The League of Women Voters House District 69 Forum

Independent candidate Sergei Sharenko is challenging incumbent Democrat Susan Donovan for Bristol's House District 69 seat.

On Monday the League of Women Voters - Rhode Island [LWV-RI] held two forums featuring candidates for the Rhode Island General Assembly at Roger Williams University. The forum was moderated by Scott Pickering of East Bay Newspaper Group.

This forum features Independent candidate Sergei Sharenko, who is challenging incumbent Democrat Susan Donovan for the House District 69 seat in Bristol. This forum took place after the forum between Democrat June Speakman and Independent challenger John Hanley for House District 68 in Bristol and Warren. [See: The League of Women Voters House District 68 Forum]

Here’s the video:

Here’s the transcript, edited for clarity. We start with opening statements:

Sergei Sharenko: My platform is accountability and integrity. I'm running on [an] agenda [of] housing, infrastructure, education, and healthcare. I would like to go back to the basics. This is what we lost recently in the General Assembly [when] we moved to be a bill factory - and the most important bill that we have is the budget and it's a horrible failure every year. We need to look at the budget [and] take care of the bolts and nuts of running the state.

Susan Donovan: It's a great honor to have served as your legislator for the past eight years, advocating on behalf of Bristol and Prudence Island. I'd like to continue the work [of] bringing good public policy to our communities and state at the General Assembly. I'm proud of the progress we've made this year within our budget, tax relief for families and seniors, restoring the COLAs [Cost Of Living Adjustments] for some retirees, and increasing aid to school districts by $71 million. We've made housing a priority for families and seniors, increased investments in Medicaid, and raised reimbursement rates for medical services to our seniors and vulnerable populations. We've made investments in the Hope and Promise higher education scholarships, as well as Real Jobs Rhode Island for those taking a technical career path. I'm running for reelection to continue this work and to do much more.

Scott Pickering: If elected to serve in the General Assembly, what is the one bill you would work most diligently to pass in the next session?

Sergei Sharenko: The only bill that's important is the budget. It's a runaway train right now. We should be on track to lose $2 billion next year due to the lack of funds from the pandemic. So our budget should be at least the same or lower and we have to stop throwing money away.

Susan Donovan: The issue that's often overlooked, which impacts the attractiveness of our region and our community when courting businesses to our state, is the availability of childcare. The most proactive states view childcare as an advantage when competing for business and workers. It's a factor when ranking states' attractiveness for those businesses. When you see those ratings, Rhode Island is here [in the middle]... When meeting with other legislators and the defense industry contractors at Raytheon this past year, housing was number one and childcare was number two of their priorities. Families can't relocate here if they can't find a house or a childcare facility in a reasonable amount of time. Right now, it's virtually impossible to provide high-quality childcare that working families need at a price they can afford. We have childcare deserts all over Rhode Island and the waiting lists are sometimes eight months long. We have to do better and it's necessary for the state's economic development. So that's a priority of mine.

Scott Pickering: The extreme shortage of housing, specifically affordable housing, is a crisis in all Rhode Island communities. Despite considerable money allotted and legislation enacted to address the problem, results have been negligible. What further action should the legislature take to make meaningful progress toward solving the problem?

Susan Donovan: Too many Rhode Islanders are cost-burdened. They're paying more than 30% of their income on housing and we've made an effort to deal with this situation. Rhode Island has the lowest housing production rate of any state in the United States and that makes homes or rental units out of reach for so many. Our children and grandchildren are being priced out of this community. Unless we confront the impediments to housing construction, we can't solve the problem. I'm grateful to the House for forming the commission that my colleague, Ms. Speakman [runs] so well. She does a wonderful job with the Housing Commission. We're trying to make the permitting process for building housing and units easier and more efficient. If we allow more flexibility in land use, we hope to encourage more construction, particularly multifamily and housing through adaptive use. I'd like to stress that this doesn't mean that our local zoning does not apply, only that the process is easier and appeals are handled more efficiently.

Also, as Representative Speakman said [in the prior forum], we want the process to be consistent from community to community, and we want to help fund planning and technical assistance for our local building commissioners.

Sergei Sharenko: [In the] last two sessions, the House and the Senate passed close to 30 bills on housing and I think most of them are detrimental to the communities in one way or another. Nobody wants to come here to build [and] nobody wants to own a company here to build. That's in part because we've got too much red tape, too much regulation, and the prices are too high - so people have to pay all sorts of fees to build here. District 69, frankly, will be running out of places where to build. A couple of bills that we had - one bill would allow building in the flood areas and the other bill would allow building in the reed zones with a permit from the Department of Environmental Management. Nothing could be worse than that. We need to start deregulating.

Scott Pickering: Do you support what many would consider common sense gun policies and laws such as a ban on assault weapons, high capacity magazines, bump stocks, and other rapid fire devices in addition to stronger background checks, waiting periods, secure gun storage, and gun dealer reform?

Sergei Sharenko: I would support common-sense gun laws. That does not include bans. I don't like banning anything. I am in no place to tell people what they can have. We have a ton of bills. Some of them are completely unenforceable, and some of them are just feel-good measures that were passed that nobody would ever do anything about.

We need to not restrict firearms. We need to restrict certain people from having firearms because a lot of people should not be anywhere near any kind of firearms. That would be mental [health] checks and red flag laws so if people should not have firearms, they should not have any kind of firearms.

Susan Donovan: Gun safety is supported by 70% of Rhode Islanders. When I talk to neighbors a top issue is keeping military-style weapons out of the hands of civilians. No one will argue that we need to keep our kids safe in school, our citizens safe in public places, and our loved ones safe from suicide by firearm. As a former public school educator, I've done lockdown drills from kindergarten through high school and I can tell you that those drills aren't enough to keep our kids safe. Mental health services can only reach those who seek help. I've had conversations with parents who are relieved when multiple siblings are not in the same school building - that decreases the risk of losing them all in an attack - that's the sad reality that parents are living with every day. We've made progress, but much more needs to be done.

Scott Pickering: In your opinion, should Rhode Islanders choose to hold a Constitutional Convention?

Susan Donovan: I'll vote against a Constitutional Convention for the same reasons that were stated [during the previous forum.] I think the advocates who are pushing for the [Constititional Convention] have a risky agenda. Limiting workers' rights, limiting LGBTQ rights, and blurring the lines between church and state. It's [also] very expensive. I think it's two to $4 million just to run it. [Lastly] we have a process to change our laws and that's through legislation and we elect officials to do that. So I will vote against it.

Sergei Sharenko: I would be for having the Constitutional Convention. I'm an independent, so [are] the majority of people in the state. I don't have an agenda [like the] majority of people in the state. There could be people from both sides coming in with certain amounts of money trying to influence [but] I think it would be a wash in the end. The amount of money that our administration is throwing away every day is 10 times more than what we will try to put into the constitutional convention. So I think we should have it. At least, people should have a choice.

Scott Pickering: Do you agree with how Rhode Island is spending, it's nearly $14 billion annually. Does the state have the right priorities and focus or would you work to shift how and where its resources are being allocated?

Sergei Sharenko: We're doing a horrible job. The administration right now is basically [?] running around and especially ... see what's happening with the infrastructure. We're throwing money [away], one bundle after the other. [The] administration has to be on a very short leash and that's the job of the House and Senate. Money has to be given out in very small doses with the proof that they spent that money on something tangible. The other thing is our healthcare reimbursements. Doctors are leaving because we're not reimbursing them. Nurses are leaving. We cannot have any Certified Nursing Assistants [CNAs]. That's a big issue.

Susan Donovan: The budget is a huge document and we take a lot of time. We go through it article by article. We do a lot of talking [about] it. It's a document that reflects our priorities as a state. I serve on the Health and Human Services Committee and the legislation I see directly impacts the health and well-being of all Rhode Islanders and that includes primary care. Mr. Sharenko talked about primary care. We've raised Medicaid reimbursement rates for children and seniors, which impacts primary care doctors. We protected patients from annual and lifetime limits on health insurance benefits. We've allocated $20 million to fully fund provider increases for behavioral health and community health services. These things are important to Rhode Islanders.

In response to concerns about primary care, Blue Cross and Blue Shield eliminated nearly 65% of prior authorization requirements, allowing primary care doctors to expedite care for patients and relieve the administrative burdens on their practices. We are losing primary care doctors and there's a commission to study that. I happen to be on that [committee but it] will take at least 10 years, in my opinion, [to see] an increase in primary care doctors. We have to incentivize doctors to stay here in Rhode Island. It's market-driven. Why would you stay in a place when you can go over the line and get 20% more? It is a big issue as far as the budget goes. Sure, there are places where we have differences of opinion on what we could cut and what we could add. But like I said, there's a lot that goes into [the budget] and it's a thoughtful document.

Scott Pickering: What policies would you initiate or support to help people who are living with substance abuse disorders or mental health problems?

Susan Donovan: I just mentioned that we fully funded provider increases for behavioral health. That was a real issue for providers. We need to increase mental health services for children. Whether we do that in the private sector or schools, we must pay more attention to children's mental health funding. We need to pay more attention to funding adequate services, make sure that we reimburse the practices, and make sure that patients get the adequate healthcare care they need.

Sergei Sharenko: We have to be careful how we expand the money that we are using right now. We have to categorize people with serious mental issues or people who want to do drugs because some people have actual issues, [and] some people don't want to be helped. If people don't want to be helped, why are you wasting money on them?

Scott Pickering: Several climate-related bills were passed by the General Assembly in the last session, but several were not. What should Rhode Island do about climate change and climate resiliency in the short term in particular? What would you advocate for Warren, Bristol, and other East Bay towns that are affected by rising water levels?

Sergei Sharenko: Locally we have massive issues with flooding and the bills that we passed are detrimental to District 69 because a lot of them would, like already said, allow people to build in the reed areas and flood zones. We were trying to put a hotel on Gooding Avenue, filling up the flood zone. The more concrete boxes that go into the ground, the more issues we will have. We have to be very careful about how we build and where we build. As far as the bills that we passed, a lot of them are pieces of paper - they're not going to be helping anybody. They might help some nonprofits to use that money for their issues, but they're not going to be helping people.

Susan Donovan: Our coastlines are particularly vulnerable to sea level rise caused by climate change. It threatens our homes - even neighborhoods away from the coastline. They're flooding, as we saw in the recent storms down south. It threatens our infrastructure and it threatens our business districts. A lot of our businesses are right along the water. We've mandated the creation and maintenance of a statewide coastal resiliency plan to assess our community's vulnerabilities. We recommended mitigation strategies along rivers and coasts and most importantly recommended financing strategies. Finding the revenue sources to fund these projects is an ongoing challenge at both the state and the local level. I know we rely on the federal government for a lot of this money, but they're not going to be able to fund a lot of it when the crisis hits us. I'm proud that Rhode Island is a clean energy leader and we have the first offshore wind farm. I'm glad that we have Act on Climate. We have goals that we have to meet, but looking for funding sources in the future is going to be the real problem.

Sergei Sharenko: As a response - climate changes all the time. As long as we have the written history of the world, climate is changing. We had the ice ages, we had the warmups, and whatever we try to do might not be very much versus the planet. What we can do [is] make comprehensive decisions [about] what serves certain areas because what's happening in Woonsocket is different from what's happening in District 69.

Scott Pickering: What are your thoughts on the job done by Governor Daniel McKee and Department of Transportation [DOT] Director Peter Aviti regarding the Washington Bridge situation?

Susan Donovan: I'm just as angry as everyone else about the bridge. I use the bridge, my family members use the bridge and the safety of the commuters is the highest priority for me. As Representative Speakman said [during the previous forum], we have meetings regularly with Director Alviti. We passed legislation so that he would have to meet with us. The bridge is a failure of the highest order. It puts public safety at risk. A forensic analysis will hopefully tell us what went wrong and what agencies are responsible. We have a pause right now in the demolition because we don't want to destroy the evidence for that analysis. We have to wait and see. I want to make it clear to everybody though, that the Governor is responsible for the Department of Transportation. We can ask questions and we can call them to oversight. We can demand that he speak to us, but we don't have the power to do much else. It's very frustrating. I know you are all frustrated too.

Sergei Sharenko: I think the Governor and DOT are doing a horrible job and what's worse, they're throwing millions of dollars into the problem thinking that it will go away. It's not going away. It's only the beginning of our issues because that's one bridge out of 200 that we have in the state. We have a bridge right over here [the Mount Hope Bridge] that's barely there. The issue has to be in the next budget. The governor has to start showing results before he gets more money. That's the only way to keep him on a short leash because he's not doing a good job and that's proven. We all know it.

Scott Pickering: What have we not talked about tonight that you would like to talk about?

Sergei Sharenko: I would like to talk about education. It is an issue. With the Kickemuit Middle School, we all know it. The Warren Police Department is there constantly. They have kids fighting [and] doing whatever stuff. We have fewer issues in the lower classes and the higher classes. We passed the bond to build a new high school, but now Warren has financial issues.¹ They lost two major lawsuits. I'm afraid we'll be here in the Bristol holding the bag. We have to carefully look at that - and that's without talking about the quality of the education the children get.

Susan Donovan: There are so many issues. It's hard to pick. I'd like to talk a little bit about tax relief and pensions because we've made some progress in that area. We've raised the exemption on certain pension plans and annuity income for seniors - $50,000 for a qualified filer and a hundred thousand dollars for joint filers. Most small business owners no longer have to pay a burdensome tangible tax on computers, furnishings, fixtures, and the like. Over the past several years, we've fully eliminated the car tax - ahead of schedule. We've repealed the suspension of the annual cost of living adjustments for state employees who retired before 2012... I think we've made progress on the tax front and we continue every year to help - especially seniors and young families - have tax credits and pay less taxes at the state level.

Scott Pickering: Closing statements…

Sergei Sharenko: I'm running as an Independent. That means the only people I'm accountable to are you, the people that live in the district. I am well-known for saying 'no' to certain things, but I usually look for consensus and that's what we lost. In the General Assembly, the majority rules, and the voices that say 'no' and not heard. It's one-sided and it's starting to hurt us on the state level. We need more to talk to each other. We need more to have a consensus and to have some type of outcome that nobody likes but everybody can live with. That's what I'm running for.

We lack contact [between] the General Assembly members [and] the Town Councils and Town Administrators. That's what I pledge to do. I pledge, if I win the election, that I will have at least quarterly reports to the town hall. [As in.] 'What is going on? What kind of bills are happening?' because we had two instances where the Town Council was apoplectic after they found out about the first 15 Housing bills passed and then another 15 bills on Housing passed. Now they had to deal with all that falling on their heads because we have no contact between the General Assembly and the town governments. We have to reestablish that. It has to be done. People have to know what is happening there. The General Assembly members get 10 days to look at the budget and it's written, just about, in Chinese. People have to start looking at the budget the moment the Governor releases it because everybody has to know what's in it, where the money is going, and why there's so much money going.

Susan Donovan: I'm going to respond to what he just said. If any bill is problematic for our communities or our town council [members], Representatives and Senators are more than willing to address that issue. That's our job. We met before this year's legislative session and during it to communicate with our municipal officials. The League of Cities and Towns is a great resource that advises our mayors, our administrators, and our councils on bills affecting their communities. The League worked closely this year with the Housing Commission and did not oppose any of the housing bills that came to the House floor. The League gave Representative Speakman and me a nine out of nine score for our votes that were a priority for the League.

Now I'll move on to my closing statement:

As your state representative, I have an eight-year record of shaping public policy on a multitude of issues ranging from housing, education, pay equity, public health, the environment, business regulation reforms, fair taxation, gun safety, and reproductive healthcare. And that is a fraction, for those who are seeing me for the first time. I grew up here and attended our public schools and colleges. I earned a bachelor's and master's degree and taught in our public schools for over three decades. My full bio is on my website. In 2022, I was appointed chair of the Health and Human Services Committee. In that role, I not only oversee the testimony of witnesses, but I am also responsible for meeting with leaders in healthcare and with public health advocates whose efforts influence public health policy in Rhode Island.

As I mentioned before, in response to concerns raised by our committee, Blue Cross and Blue Shield eliminated nearly 65% of our prior authorization requirements, allowing primary care doctors to expedite care for patients and relieve burdens on their practices. I also serve on the Education, Veterans Affairs, and Oversight Committees. I've spent my entire adult life in public and community service working and advocating to improve the lives of those who live in this exceptional place we call home. As you've heard, a priority of mine in the coming year will be addressing the availability and crippling costs of childcare for struggling young families in Rhode Island. Finding the solutions to the many problems we face takes time and collaboration, but I'm convinced we can make progress if we have the collective will to work together in this coming election. I'm asking you to trust that I will continue to be a thoughtful and reasonable voice for our district and come out to vote for me on November 5th.

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1. Bristol and Warren have a combined School District.