elected representatives of the people.

“This growing trend of government by executive fiat and regulatory despotism bypasses the traditional democratic process and must cease. Like RhodeMap RI, why do we continue to allow unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats to arbitrarily make such important public policy decisions,” asked Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “Where are the voices of the Governor and our General Assembly, whose authority is being infringed upon by out-of-control bureaucratic ideologues? We call on the Governor to immediately halt this mandate in order to give lawmakers time to consider overturning this unprecedented edict.”

“Not only are the FDA approved vaccines for HPV relatively new and not vetted to the satisfaction of many in the medical community, they have been cited as the cause of many injuries, health complications and even death in some cases. Parents and the public have every right to be concerned about their children’s health,” said Gary D. Alexander, former Secretary of Health and Human Services for Rhode Island and adjunct scholar for health issues to the Center. “The state has not provided a proper public forum to discuss these concerns with parents. The implementation of this mandate must be delayed until a full public process has been conducted and all fears allayed.”

Also, a group of Rhode Island physicians that have been in contact with the Center do not believe an epidemic exists, especial one that should warrant such a drastic mandate; they further question whether the Gardasil vaccine is even effective. The doctors further claim that the potential side-effects of the vaccination include paralysis and death. The group cites that traditional pap smear tests are highly effective in diagnosing the human papillomavirus. The physicians also argue that the disease is not a public health issue in America, but rather a personal health issue, where parents – not the state government – should be making such important decisions about whether or not to have the vaccines administered to their children.

In 2011, then Texas governor and presidential candidate, Rick Perry, came under intense national criticism for issuing a similar executive order. Perry would later call his executive order a mistake, after the Texas legislature decided to overturn it.

The Center strongly recommends that any parent uncomfortable with this vaccine for their children should claim a ‘religious medical exemption’, which can be executed via a simple form that can be downloaded from the health.ri.gov website.

Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise think tank. The mission of the 501c3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.

Rhode Island Employment Snapshot, June 2015: RI Bucks Southern New England Trend?

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[Click here for the printable one-page PDF of this post.]

The June employment data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) provides a good lesson in a number of the ways in which the data can be misleading. For one thing, looking at the unemployment rate, one could say that Rhode Island dipped below 6% for the first time since November 2007. Of course, one could have said the same thing last month. But the BLS revised May up to 6%, so the Ocean State gets to repeat its milestone.

As the first chart below shows, this has been a banner, booming year, for Rhode Island. More and more people are looking for work and, at least when it comes to the statistics, more and more people are finding it. The curious thing is that this growth has been unabated for so many months, yet the news and anecdotes around Rhode Island wouldn’t lead one to expect such a boom. Indeed, in June, the number of jobs available in Rhode Island, as measured by another BLS dataset, actually went down. Readers should keep in mind that two years in a row have brought dramatic downward revisions come the following January.

Another bit of conflicting information is related to the second chart. The fact that Massachusetts and Connecticut are doing so much better than Rhode Island, when it comes to making up for losses during the recession, is not new. What’s new is that Massachusetts and Connecticut slowed or lost ground in June, while Rhode Island’s sprint continues. That could be accurate, but it seems unlikely.

The third chart illustrates the significance of the size of the labor force. The red line shows what the curve would have been if the labor force had not shrunk since January 2007, and it ends in a conspicuous cliff. It also illustrates that Rhode Island has a long way to go, even according to the questionable statistics. In June, unemployment would still have been 8.5%. Even that represents a huge drop, over the course of this year so far, from 11.0% in December.

RI-laborforceandemp-0107-0615

RIMACT-laborforceandemp-0615perc0107

RI-unemploymentrate-steadyLF-0107-0615

Making RhodeWorks Work for Rhode Islanders

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[button url=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/ricfp-makingrhodeworkswork-071315.pdf” target=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/ricfp-makingrhodeworkswork-071315.pdf” size=”medium” style=”royalblue” ]Click for full “Making RhodeWorks Work” report[/button]

As an alternative option to fund repairs of the Ocean State’s crumbling bridge and road infrastructure, a “pay as you go” approach that prioritizes current general revenue in the budget would provide budget certainty and save over half a billion dollars in wasteful, non-productive financing and overhead costs for Rhode Islanders, compared with Governor Gina Raimondo’s RhodeWorks plan, which increases Rhode Island’s debt burden and tolls the trucking industry to pay for it.

Specific savings that can be achieved by adopting a Pay As You Go approach include:

  • $563 million in interest costs
  • $49 million in financing debt and service reserve costs
  • $43+ million in tolling infrastructure (gantries and administration)

Cuts to corporate welfare and other non-essential spending programs can pay for the project instead. Prioritizing infrastructure spending in the state’s existing budget, there would be no need to identify significant new sources of revenue that would drain money from the private sector, make Rhode Island even less competitive with our neighbors, and place unnecessary downward pressure on an already stagnant state economy.

Taxpayers also should not automatically accept the historically high cost of road and bridge repair and construction in our state.
Instead of enriching insider interests such as Wall Street financial institutions, labor unions, and large union-shop contractors, taxpayers should demand fiscal discipline and restraint by limiting the scope of the RhodeWorks project to what Rhode Islanders actually need and can afford.

From a process perspective, Rhode Islanders are fed up with non-transparent backroom deals among insiders that shut out the voice of the public. Few details of the plan’s financials have been released. It is also questionable from a constitutional and ethical point of view whether or not a bond of this magnitude can be, or should be, authorized without a vote of the people.

RhodeWorksvTruePriorities-costs-web

[button url=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/ricfp-makingrhodeworkswork-071315.pdf” target=”https://rifreedom.org/wp-content/uploads/ricfp-makingrhodeworkswork-071315.pdf” size=”medium” style=”royalblue” ]Click for full “Making RhodeWorks Work” report[/button]

BREAKING: New Federal HUD Rule Validates Center’s RhodeMapRI Claims

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 10, 2015

As Forewarned, HUD Finalizes Rule in Effort to Desegregate Local Neighborhoods via Plans like RhodeMap RI
State Planning Officials Denied True Agenda and Federal Connection

Providence, RI — Following weeks of speculation in national news stories, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) this week has finalized a new housing rule that confirms the federal connection and hidden agenda of the controversial RhodeMapRI plan, as forewarned almost 9 months ago by the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity

“Despite denials by officials from the RI Division of Planning, it is now fully apparent that RhodeMap RI is nothing more than a Trojan Horse to implement a federal agenda,” commented Mike Stenhouse, CEO for the Center. “RhodeMap RI is a social-engineering tool of the federal government that will supersede the sovereignty of municipalities and will infringe upon the rights of private property owners … all in the name of the HUD’s warped vision of how to achieve social equity.”

Rhode Island administration officials have continually denied any connection with this federal agenda, yet recent developments belie their claim. The stealth advancement of the true agenda behind the RhodeMap RI plan, as the Center has maintained from day one, was further validated at a recent forum conducted by the nationally renowned Brookings Institution, a major supporter of the Obama administration’s anti-suburban ‘regionalist’ policies. In a video of the event, one supporter of the new HUD rule stated in effect, that keeping the purpose of the rule “obscure” may be the best political strategy to “get it through” (1:23:43 mark). Similarly, the Center has suggested that this type of intentional deception is how RhodeMap RI was able to become an official part of the state guide plan without any approval of the RI General Assembly.

This revelation is important, as two critical pieces of related legislation are now in legislative limbo due to the abrupt closure of the 2015 legislative session:

House bill H6107-A, which stealthily passed the House Finance Committee in an eleventh hour suspended-rules maneuver, would provide RhodeMap RI proponents with a vital tool to advance its agenda … namely, to expand a dual-tiered property tax system that would likely raise property taxes on single-family homeowners; but could also reduce overall revenues to municipalities by dramatically reducing property taxes on a multitude of loosely defined affordable housing units. Potentially unconstitutional in Rhode Island, a similar policy in the town of Barrington is being challenged in a citizen-initiated lawsuit now in the state’s Superior Court.

Conversely, House bill H6040-A, which passed the entire House, would restore some measure of sovereignty to municipal governments by allowing them to opt out of some of the more burdensome housing mandates of the RhodeMap RI plan.

Neither bill had the chance to be officially considered in the Senate.

Rhode Islanders are encouraged to contact their legislators to reduce the negative impact of RhodeMap RI via an easy-to-use online tool at The Gaspee Project, a partner organization.

The Center has published multiple reports and related analysis pieces on RhodeMap RI, which can be viewed at RIFreedom.org/PropertyRights.

Media Contact:
Mike Stenhouse, CEO
401.429.6115 | info@rifreedom.org

About the Center
The nonpartisan RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity is Rhode Island’s premiere free-enterprise think tank. The mission of the 501c3 nonprofit organization is to return government to the people by opposing special-interest politics and advancing proven free-market solutions that can transform lives by restoring economic competitiveness, increasing educational opportunities, and protecting individual freedoms.