(MSWord version of this release)
Kingston, RI. Michael A. Rice of 201 Old Post Rd. in Wakefield announces that he will be running for the Rhode Island House of Representatives as a candidate from the Democratic Party to fill the seat of incumbent John Patrick Shanley who will be retiring after serving four terms representing the Town of South Kingstown in District 35. Dr. Rice holds degrees from the University of San Francisco and the University of California at Irvine and has lived in South Kingstown 21 years, employed as a professor of fisheries and aquaculture at the University of Rhode Island. Over the years Dr. Rice has been active in the community, serving two years as the president of the Tavern Hall Club in Kingston, serving as a member of the South Kingstown Conservation Commission for 15 years, and chairman of that municipal commission since 1998. At the University, Mike has been an active instructor and researcher working closely with Rhode Island’s growing aquafarming enterprises and served two years as chairman of the URI Faculty Senate. Mike has been married 25 years to Rufina Delizo Rice and has one daughter, Maria Isabel, who graduated from URI last month with a degree in Natural Resources Economics.
In the recognition that the University of Rhode Island is a major economic engine, partner, and cultural resource for the state and South Kingstown in particular, Dr. Rice is most interested in working toward fostering greater support for the state’s flagship research university as a critical resource in building and capitalizing upon our unique position in the rapidly growing, knowledge-based world economy. Additionally, his issues of concern include environmental protection and conserving of the sense of ‘place’ so dear to South County residents, especially in the face of these global pressures toward growth and uncomfortable change. He is interested in a strong local agricultural economy, because economically working farms serve as a critical component in open space preservation, moderating growth-related expansion of municipal services, and as a source of precious local crops as the price of gallon of gasoline creeps skyward of $5 or more. He is also interested in energy and transportation policy and planning issues that are sure to become much more important to South County in the next decade. Additionally, Mike is keenly aware of the tax burden faced by members of our community, and will work toward achieving the best quality of state government that our tax dollars will buy. Mike Rice can be reached at rice35ri@gmail.com.