- [Narrator] Tonight, Prudence Island's water crisis.

- What would happen to Prudence Island if fresh water resources run out?

- I think it would probably cease to exist.

- [Narrator] Then we meet a group of vigilantes, armed with paint brushes, fighting graffiti at some of the state's most breathtaking locations.

- I know about painting and colors and nuance.

So we said, let's try painting over it, camouflage.

- [Narrator] And remembering Rhode Island State Senate President Dominick Ruggerio with Ted Nesi.

(lively music) (lively music) - Good evening and welcome to Rhode Island PBS Weekly.

I'm Michelle San Miguel.

- And I'm Pamela Watts.

With 400 miles of coastline here in Rhode Island, many would think that water wouldn't be an issue, but how much water is drinkable is the subject of our first story tonight.

- Scientists say extreme weather patterns are now hampering our ecosystem's ability to collect and hold our drinking water.

Nowhere is that more prevalent than in some of the ocean state's most isolated areas, its island communities.

Disconnected from the mainland's large situate reservoir, the state's islands are figuring out how to deal with their decreasing fresh water supply and their aging infrastructure.

Olivia Ebertz reports on how residents of one island are facing one of climate changes' biggest challenges.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Prudence Island is a small community of about 230 year rounders.

Only reachable by boat, residents live in one of the most isolated areas in Rhode Island, and although they're surrounded by Narragansett Bay, they're running out of water.

- As a child, I think everybody understood that water was a limiting factor, and we just adopted conservation strategies over time.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Robin Weber is the moderator for the Prudence Island Water District.

She's been trying to solve Prudence's water woes for 11 years.

- We used to have very small summertime cottages that were occupied only for a few months a year.

Now those are being knocked down and larger homes are being built with, you know, the full heat and the water use and, you know, washing machines.

- [Olivia Ebertz] The community says it has only two wells to serve all of its customers on the nearly thousand acre island.

The infrastructure is aging and there's no backup water supply.

Part of your charge is to ensure that people who are tied into the water district get water.

That water doesn't run out.

Do you ever have trouble meeting the needs of the people who are.

- We have had difficulty meeting the needs.

Our worst instance of that is we lost our primary production well, the pump failed.

We came very, very close to complete dewatering of the system.

We managed to get through.

We had an emergency pump installed and were back in business.

But it literally took about a week and we were very, very close.

If not for an operator getting up in the night, and coaxing that well to produce, we would've been in big, big trouble.

- [Olivia Ebertz] And scientists say climate change is compounding the island's risks.

- We have to start thinking about the sea level rise.

Sea level rise is happening.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Hydrologist, Soni Pradhanang says that this sea level rise could permeate Prudence Island's water supply.

- Storm water surges, this storm surge and sea level rise will have quite impact on the coastal communities and islands being surrounded fully by water, salt water.

They're prone to salt water intrusion.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Pradhanang has a table where she and her graduate students can map various rising sea level scenarios, including one that illustrates just how this might play out on Prudence Island.

- Once we run water through the system, the water will start seeping in under the ground recharging the water table.

- [Olivia Ebertz] This salt water seeping in can damage infrastructure.

And scientists say it is notoriously difficult to treat and can be dangerous in the long term to residents' health.

- Salt water intrusion is a slow creeping of salt water under the ground.

The island's, the geology of island, you know these, they will have a fresh water and salt water.

Fresh water lands, you know, atop of salt water.

And when the sea level rises, the salt water wedge can slowly creep in and it'll also rise due to the sea level rise.

- [Olivia Ebertz] According to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in one of the most drastic scenarios, the sea is set to rise by about nine feet by the end of the century.

- And the volume of fresh water that's available can shrink significantly, which means the amount of water that's available for, you know, consumption purpose of various, various consumption purposes will reduce.

But then there's also like storm surge also could impact well water by, you know, like the topping or inundation by over topping.

So that's a double whammy.

- [Olivia Ebertz] But rising sea level's not the only issues facing Prudence Island and Robin Weber has witnessed some of these changes firsthand.

- We've had decades of winter moth, we had gypsy moth infestation, and you can really see it on the landscape.

We no longer have what you would consider a closed canopy forest on the island.

And that has changed in the last 15, 20 years.

- [Olivia Ebertz] On a walk through the largest forested area on the island, Robin points out trees that look ill. During a prolonged statewide drought starting in 2014, invasive gypsy moths descended on the trees, eating as many of their leaves as possible, and eventually killing much of the forestation.

- And the summer of that year, those years looked more like fall because leaves are all eaten up, right?

And when it falls into the water, like it was everywhere, for sure, you know, you can't walk along the forest.

They will, it will find a little bug on your head.

It's literally everywhere.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Scientists say, because of climate change, we now get more intense bouts of rainfall.

It often falls more quickly than the ground can soak it up and then runs off back into the bay.

Tree root systems can help capture that extra water.

So when the moths began killing trees on Prudence Island, the ground got even drier.

- So you are causing that dry and adding that dryness even more to the system.

So it's basically, it circles.

- [Olivia Ebertz] These climate change issues are something the community says they've not had the time or money to address.

That's because their all volunteer water board has been busy with the project to chlorinate one of their wells.

In the meantime, they've been on a boil water notice for six years due to one positive E. coli test back in 2018.

- Now we're in a position where everything that we need to move forward with the project is actually in place, finally.

- [Olivia Ebertz] Now Robin says she can shift her focus on trying to secure the islanders additional water, but the most promising stores are located on state land.

And there's a clause in the deed that prevents the water board from drilling wells there.

Robin says her attempts to get the state to change the clause have been unsuccessful so far.

- That's our real challenge, is that we don't have anywhere to drill.

- What would happen to Prudence Island if fresh water resources run out, what would happen to the community here?

- I think it would probably cease to exist.

- And as we said earlier, Prudence is not the only island struggling with this issue.

In the coming months, Olivia Ebertz will have reports on Block, Conanicut and Aquidneck Islands as they pursue solutions.

Up next, spray painted words and pictures are usually clandestine and often illegal art, is now getting erased by a Rhode Island group who's tagged itself the Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes.

But as we first reported back in 2023, the method they employ against the perpetrators is an art in itself.

- I love those rocks.

Yes, they're my friends.

I've known them forever.

So I take it very personally when people deface them and put terrible things on them.

- [Pamela Watts] Artist Holley Flagg has good reason to be protective of the picturesque rocks that define the 400 miles of Rhode Island's rugged coastline.

It's the view right outside the window of her third floor studio in the home her family has lived in for generations.

This was her childhood playground, - Grew up there, picnicked there, ran all over the rocks.

Know them like the back of my hand.

Also, I'm an artist, so I really love the beauty of them.

They're just unique rocks.

- [Pamela Watts] Raw, natural beauty is the bedrock of Flagg's work.

She's currently painting watercolors of Nebula from images captured by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

- This is Madam Butterfly.

- [Pamela Watts] Flagg is also a graphic artist creating designs for the Metropolitan Opera and the Museum of Natural History in New York.

But when so-called Street Art spray painted graffiti began proliferating along the rocks in her Narraganset neighborhood, the artist saw red.

- When you see somebody defacing them and writing their personal messages, which they think are going to be immortal all over the rocks, it's really upsetting to me and I, it's visceral.

- [Pamela Watts] Flagg was so outraged, she took justice into her own hands, forming the citizen's group, Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes.

- Just lightly brush over it like this.

- [Pamela Watts] Armed with only a brush and cans of latex house paint, she started taking a swipe at what she views as crimes against nature.

But what might critics think of their attempts to obscure the colorful doodles of others?

You see this as restoration of nature.

Others might see it as destroying urban art.

They say graffiti is an art.

What do you say?

- I say, go somewhere else and do your urban art.

And some people do really fabulous art, and I respect that and I admire it, just not in nature.

Let nature be nature.

Let see what color you got.

That's it, looks good.

- [Pamela Watts] Soon, a small posse of like-minded volunteers took up the charge.

Their restoration of these geologic gems requires wiping out the words and pictures in such a way it tricks the eye.

Instead of just a coverup, the rocks magically appear as they once were.

- I judge how close I am with the color that I've put on.

Really the key to a good job is to just feather it in really lightly.

Let the texture of the rock come through.

- [Pamela Watts] At first in an effort to be truly natural, the Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes tried to clean off the spray paint with wire brushes, even chemicals.

Nothing worked because the rocks were too porous.

The beach was too steep for sandblasting equipment, so.

- I know about painting and colors and nuance.

So we said, let's try, let's try painting over it, camouflage.

- How did you come up with this technique of camouflage?

- I didn't really think about it.

I mean, it was just very basic.

How do I make this look like the rock there?

I keep adjusting my paint colors as I go along.

You keep doing it until you like the effect that you've gotten.

- Because the rocks are different.

Some are granite, some are brown.

So you have to pick the colors.

- Yeah, and you do many colors over one little area of rock.

You don't just say, okay, this rock is gray, here's gray.

- Get a big dry brush and you just smash it into the rock.

I think it's more just feel than anything.

- [Pamela Watts] Joan Pavlinsky is a social worker, artist, and ardent Anti-Graffiti Vigilante.

- It's just a way of kind of making my own mark by marking over other people's work.

If you think about what art really is, it's mark making, you know, and hopefully we're creating an environment so that it's not going to be, you know, vandalized again.

- If we do a good job, then they can't tell where it was.

So that's what we're hoping that as you walk around here, you don't even think about graffiti.

It's just not what you came here to see.

- [Pamela Watts] Volunteer Marianne Chronley joined the Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes a decade ago.

Spring and Autumn, the band of avengers attack rocks at places like this along Black Point Trail at Scarborough North Beach, near the iconic remains of the 19th century mansion, Windswept, itself, the victim of vandals.

Chronley says they gather tips from informants.

- We watch for it, you know, and we hear about it.

People tell us about it.

When we hear that it's down here, we say, all right, well, we got to get our crew together and come on down.

- [Pamela Watts] The Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes go to great lengths to disguise the work of vandals.

Sometimes hiking through outcroppings and sea spray just to reach their targets.

- We have a large canvas, you know, a large graffiti canvas, and you're like, oh, you know, this is going to take forever.

You just, there's like, no way we can do this.

Within like an hour or two, it's done.

And you sit back and you're, I am often amazed myself.

- [Pamela Watts] These before and after pictures are testimony to the results.

Some photos we can't share because of objectionable words and images.

- The last thing you want to do when you had a hard day at work, you're out with your dog, you're with your kid, you're walking along the path and you see a large pink profanity like written on a rock.

You know, it's like, it just, it just sort of just creates this energy that's just drains you, I think.

- [Pamela Watts] The Anti-Graffiti Vigilantes say, those who come to stroll along the shore often voice appreciation and sometimes offer to help.

- A lot of people say, oh, I'm so glad you're doing that.

They sympathize and they totally agree with how we feel.

And then other people are totally blank, they have no clue what we're doing, and they just think there's a bunch of weird people.

- [Pamela Watts] Undaunted, the Graffiti Vigilantes keep chipping away, true rock stars of Rhode Island's shores.

- It's with great satisfaction.

So as I step over some of the rocks, I can think, ah, we've been here and we did that one, and we've done that one many times.

We'll probably have to do it again.

But it's nice to know that we were here and it looks better now.

- I want you to be able to look at these beautiful rocks and not read things.

No words, no images.

Just say, wow, these rocks are really beautiful.

This ocean is beautiful, and we are so grateful to have it.

- Now on tonight's episode of Weekly Insight, Michelle and our contributor, WPRI 12's politics editor Ted Nesi, break down the heated debate in Providence over a proposed property tax increase.

But first, remembering the late Rhode Island Senate President Dominick Ruggerio.

- Ted, welcome back.

I wanted to start with the news of the death of the late Senate President Dominick Ruggerio, who died on April 21st at the age of 76.

We had discussed here several times on Weekly Insight that his health was on the decline and how that was affecting the Senate.

And still, there were many people who were caught by surprise regarding the news of his passing.

- I was one of them, Michelle, you know, obviously, as you say, we knew he was frail.

We knew he'd been battling cancer.

We've talked about that repeatedly on this segment.

But in recent weeks, several people I trust who'd talked to him, who'd seen him, who'd been with him, felt he really was rallying and strengthening and doing better.

I was getting those reports.

So when he was put back in the hospital, I didn't think it was necessarily his final hospitalization.

I don't think many people did.

And then the news of his death came early that Monday morning yes.

- Ruggerio was a fixture in Rhode Island politics for almost 50 years, which is quite incredible.

He even played on the same high school football team as U.S.

Senator Jack Reed.

- At La Salle Academy.

- Which is an only in Rhode Island thing.

- Very much.

- And as you know, the tributes have been pouring in from so many people.

I want to take a moment and take a listen to some of those.

- You actually went to high school with him.

- I did go to high school with him at La Salle.

I played football with him.

And he was a remarkable gentleman even then.

His kindness and his willingness to reach out to the young kids on the team and buck them up.

And that's not common.

- And he taught me a lot.

I remember what his famous saying was, "Speaker never say it's no, just say it's not now."

So when he would want something, I would say to him, "Donny, it's not no, it's just not now."

And he would laugh, he said, "Boy, I taught you too well."

- I got to know Dominick very personally as a great leader, a kind person, and someone who has worked, you know, worked a lifetime for the working families in the state of Rhode Island.

- And as you know, Ruggerio has also been described as an old school Democrat compared with younger generations.

- Yes, you know, he was socially conservative.

He was opposed to abortion rights in favor of gun rights.

He had deep ties to organized labor, especially the Laborers Union, which he worked for for many years.

And he was just sort of a traditional type of guy.

I always saw him in a suit and tie at the State House.

He very much believed your word is your bond in politics.

When you make a deal, you stick to it.

You settle your differences behind closed doors.

That was how he approached the job.

- Attention is now turning to who will replace him.

It was a position that he held as Senate president since 2017.

And already a few names have been floating around.

- Yes, and I want to be candid with the viewers.

This is a very fluid situation.

So this could change from the time we are recording this until the final vote comes.

But the three people I'm watching most closely, the first two are current majority leader Val Lawson and former majority leader Ryan Pearson.

Lawson replaced Pearson when Ruggerio got angry with Pearson for approaching him privately about his health last year.

And so it's thinking that Lawson could inherit Ruggerio's supporters, but she's the president of the NEA Teacher's Union.

She's never chaired a committee.

So there are some questions there.

Pearson's been working to build up his allies behind the scenes, arguing he was being honest about what was going on with Ruggerio which shouldn't be held against him.

And then the other is Labor Committee chairman Frank Ciccone is very much in the Ruggerio mode, socially conservative ties to the labors, but he's in his late 70s.

He's opposed to the Assault Weapons Ban Act.

So interested to see if it's one of those three or a dark horse.

- Yeah, and of course we'll continue following that.

Let's turn now to the city of Providence where Mayor Brett Smiley recently unveiled his budget proposal.

Fair to say, a lot of people are unhappy with this.

It includes tax increases, fees and fines going up and spending cuts.

And the mayor says all of this is to cover $15 million in an education funding increase that was demanded by the state.

Now the mayor is waiting to seek approval from the General Assembly to breach the state's 4% tax cap.

Here's how the mayor describes the situation.

- I remain confident that the General Assembly will pass our request for a one-time exception to the cap.

Were that not to pass, we'd be back to the drawing board and we're going to have to make very serious cuts.

But I don't think anyone wants to do that.

- And Ted, the mayor, is facing some real pushback.

You're seeing video here of protestors who confronted him at the State House after a committee hearing on the tax increase, pressing him not to go through with it.

But the mayor says there are no alternatives.

- Michelle, this, I think, fundamentally goes to the financial problem that Providence has at a basic level.

More than 40% of its annual revenue goes to retirement benefits for pensions and healthcare.

Another 20% or so goes to debt service.

So that means less than half the city's annual revenue is available to cover current services for current residents.

So when you suddenly need to put $15 million into the school, somewhat unexpectedly, there's nowhere easy to go when you're already struggling to pay for parks and libraries and education.

So the question I think is going to be with the budget that tight, did the mayor allocate the pain appropriately?

I think that's what the city council's going to be focusing on in the coming weeks as they vet his plan.

- That's a good way to frame it.

Always good to see you, thank you, Ted.

- Good to be here.

- Finally tonight, Rhode Island PBS and the Public's Radio are partnering with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island to amplify the importance of youth mental health.

During the month of May, we'll have coverage across our programming.

Our aim, to make critical information more accessible and raise awareness among our diverse audience by featuring stories spanning community affairs to arts and culture.

So tonight we begin with a sneak peek at one of the stories we hear at Rhode Island PBS Weekly, will air next week on the ever-growing issue of loneliness.

- Loneliness is just as deadly as smoking an entire pack of cigarettes a day.

- [Steph Machado] Ashley Kirsner has spent much of her career studying the psychology of loneliness.

- One of the trickiest things about loneliness is that the lonelier you are, the more negatively you see social situations, and therefore the less likely you are to put yourself in social situations.

- [Steph Machado] Kirsner saw firsthand how damaging this mindset can be.

For two years she volunteered at a suicide hotline in Boston where she began to notice a pattern among the people who called in.

- No matter who I was talking to, they generally had someone who cared about them in their life.

But when I asked them, oh, have you talked about how you're feeling to that person?

Almost across the board, people would say, oh no, we just don't talk about that sort of thing.

Or, no, I don't want to be a burden.

It just seemed like the determining factor of whether you were lonely or not was whether you felt comfortable opening up to those people.

I started asking, well, if the roles were reversed, would you want them to tell you about it?

And the answer was, without exception, oh, of course I would want them to tell me about it.

So I realized there was this weird gap between how vulnerable people were comfortable being and how vulnerable people wanted others to be with them.

- That's our broadcast this evening.

Thank you for joining us, I'm Michelle San Miguel.

- And I'm Pamela Watts.

We'll be back next week with another edition of Rhode Island PBS Weekly.

Until then, please follow us on Facebook and YouTube and visit us online.

You can see all of our stories and past episodes at ripbs.org/weekly, or listen to our podcast on your favorite streaming platform.

Goodnight.

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