In Rhode Island, $107,452 won’t get residents very far in the housing market.
That figure – the state’s median household income – doesn’t support an affordable home purchase in any of the Ocean State’s 39 municipalities, according to the 2024 Housing Fact Book, an annual publication compiled by HousingWorks RI at Roger Williams University.
This year’s fact book, which the housing nonprofit released earlier this month, paints a dreary picture for renters as well. Throughout the state, more renters than ever are cost-burdened, meaning they spend at least 30% of their income on housing expenses.
But state leaders and housing advocates see some potential for relief on the horizon from rising house prices and rising rents. In November, voters will be asked to authorize a $120 million bond issue intended to support housing infrastructure in Rhode Island – a cash infusion that is slated to be dedicated to everything from creating low- and moderate-income housing to renovating existing homes to promoting homeownership.
Voters have previously passed four statewide housing bonds, but the amount proposed under Question 3 is larger than ever because housing advocates say the need for housing production is greater than ever.
“While it’s a bigger amount, it’s still not enough,” said HousingWorks R.I. Executive Director Brenda Clement. “We’ve been underproducing since the mid-1980s, so we have a lot of catch-up work to do.
“It’s great to be able to build more units, but we also need to continue to find ways to keep state money and dollar investments into the long-term as well,” she said. “This is not an issue that’s going to go away or be solved overnight.”
The proposal is one of four statewide ballot questions asking Rhode Island voters to approve a total of $343.5 million of borrowing for infrastructure improvements around the state – bonds that are estimated will cost $551.3 million in principal and interest over 20 years, based on a 5% interest rate.
In addition to the request for housing funds, voters will also consider $160.5 million to construct two buildings at the University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College, $53 million for “green economy” projects, and $10 million for grants to art and performance centers and museums.
A few of the ballot questions will have a familiar ring.
In 2022, a $100 million bond issue for repairs and new construction at URI’s Narragansett Bay campus was approved by 58% of the voters. That same year, voters authorized a $50 million “green bond” for environmental and recreation purposes by a 2-to-1 margin.
Along with the statewide bond requests, voters will be asked if a constitutional convention should convene to consider amending or revising the document that sets the state government’s fundamental framework (Editor’s note: See story about Question 1 here).
(caption id=”attachment_479715″ align=”aligncenter” width=”1024″) GROWTH POTENTIAL: Jaime M. Ross, left, assistant professor of neuroscience at the University of Rhode Island, works in a URI lab with pharmaceutical sciences student Lauren Gaspar. If a $160.5 million higher education bond issue is approved, administrators plan to use part of the bond to build a new biomedical sciences building at URI’s main campus and expand research and education in that field. PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO(/caption)
QUESTION 2: Higher education facilities
The University of Rhode Island wants a biomedical sciences building; Rhode Island College wants to create a leading-edge headquarters for its fledgling Institute of Cybersecurity and Emerging Technologies.
That’s why voters are being asked to authorize $160.5 million in borrowing – $87.5 million to construct a biomedical sciences building at URI’s main Kingston campus in South Kingstown and $73 million to overhaul the 66-year-old Whipple Hall on RIC’s Providence campus.
Question 2 coincides with Rhode Island’s recent push to establish the Ocean State as a “hub” for the life sciences. Under this push, Rhode Island leaders seek to establish an in-state life sciences economy comparable in scale to neighboring, smaller communities in the Greater Boston area such as Worcester, Mass., and Mansfield, Mass.
URI President Marc B. Parlange says the university will play a crucial role in this effort.
“The biggest challenge is that, quite frankly, we don’t have enough research and education infrastructure on the Kingston campus,” Parlange told Providence Business News recently. “And this is really limiting life sciences and transformative research.”
The deficient infrastructure is painfully apparent in the university’s lab spaces, Parlange says, where three labs could be crammed into a space designed to hold one.
URI also made an appearance on the 2022 statewide ballot. Two years ago, the university received authorization for a $100 million bond to support construction and improvements at its Narragansett Bay campus, which has a blue economy focus.
Now, Parlange hopes to see history repeat itself, holding that investments in this type of infrastructure will support the broader economy. And benefits could extend beyond Rhode Island, Parlange says, with URI researchers currently developing treatments for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions.
While the square footage of the proposed building was not available, renderings of the project show a three-story structure located on what is an open grass parcel along Flagg Road next to the Center for Biotechnology & Life Sciences. If approved, the new building is expected to be ready for use in 2028 and will have a useful life of about 50 years, according to URI.
RIC, meanwhile, would use its $73 million allocation to transform Whipple Hall into a technology hub for its cybersecurity institute.
Launched in fall 2023, the institute enrolled about 400 students in its first year, but it lacks up-to-date equipment.
Under the bond issue, the proposed building would include state-of-the-art computer labs, secure data centers and dedicated “cyber range” facilities – a virtual environment that simulates real-world cyberattacks and networks.
If the bond issue is approved, RIC says renovations will begin next year and are expected to be completed in 2028, with the work giving Whipple Hall another 50 years of usefulness.
QUESTION 3: Housing and community opportunity
While state leaders and housing advocates – including House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi, who in recent years has spearheaded legislative efforts to increase the state’s affordable housing stock – are optimistic that Rhode Islanders will approve this latest round of housing borrowing, they recognize that the $120 million bond issue won’t serve as a fix-all to the deeply rooted housing difficulties.
In recent years, reports have ranked Rhode Island the slowest state in the country for new housing production. But Shekarchi says that thanks in part to past housing bonds, the Ocean State has started to move the needle on this statistic.
“I wish I could tell you that there was one solution, one bill to stop all the problems,” Shekarchi said. “Unfortunately, there is not. We have many legislative successes, and we need to turn those legislative successes into one thing: production, production and more production.”
If approved, the borrowing would be broken down this way:
• $80 million for the creation of low- and moderate-income housing.
• $20 million for initiatives to increase homeownership among low-, moderate- and middle-income families.
• $10 million for acquisition and community revitalization projects.
• $5 million for site acquisition for affordable housing.
• $4 million for improving housing-related infrastructure.
• $1 million for municipal planning.
Some have taken a more critical stance on the housing bond.
The business-backed nonprofit Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council, for instance, has argued that the proposed bond issue, while historic, would not adequately address the needs of the ongoing housing crisis.
Specifically, RIPEC has said the state needs to place more emphasis on middle-income and market-rate housing; establish a dedicated revenue source for housing investments; simplify its housing programs; and develop more-innovative approaches to combating the housing shortage.
“Our findings suggest that to eliminate the wide gap in affordable housing in the Ocean State, we need both significant additional state resources and substantial improvement on the state’s return on investment,” RIPEC CEO and President Michael DiBiase said in a statement, released as part of the organization’s analysis of the ballot measure.
Meanwhile, Scott Wolf, executive director of Grow Smart Rhode Island, notes that some housing advocates pushed for an additional $30 million in funding, which would have brought the total bond to $150 million.
Grow Smart RI, a nonprofit that advocates for sustainable, equitable economic development, “would have preferred this higher figure,” Wolf said, but he acknowledged that the proposed amount is still “a consequential investment” and supports the plan for a heavy focus on affordable and workforce housing.
QUESTION 4: Green economy
If approved, the $53 million in borrowing would be split among nine uses, the biggest of which would be a $15 million allocation for improvements at Quonset Business Park’s Port of Davisville. Those improvements include new berthing space, a port access road, cargo storage areas and security upgrades at a pier that accommodates imports and offshore wind projects.
Another $10 million would fund the restoration and improvement of the resiliency of local infrastructure, coastal habitats, and river and stream floodplains in the face of increased storms. And an additional $2 million would be made available for 75% matching grants to public and nonprofit agencies making resiliency improvements.
Among the remaining funding, brownfield remediation and economic development; local recreation facilities; an agricultural land preservation commission; and forests and habitat management would each receive $5 million. And the state’s open-space acquisition program and repairs to the Newport Cliff Walk, which partially collapsed in 2022, would each receive $3 million.
The proposed bond issues received high marks from the Rhode Island chapter of The Nature Conservancy, says Sue AnderBois, director of climate and government relations for the environmental nonprofit.
“It’s a great investment for a lot of the work that needs to be done,” AnderBois said, particularly around brownlands remediation and farmland preservation. “A number of these programs are regularly funded through green bonds and fully tapped out.”
(caption id=”attachment_479716″ align=”aligncenter” width=”1024″) INCREASED VISIBILITY? Lorén M. Spears, executive director of the Tomaquag Museum, says the museum’s location in rural Exeter makes it difficult for people to visit. It’s looking to use part of a $10 million bond issue to help relocate the museum to South Kingstown. PBN PHOTO/ELIZABETH GRAHAM(/caption)
QUESTION 5: Cultural arts and the economy
As the state’s only museum dedicated solely to Indigenous history, the Tomaquag Museum last year hosted about 22,000 people through its on-site and off-site programming, says Lorén M. Spears, executive director of the museum.
The museum is located in rural Exeter, near the Arcadia Management Area. Not only are most Rhode Islanders not casually passing through this area, Spears says, but people reliant on public transportation and tourists passing through the state in groups also have difficulty reaching the museum.
The ballot measure asks voters to authorize a $10 million bond for 1-to-1 matching grants to finance “capital improvement, preservation and renovation projects for public and nonprofit artistic centers, performance centers, museums, and cultural art centers.”
Tomaquag Museum’s share would be $2 million, which Spears says would allow the museum to take a step toward establishing a new location on the URI Kingston campus in South Kingstown, which the museum anticipates could attract 150,000 people by its third year.
The Newport Contemporary Ballet and Trinity Repertory Company would also receive $2 million each, with the remaining $4 million left to the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts for matching grants to other arts organizations.
The ballet is hoping to build a Center for Arts, Dance & Education in Newport, while Trinity is looking to expand and upgrade its Lederer Theater on Washington Street in Providence.
“Many of our arts organizations are in historic buildings that require upgrades when it comes to accessibility,” said Todd Trebour, executive director of RISCA. “Improvements to these organizations and infrastructure commonly have a ripple effect on their home municipalities.”
