Happy Saturday! Here's another edition of my weekend column for WPRI.com -- as always, send your takes, tips and trial balloons to tnesi@wpri.com and follow me on Twitter, Bluesky and Facebook.

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1. Lately I've been thinking a lot about pensions. (Yes, this is why I'm fun at parties.) For as long as I've been a reporter, the ever-rising cost of retirement benefits has been a defining problem for government budgets at all levels. Just look at the region's two biggest cities. In Providence, Mayor Smiley has hiked taxes 6% in order to address years of inadequate school funding. The tab for the additional K-12 aid is $15 million -- almost equivalent to how much the city has increased its annual pension contribution in just the

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