Providence voters on Nov. 7 overwhelmingly approved an amendment to the City Charter instituting term limits for city officials. Passed by a two-to-one margin, the change to the charter, widely viewed as a response to the two decade-long tenures of convicted former Mayor Vincent "Buddy" Cianci Jr., limits the mayor of Providence to two consecutive four-year terms and City Council members to three consecutive four-year terms. The limits will take effect in 2011.
If the term limits had existed prior to the November City Council elections, less than half of the 15-member council would have been eligible to run for another term. But because the limits do not take effect until after the 2010 city elections, any City Council member could potentially serve for another 16 years, and recently re-elected Mayor David Cicilline '83 would be able to stay in office until 2019.
City Council President John Lombardi, who was first elected to the council in 1984, has always supported term limits and was not surprised by the high level of support for the ballot measure.
"It's a sign of the times," said Lombardi, who represents Ward 13. "People want change. No one should ever gain the kind of clout (Cianci acquired)."
Lombardi said the initiative to institute term limits began six years ago in the wake of several federal criminal charges and investigation into the Cianci administration. That investigation led to the former mayor's incarceration in 2002.
In between the Cianci and Cicilline administrations, Lombardi, who has served as council president since 1999, was interim mayor of Providence.
Ward 2 City Councilwoman Rita Williams has served since 1990 but lost in this fall's Democratic primary to challenger and now Councilman-elect Cliff Wood.
Williams said she supports term limits, which she called "reasonable." She does not, however, attribute her defeat to voters wanting new faces on the council, but rather to the large number of her supporters who voted in the Republican primary to re-elect Sen. Lincoln Chafee '75.
"The Republican primary drew a lot of support for the Chafee vote," Williams said. "Based on feedback I got from people, they said, 'I was so upset I couldn't vote for both (Chafee and Williams).'"
Williams cited Lombardi, Ward 11 Councilwoman and Council President Pro Tempore Balbina Young and Ward 15 Councilwoman Josephine DiRuzzo as members who have "been on the council longer than me."
Wood, the newly minted city councilman from Ward 2, said he is "on the fence" when it comes to term limits.
"I like the line 'term limits are called elections' but I haven't seen that always work," Wood said. He did not rule out Williams' tenure on the council as a motivating factor behind support for his candidacy.
"The city has changed a lot and the incumbent has not kept up with that change," Wood added.
Five new faces will join the City Council in 2007. Three councilmembers lost to September primary challengers, and two other vacancies were filled in the November election. All three of the defeated incumbents served for at least eight years.
Supporters of term limits look to Cianci's administration as an example of corruption run amok and too much power in the hands of a few city leaders.
"Given the history of the city of Providence under Cianci," Williams said, "term limits can keep the executive branch from getting so entrenched in power."
"The bottom line is if someone's corrupt, they're corrupt," said Lombardi, who referred to the Cianci administration as a "fiefdom."
"If someone's unethical, negligent and criminal, how does one defend against it?" Lombardi asked.
Not every elected official backs term limits, including State Rep. Edith Ajello, D-Dist. 3, whose turf includes all of Brown's campus.
"It's the voters' responsibility to enact term limits for specific elected officials if they see fit," said Ajello, who is finishing her 14th year in the General Assembly.
Currently, only statewide elected officials have limited terms and may only serve two four-year terms.
According to Ajello, term limits prevent elected officials from gaining the experience and expertise necessary to govern and impede institutional memory by cycling through new leaders every eight or 12 years. She cited her own position as a state legislator, which is a part-time job, as evidence that more time is necessary to accumulate knowledge and understand the many issues tackled by the General Assembly.
"A part-time legislative job means it takes longer to know about the broad range of concerns the General Assembly addresses," Ajello said. "You have to learn the negotiating process, develop your own areas of interest and find your footing."
While the City Council is officially a part-time job, Williams said the position is "time-consuming." In 2002 Williams left full-time employment as a social worker in a North Providence school to dedicate more time to working on the council.
"It wasn't fair to me. I didn't have a life," said Williams, who also cited the transition period from Cianci to Cicilline as a motivating factor in her decision.
In the final months of the gubernatorial race between Republican Gov. Donald Carcieri '65 and outgoing Democratic Lt. Gov Charles Fogarty, Fogarty began advocating term limits for members of the General Assembly as a check on corruption in the State House. Williams declined to comment on whether state legislature term limits were a good idea, while Lombardi supported them on the condition that legislative terms are extended from two- to four-year terms.
"In four-year terms, you don't have to constantly campaign," Lombardi said. "Legislators can actually put their noses to the grindstone and govern. People have to get on and do their job."
Current proposals for term limits in the state legislature would allow legislators to hold office for only six or eight consecutive years (three or four terms), not enough time to handle the tough issues that recur in Rhode Island politics, Ajello said.
"If you don't have people with more than six or eight years you don't have (institutional memory) except in the staff, and the staff may have its own axe to grind," Ajello said.
Ajello recalled a credit union crisis in 1991 shortly before her first term in the State House as an example of how a long-serving legislator's experience and observations can serve as a boon to freshmen colleagues in the State House.
"For a long time (in the State House), I sat next to Barbara Burlingame from Woonsocket. When issues related to the credit union crisis came up again, she was able to put the issue into a better perspective (for me)," Ajello said.
Burlingame served in the General Assembly from 1987 until her death in 2001.
