To the editor:

Fellow taxpayers and Rhode Island voters: There is a very good chance our state budget will be $9 billion dollars next June, yet the governor wants to borrow $500 to $600 million for infrastructure. The state already owes $2.2 billion. The cost to borrow $500 million will be around $250 million. You try to get a mortgage with these numbers.

And, just like your mortgage, you pay more, a lot more, for borrowing. Buy a house with a mortgage over 30 years and you end up paying four times more than you would as if you have paid cash.

This state government, for 75 years, simply does not get budgeting and economics.

We found this out during the fight against the tolls on the Sakonnet River Bridge. The state argued they would get $20- to 25 million in toll revenue. There is no doubt about those income numbers.

What state government failed to do was an exhaustive economic analysis. It was a number of East Bay residents who pointed out in Senate and House Finance Committee testimony in 2013 and 2014 that the state would lose at least that much in lost state tax revenue due to a corresponding decline in tourism and business.

It seems this story is replaying itself. The Infrastructure Commission in the fall of 2013 brought to light that this state needed about $1.1 billion to go “from worst to first” in road and bridge status. There are roughly 1,200 road and bridge projects that need attention. They are in different repair conditions. We are not going to fix them all in one year. How about spreading out the repairs over 10, 15 or 20 years?

If we do that, then we do not need to borrow $500 million; $1.1 billion spread over 20 years is $55 million a year, with no interest.

You mean to tell me that we cannot find $55 million a year in sofa change in this budget over the next 20 years saving $250 million or more in interest and fees to Wall Street cronies?

Gov. Raimondo is using the Ron Emanuel proposal: Never let a crisis go by; you can get a lot of things that you couldn’t normally get. If you don’t have a crisis, invent one. And Nancy Pelosi, you must pass a bill to find out what’s in it, as the Rhode Island Senate has done.

Oh and by the way, in accordance with NEPA, where is the comprehensive and exhaustive economic analysis?

Please go to StopTollsRI.com, to find out how you can help stop this madness.

Antone Viveiros, chairman

Sakonnet Toll Opposition Platform (STOP)

Middletown