Rhode Island
Years in the making, R.I.’s first life science incubator labs prepare to open – The Boston Globe
According to Dr. Mark A. Turco, president and CEO of the Rhode Island Life Science Hub, the moment is now only weeks away.
“It’s a very exciting and big year for the state of Rhode Island,” Turco said.
Speaking with the Globe, Turco discussed the lab’s inaugural year ahead, funding, and the pitch he makes to attract companies to the capital city.
Q. What’s it like to finally be arriving at this moment after years in the making?
Turco: Specifically, about Ocean State Labs at 150 Richmond St. in Providence, we have the infrastructure here that can provide companies with resources that many founders could not find in the state, and that caused companies to move out of the area.
It’s really exciting now to have this physical space supporting the pathways from discovery all the way through commercialization.
In September, you announced these five inaugural companies that will move into Ocean State Labs during the first quarter of 2026. Have any moved in yet?
Our first four companies – OncoLux, Inc., Pax Therapeutics, XM Therapeutics, and P53 Therapeutics – will actually move in Feb. 2, and the facility received its certificate of occupancy just prior to the end of this last calendar year. So the month of January here has been really doing some punch list items and moving furniture in and getting the facility ready for science.
The entire lab space can accommodate up to 30 companies. Has the roster grown beyond the inaugural five?
There’s actually six companies that have signed leases to move in, and there are a number of others that are in the pipeline.
What’s the pitch you make to companies about moving to Providence?
One, this is a great state to come and work in. Two, it is also an opportunity for a company coming in to leverage the resources of our academic institutions, as well as leveraging our growing workforce that is becoming more and more experienced in the life science sector. One thing that resonates with companies on the smaller side is that a company moving here to Rhode Island can be a big fish in a small pond.
I think our story is pretty compelling. My hope is that Rhode Island is seen in the life science sector as somebody that could house and manage and work with entities from inception all the way through to commercialization.
The Rhode Island Life Science Hub launched with a $45 million investment from the General Assembly in 2023 and it’s going to need another round of funding this year. What have you heard from lawmakers?
We have submitted an operational budget [and] a capital budget. What we do know is that in the governor’s budget, there is an innovation bond that will be upwards of $115 million that [Rhode Island] Commerce will oversee for defense, marine, and life sciences. So my hope is if the voters were to move forward with approval of the bond, that would give us an opportunity to continue to build out what we are working to do and have done to this date. It’s still a bit unclear where we stand with regards to operational and capital budget requests.
Are you concerned about not being able to get that kind of investment?
As a president and CEO, if you weren’t always concerned about your funding, that would be of concern. But I feel very confident that we will continue to have support to drive these initiatives. The speaker, the governor, the General Assembly, our federal delegations here have been incredibly supportive to date. We as a hub and certainly through our board of directors have had regular conversations with state leadership about continuing the vital work of the Rhode Island Life Science Hub.
What’s your vision for what the incubator will look like at the end of its inaugural year?
My hope is that our incubator becomes a very vibrant community of companies and innovators, and that as we move through this calendar year, there continues to be great work and that some of these companies continue to mature within the Ocean State Labs environment.
We’ve now provided state-of-the-art infrastructure in our state. Let’s work these companies that are now part of that ecosystem to really help them mature.
This interview has been condensed and edited for length and clarity.
The Boston Globe’s weekly Ocean State Innovators column features a Q&A with Rhode Island innovators who are starting new businesses and nonprofits, conducting groundbreaking research, and reshaping the state’s economy. Send tips and suggestions to rinews@globe.com.
Christopher Gavin can be reached at christopher.gavin@globe.com.
(WJAR) — Rhode Island lawmakers are considering several firearm bills on Wednesday.
The House Judiciary Committee will discuss these bills after two mass shootings happened in the region in just six months.
It’s also been nearly a year since lawmakers banned the sale and manufacturing of assault weapons in Rhode Island.
Some of those Bills include:
- A ban on buying more than one gun in a 30-day period
- Requiring anyone looking to possess a firearm excluding police and military, to complete and pass firearm safety training
- One that would ban people with felony convictions from owning a gun
- There is also a bill that would make it permissible for students, professors or employees of any public or private university to carry, and possess a stun gun or pepper spray for purposes of self-defense
One that may not be talked about today but has been introduced, a bill that would outright ban the possession of military-style semiautomatic guns.
Second Amendment advocates are expected to don yellow shirts and pack the state house for the hearing to make their voices heard.
Rhode Island drivers are the most attentive in America, a recent study revealed.
The study, conducted by personal injury law firm Easton & Easton, examined National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Fatality Analysis Reporting System data and Federal Highway Administration licensed driver statistics from 2019 to 2023 and determined Rhode Islanders died in distracted driving crashes less than the residents of any other state, according to a media release accompanying the results.
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“That gamble has cost thousands of American families a loved one in the past five years,” according to the release. “Now, with Google rolling out its voice-interactive ‘Ask Maps’ feature, the question is which parts of the country can least afford one more distraction.”
See also: Rhode Island’s Truck Traffic Densest In Nation: Study
A mere 2.6 Rhode Islanders were killed in distracted driving crashes per year from 2019 to 2023, compared to 639.8 Texans.
But the rate per 100,000 drivers was also impressively the lowest in the nation at 0.34. The state with the highest number per 100,000 drivers was New Mexico with 16.95
Watch: advocate argues for minimum wage in Rhode Island’s going to $20
Affordable Rhode Island’s Michael Beauregard argues that the minimum wage should be $20 an hour, to get closer to what it actually costs to live.
PROVIDENCE – As lawmakers debate raising Rhode Island’s minimum wage, which would impact many grocery store workers, a bill to limit the number of self-checkout lanes at grocery stores is again stirring conversation.
Rep. Megan Cotter, D-Exeter, Hopkinton, Richmond, introduced a version of her initial bill, proposed in 2023, to reduce the number of self-checkout kiosks a grocery store can have open, and mandate the amount of labor required to operate them. Her bill, H 7290, has eight co-sponsors in the House, while Senate President Valarie Lawson, D-East Providence, introduced a companion bill in the Senate, S 2342.
When Cotter’s bill was first introduced, it included a mandate that grocers give a 10% discount to customers who used self-checkout for more than 10 items. The newest iteration scraps that language in favor of a more streamlined approach:
- Grocery stores can have no more than eight self-checkout kiosks operating at one time.
- One checkout line must be manned for every two self-checkout kiosks.
- One worker must be assigned to every two self-checkout stations.
Here’s how the math on the self-checkout proposal works:
For a store operating the maximum number of self-checkout kiosks, eight, this means the store would be running four lines with cashiers at a time. That same store would also need four people monitoring the self-checkout stations, for a total of eight workers across 12 cash registers, both manned and unmanned.
Limiting the number of self-checkout aisles a store can have is all about preserving jobs and hours worked, she previously said.
Why stores are using self-checkout
In 2023, Cotter said her original bill was partially a function of her frustration with using the Walmart self-checkout kiosks.
Problems with self-checkout kiosks abound as each industry, from groceries to pharmacies to hardware to big box stores like Walmart, sets different parameters and triggers on self-checkout machines.
Clements’ Marketplace Operations Director Charles Anthony IV wrote in testimony against Cotter’s bill that the grocery, with locations in Bristol and Portsmouth, installed the self-checkout kiosks to be their “fast lanes.”
“With smaller orders often causing backups across the Front End, the Fast Lanes have helped to maintain a steady pace and take care of our customers more efficiently,” Anthony wrote.
At Target, self-checkout was meant to be limited to people with 10 items or fewer.
Why limit self-checkout?
Cotter’s bill only targets grocery stores. That caught the attention of Rhode Island Food Dealers Association President Scott Bromberg, who submitted testimony against the proposal.
“This proposal is especially egregious because it specifically targets only grocery stores,” Bromberg wrote. “Big box retailers, along with hardware stores, pharmacies, dollar stores, fast food chains and more utilize self-checkout to allow them to deploy their staff where needed most.”
The bill mostly targets traditional grocery stores, but also hits pharmacies, like CVS and Walgreens, but might not include big box retailers like Walmart and Target.
It defines groceries as:
- Raw or processed food or drink
- Prescription and over-the-counter drugs
- Hygiene items when a store also sells food, drink and “miscellaneous household items” like laundry detergent and dishwasher soap.
A grocery store is defined as a business that gets most of its revenue from selling “groceries.”
Shaw’s and Star Market’s Jim O’Leary wrote that 60% to 65% of its transactions are done via self-checkout systems and 10% are done through its drive-up platform.
“Only approximately 25% of customers utilize traditional staffed registers. This distribution highlights the importance of maintaining adaptive service models to accommodate a broad spectrum of consumer preferences, thereby enhancing the overall shopping experience and most importantly convenience,” O’Leary wrote.
Which RI stores use self-checkout?
Stores in the state offer a wide variety of takes on self-checkout.
At many Five Below stores, self-checkout is the only option. Home Depot has replaced most checkout lanes at the front of many its stores with self-checkout lanes.
At the discount grocer Aldi, many stores have open self-checkout kiosks. Depending on how slow business is, it can sometimes take a few minutes for a cashier to return to a regular checkout lane, as employees do double duty as cashiers and stockers. Customers are also expected to do their own bagging.
Stop & Shops usually have a variety of self-checkout kiosks and cashiers, but the kiosks practically shout at customers and the scales, meant to prevent theft, often wrongly register item weights, forcing a worker to override the machine after an item is bagged too quickly, or not quickly enough.
Many CVS stores also have the self-checkout kiosks.
Self-checkouts have also moved into the world of fast food, for example at Taco Bell and McDonald’s, shifting workers away from being cashiers.
Is low-skill labor worth keeping?
The two-self checkout restriction bills are aimed at preserving jobs often classified as entry level or low skill.
The worth and value of those jobs is increasingly under fire by legislators and the business community, especially as the debate over minimum wage increases rages.
Rep. Stephen Casey, D-Woonsocket, made the case during a hearing on March 18 that it would be unfair for the minimum wage to be increased because public sector workers don’t make enough, making an argument that low-skilled labor deserves to be paid less.
“So the average fireman in Rhode Island makes $28.06 an hour, so you’re saying that the guy that’s flipping burgers should make $20 an hour?” Casey asked during the hearing.
That argument also appeared during the debate over a bill to give health care workers time-and-a-half on Sundays, as Woonsocket resident Jason Romblad said he was “amazed that people selling us a pack of gum will get time-and-a-half on these days, but a health care worker who takes care of us when we are sick and hurt do not get it.”
A separate bill to strip caterers and commissary workers of time-and-a-half on Sundays and holidays was lauded by businesses groups that called for ending the practice entirely. National Federation of Independent Businesses State Director Christopher Carlozzi wrote in support of ending the benefit, claiming that paying minimum wage workers $24 an hour on Sundays instead of the mandated $16 (a $64 pre-tax difference for an eight-hour shift) means the difference between opening a shop on Sundays or leaving it closed.
According to the state’s latest Occupational Employment And Wage Statistics, published in May 2025, cashiers, an estimated 9,710 of them in the state, make a mean average of $15.90 an hour. That climbs to $16.67 an hour for “experienced wage.” The entry wage was $14 an hour, the minimum wage in 2024.
In January, the minimum wage increased to $16 an hour and it increases to $17 an hour on Jan. 1, 2027.
Other large groups of similarly paid professions are fast food and counter workers, 12,650 of them; dining room and cafeteria attendants, 2,720 of them; and dishwashers, 2,830 of them.
The statistics count an estimated 493,800 employed, making cashiers 2% of the total employment in the state.
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