Target 12: 'Taxpayer taxi' stirs debate

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Senate President M. Teresa Paiva Weed says she's reconsidering whether she and House Speaker Gordon Fox should have government cars with taxpayer-paid drivers after a Target 12 investigation revealed her using one to get a ride home from a party fundraiser.

The two official Ford Explorers assigned to Fox and Paiva Weed cost $59,000 to buy in 2010 and $7,500 a year to maintain. No official log of their travel is kept and no formal policy for their use is in place. Paiva Weed's and Fox's counterparts in Massachusetts and Connecticut do not get government cars.

• See the report: Top Dems take 'taxpayer taxi' 

Paiva Weed acknowledged to Target 12 that she had a state employee pick her up in the Senate car on Oct. 11 at the R.I. Democratic Party Unity Dinner in Burrillville and drive her 48 miles home to Newport, though she said it's "rare" that she uses the official vehicle for transportation from partisan events.

"The policy that I have had in office has been to go in private vehicle if there is a political event and be picked at the political event to be brought home," Paiva Weed, a Newport Democrat, told Target 12.

"I think the bigger question is should we have a state vehicle at all," she said. "I think when that decision is mine to make I will take that into consideration."

John Marion, executive director of the good-government group Common Cause Rhode Island, criticized the Senate president for using taxpayer resources in connection with a political event. "To be honest, it surprised me they even owned the vehicles," he said.

The General Assembly's annual budget for 2012-13 is $38.8 million this year, with $21.6 million of that total under the control of the five-member Joint Committee on Legislative Affairs and largely shielded from public view.

Tim White ( twhite@wpri.com ) is the Target 12 investigative reporter for WPRI 12 and Fox Providence. Follow him on Twitter: @white_tim

Ted Nesi contributed to this report.