Rewrite this post 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 and on Facebook. 1. It appears the phrases “de minimus” and “vegan cheese” will now take their place in Rhode Island political lore, shorthand for the outrageous alleged behavior of David Patten, the state’s property-management chief, during a now-infamous official trip to Philadelphia. An email documenting his “blatantly sexist, racist and unprofessional” conduct finally saw the light of day this week after Governor McKee’s office lost a three-month fight to keep it secret, and the reaction was explosive. The governor has allowed Patten to keep his job while HR and the state police both investigate the trip; in an interview with our Amanda Pitts on Thursday night, McKee neither condemned nor defended his staffer. Patten aside, though, the email also spotlighted the uncertainty surrounding the long-running effort to redevelop the Cranston Street Armory; that was the reason for his trip in the first place, to visit the contractor undertaking the effort, Scout Ltd. While McKee has been willing to allocate tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to other big projects — the soccer stadium, the Superman building, South Quay — he has resisted Scout’s pitch to spend over $55 million transforming the Armory along the lines of Bok, its mixed-use facility in Philly. Scout has strong support from Mayor Smiley as well as West End lawmakers like Sen. Sam Bell and Rep. Enrique Sanchez, but the governor isn’t sold. “We’re going to wait until we see the report that I have asked for to make sure that the representations of it being a good investment are actually true or not,” he told Amanda. No matter what, state money will keep flowing to the Armory, since it costs millions a year just to maintain as is. The Scout executives have their own theories about Patten’s disastrous visit, writing in the newly released email: “We are not sure if this was intended to try to force our hand to walk away from the project — but we are disgusted and shocked by these actions.” 2. Of course, Rhode Islanders still wouldn’t know the details about David Patten’s alleged behavior if not for the successful effort by both WPRI 12 and The Providence Journal to force the governor’s office to release the email under the Access to Public Records Act (APRA). It’s no simple process — Eli Sherman and Tim White spent weeks researching and writing appeals filed with the attorney general’s office, trading legal arguments with the governor’s attorneys as the latter sought to keep the document under wraps. The final decision by the AG’s open-records unit was a vindication for advocates who convinced lawmakers to amend APRA in 2012 by adding a “balancing test” — a provision allowing the AG or the courts to weigh whether on balance the public would be better-served by a document becoming public. Indeed, the AG’s staff noted that one of the legal precedents the governor’s office cited “is of limited application because that case analyzed the withholding of records under a prior version of the APRA that exempted ‘[a]ll records which are identifiable to an individual … employee; including, but not limited to, personnel … records.’ That provision has since been replaced with the balancing test.” (Tim used to joke that under the old version of APRA, any bill signed by the governor could theoretically be exempt from public disclosure just because his name was on it.) Common Cause’s John Marion — one of those who supported the 2012 APRA rewrite — said the email’s release “shows how incredibly important our public records law is, and why the balancing test is a critical tool to unearthing documents like this that are clearly in the public interest.” 3. With less than three months to go until the Sept. 5 primary — and barely two months before the first votes are cast — the 1st Congressional District race remains a pretty sleepy affair. State Rep. Nathan Biah became the first Democrat to exit the primary, swapping out to the smaller-scale special election to replace the late Sen. Maryellen Goodwin. That left the list of Democratic candidates at 15. Aaron Regunberg sought to show a different side of himself to voters, releasing a video in which he talked about his father’s death in a plane crash before he was born. Regunberg was also one of a number of 1st District hopefuls who expressed outrage about the David Patten email; others included Ana Quezada, Sandra Cano and Don Carlson. Quezada was also the latest 1st District candidate to join Kim Kalunian for a live interview on 12 News at 4. There was also some juicy coverage from an unexpected source — Politico’s White House newsletter — about two of the candidates, Gabe Amo and Nick Autiello. Per Politico, Biden administration types are generally supporting their former colleague Amo, who is the first of their ranks to seek federal office. Yet Jill Biden’s former press secretary, Michael LaRosa, has signed on as Autiello’s communications consultant — causing some consternation among Amo’s administration backers. And it’s clear Autiello isn’t going to cede the White House mantle to Amo; a day after the Politico piece ran, Autiello’s campaign released a statement saying he would be attending a Pride Month Celebration on the South Lawn “at the invitation of President Joe Biden and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden.” Meanwhile in the GOP, a potential Republican candidate filed with the FEC to run: Jamestown’s Gerry W. Leonard Jr. And looking ahead to next week, Pawtucket Mayor Don Grebien will roll his endorsement in the congressional race on Monday; hometown candidate Cano is the favorite to get it. 4. Stefan Pryor has his work cut out for him as Rhode Island’s newish housing secretary, seeking to reverse a decades-long trend of underproduction that has left the state with high home prices, soaring rents, and rampant homelessness. During an interview on this week’s Newsmakers, Pryor acknowledged that much of the problem stems from zoning restrictions put in place by the 39 cities and towns to limit growth. But he expressed optimism that major progress can be made just by advancing construction in places where it will be welcomed. “Let’s start with the coalition of the willing,” Pryor said. “Let’s start with the projects that mayors and other municipal leaders and communities want to do and they have legitimate barriers — we can start there and we can get hundreds, even thousands of units built.” Pryor cited two examples of low-hanging fruit for more construction: transit hubs like the new Pawtucket-Central Falls MBTA station, where parking isn’t as big a need, and empty or underutilized properties (think Memorial Hospital and shopping malls). In the latter case, he said, “often they’re accompanied by preexisting infrastructure — water, sewer, roadway — that will support housing.” Pryor is blessed to be in the good graces of Speaker Shekarchi, who has made housing his No. 1 priority and steered over $30 million more to fund housing projects in the new budget. But that blessing can also be a curse: Shekarchi is going to want to see results for all this money and effort before too much time goes by. 5. Perhaps it’s no surprise, but it’s now abundantly clear that the $220 million Superman building redevelopment plan announced with so much fanfare last year is no longer operative. Secretary Pryor, who engineered the deal in his final days as commerce secretary, acknowledged on Newsmakers that the state and developer High Rock are currently in discussions over just how much the project’s cost has risen due to inflation and higher interest rates. And Pryor indicated it will be “months, rather than weeks” before officials can offer any clarity on whether there is a new path forward to revive the state’s tallest building. “I think if there is to be any [financial] ask, and that’s an if — and if we are to embrace any ask, and that, too, is an if — it would be for the next legislative session,” Pryor said. Mayor Smiley, for one, didn’t sound overly concerned when he appeared on 12 News at 4 this week. “These are major projects, and many of the projects like this take many years,” Smiley said. 6. The House zipped through its budget debate in record time on Friday, taking less than three hours to send the $14 billion tax-and-spending plan on to the Senate. Speaker Shekarchi made one significant change at the 11th hour, adding $7 million for early-childhood programs after prodding by rank-and-file lawmakers and advocates. The document won unusually glowing praise from the top House Republican, Mike Chippendale, who praised Shekarchi for working collaboratively on a series of amendments related to Medicaid that the GOP helped craft. However, the budget has left RIPEC CEO Mike DiBiase alarmed about the state of Rhode Island’s education funding formula, which is supposed to dispense…