SMITHFIELD, R.I. — General Assembly leaders are considering a plan to revise the state's personal income tax system.

SMITHFIELD, R.I. — A regional economist says that while the country is experiencing the most serious financial downturn since the Great Depression, that's not the case in Rhode Island. The state's credit union crisis in the early 1990s was more devastating.

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. — The Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility ran a deficit of more than $2 million in 2008, despite a surge that bumped the average daily inmate population to 673, according to an audit released Tuesday night.

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. — A group of current and former Central Falls High School students held a candlelight vigil Tuesday evening in honor of the 93 teachers, support staff and administrators who have been fired, effective at the end of the year.

The union representing the city's police has come out against Mayor David N. Cicilline's plan to conduct random drug testing of police personnel, saying that if the mayor attempts to carry out the plan, he should be prosecuted "to the fullest extent" for violating state law.

A New York lawyer hired by the Carcieri administration warned lawmakers on Tuesday that failure to give Twin River's lenders the $5.036 million in financial concessions they are seeking, end dog-racing and slash employment requirements could jeopardize a big chunk of the $252 million in video-slot revenues the state expects from the bankrupt track-and-slot parlor this year, and all $259 million of what it expects next year.

The head of Weaver's Cove Energy delivered a strong response to critics of his proposed $700-million LNG terminal project in Fall River Tuesday afternoon, saying it would be safe, it would not disrupt activities on Narragansett Bay and it would help lower the state's record-high energy and electricity rates.

WARWICK, R.I. — Some of Rhode Island's largest users of electricity have come out for the first time in opposition to a proposed power-purchase agreement between National Grid and the developer of an eight-turbine wind farm in waters off Block Island.

In Michigan, where many enterprises are struggling to survive, the renowned University of Michigan is in the midst of a construction boom and hiring spree. Michigan State University, on the other hand, plans to lay off faculty and cut programs, blaming state funding that is lower than it was a decade ago. Flagship universities in other states are also prospering, while their lesser-known counterparts suffer from vanishing state appropriations. 

So, why not change the arrangement and require big-name universities to take responsibility for their own financing, leaving more state money to support the other state schools? As legislatures face their toughest budget year since the recession began, the idea of giving a few universities autonomy to control their own finances has some appeal.