Segal raps Cicilline on credit for jobs program

[Update: for a response from Cicilline campaign manager Eric Hyers, see the end of this post]

David Segal is criticizing rival CD1 Democrat David Cicilline for taking credit in a campaign commercial for a jobs program that was implemented after Segal, then a city councilor, and others took the Cicilline administration to court.

Segal has scheduled a news conference for 1 pm Monday outside Providence Superior Court, the scene of a 2006 decision in the “First Source” case. He plans to call on Cicilline to stop running the commercial in question.

A news release from Segal’s campaign excerpts part of an AdWatch analysis of the commercial by Michelle Smith of the Associated Press:

Cicilline takes credit for being the first mayor to implement the [First Source] program, and says hundreds of city residents have been hired for jobs because of it.

But Segal in an interview pointed out that happened after Segal, as a city councilman, sued the city to get them to do so. Superior Court Judge Stephen Fortunato in 2006 found that the city was not fully implementing the ordinance, that city officials were “jaw-boning” and had created a bewildering bureaucracy around it, and ordered them to comply.

“The mayor is disputing the findings of the Superior Court when he asserts that he enforced the law,” Segal said.

Here’s how the ProJo reported on the matter in 2009:

First Source, established by ordinance in 1985, was meant to serve the dual purpose of retaining working-age homeowners in the city and luring employers with a trained and motivated work force.

But for more than two decades, the program, for a variety of reasons, was not implemented. It took the City Council’s Superior Court suit against the Cicilline administration in 2006 to change things. That year, then-Judge Stephen J. Fortunato Jr. ruled in favor of the council, compelling the city to create a $250,000-a-year budget under the Planning Department and overhaul the original ordinance to clearly spell out the requirements for the city and employers.

Today, that annual budget allocation includes the $70,000 salary of the program coordinator, Anastasia Williams, who is also a Democratic state representative for the city.

I’m awaiting a response from Cicilline campaign spokesman Rich Luchette.

UPDATE: 5:01 pm. At 3:03 this afternoon, Luchette e-mailed to indicate he should have a statement to me “in a bit.” We’ve not heard from him since then.

UPDATE II: Received at 6:16 pm, through Luchette, from Cicilline campaign manager Eric Hyers:

“Mr. Segal has his facts wrong.  This ad is about David Cicilline’s relentless work to create jobs, bring new investment, and expand job training, and includes the views of a number of people who he has helped.  The Providence Business News editorial that Mr. Segal cites actually applauds David Cicilline for one of his many efforts to get people back to work.”