Archive - 2013 - News Article
May 7th
WOONSOCKET – A police officer was bitten by a pit bull early Tuesday while investigating a report of a domestic assault at 252 Burnside Ave., police said.
Patrolman Patrick Greeno, 24, was struggling with a woman in the kitchen when one of her daughters opened a bedroom door, allowing two pit bulls to get out.
As he and another patrolman were wrestling 44-year-old Katie Acevedo into a pair of handcuffs, Greeno reported, one of the dogs bit him on the right forearm, breaking the skin and opening a laceration about a half-inch long.
PROVIDENCE – The Senate Finance Committee unanimously approved Sen. Marc Cote’s bill to approve a $2.5 million supplemental property tax levy in Woonsocket on Tuesday.
The measure will now go to the full Senate, but Cote said if it is approved there, it will be held until other parts of the plan to reduce Woonsocket’s deficit plan are concluded. These include negotiations that Mayor Leo Fontaine and Budget Commission Chairman William Sequino are currently conducting with city employees and retirees to cut payroll and pension costs.
May 6th
LINCOLN – It could be upwards of a month before residents are able to move back into a Front Street triple-decker that was heavily damaged by fire Sunday night, fire officials said yesterday.
Lonsdale Fire Chief Timothy Griffin said the 263 Front St. building sustained $75,000 to $100,000 in damages and that extensive repairs will be required before the seven tenants left homeless by the blaze are allowed back in.
All of the tenants are reportedly staying with family members, he said.
WOONSOCKET – As the city inches closer to a fiscal cliff, the Budget Commission and state lawmakers are to meet with Gov. Lincoln Chafee and State Revenue Director Rosemary Booth Gallogly tomorrow to chart a course forward.
Mayor Leo T. Fontaine, a member of the commission, says state leaders do not support replacing the commission with a receiver who could push the city into municipal bankruptcy.
WOONSOCKET – The state Bomb Squad was in town again yesterday, this time to check out a backpack left aboard a Rhode Island Public Transit Authority bus passing through Depot Square.
The squad x-rayed the backpack without removing it from the parked bus and quickly determined that there was no danger, said Detective Sgt. Matt Ryan.
“The backpack was empty,” he said.
May 5th
CUMBERLAND — Lauren Kowalski, of Manville, has been named the Boys & Girls Clubs of Rhode Island Youth of the Year for 2013, and her position as the Ocean State’s youth representative is especially fitting for a young woman with a wide range of aquatic interests.
Kowalski topped her six other Rhode Island competitors for the honor because she best exemplifies the awards requirements of extensive involvement in her local club, the Boys & Girls Club of Cumberland-Lincoln, academic success, community service and much more.
WOONSOCKET — It’s a treat and a dessert and you can really have ice cream anytime. But there is something special about going to get ice cream at an ice cream stand or from a truck, even on a cool May evening.
Nicholas Michalopoulos, 62, of Woonsocket also knows how spring affects his customers’ particular taste for ice cream and has opened his Cool Corner Creamery at 171 Greene St. in the city in late April since 1995.
LINCOLN – Twin River is preparing to open its new table gaming operation at the Twin River Road casino but still needs dealers and other employees to staff it.
That means there are still opportunities for Rhode Islanders to find a job with the new operation if they qualify through the state certification process, according to Patti Doyle, Twin River’s spokeswoman.
SMITHFIELD – In case you hadn’t noticed, there is a consumer run on guns and ammunition in this country amid an impassioned debate about gun control. Whether it’s fair or not may be open to question, but much of the hoarding is blamed on gun zealots worried about a crackdown in the wake of some insanely violent and tragic episodes of gun violence.
I am not one of them. I’m not planning on buying a handgun, and I don’t have anything against people who are, but the fierce battle over gun control made me dangerously curious.
May 4th
WOONSOCKET – Jailin Alarcon, a seventh-grader at Woonsocket Middle School, didn’t know what to expect when Judge Janette A. Bertness suddenly walked over to her, grabbed a folder off her desk and started sifting through the contents.
Bertness, an associate judge of the Rhode Island Workers’ Compensation Court, and Providence attorney Jeffrey M. Biolchini, were visiting social studies teacher ToniMarie Campopiano’s students Friday as part of the school’s annual Law Day program.
