NEWS & CITY LIFE
O p-Ed | By Barry Fain and Steve Triedman
OP-ED: Providence Home Rule Charter Needs an Old Rule Back Every 10 years, by statute, the City of Providence is required to review its city charter, a process that is presently underway in the City Council. Any agreed upon changes would then be placed on the ballot for voter approval this November. To our mind, it is long overdue to consider re-implementing the old Providence residency requirement for city employment with the goal of both saving money for the taxpayers and, more importantly, improving the functioning of our city. The debate over residency requirements is almost as old as America. “Every matter, and thing, that relates to the city ought to be transacted therein and the persons to whose care they are committed [should be] Residents,” wrote George Washington in 1796. The dollars and complexity involved, of course, are now staggering, but nonetheless just as important. Back in the years when Providence enforced residency requirements, city garbage trucks did double duty as snow plows. And whenever it snowed, Ward 1 (Fox Point) was always plowed first and best. It wasn’t because they started with Ward 1, followed by Ward 2, Ward 3, etc. It was because the drivers lived there, or more likely their mothers and grandmothers lived there! Every neighborhood had laborers, police officers, firefighters, and schoolteachers who were integral active parts of their communities. Many were approachable and you actually knew their names and where they worked; they became mentors and role models. Today, the City of Providence spends $565,000,000 on salaries and benefits, yet over 64 percent of all workers live outside of the city and 80 percent of the critical constituencies – police, firefighters, and teachers – live elsewhere! Which city workers do live here? Recreation department employees, crossing guards, substitute teachers, and paid members of various city boards who earn less than $25,000 annually, more than half of the labor union members, and the school clerical workers. Potentially, a large portion of the $361 million that now leaves the city would be spent in Providence, not to mention the
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ProvidenceOnline.com • May 2022
huge added fuel savings from city workers who drive home to MA and CT. It has long been held that if people who work for the city live here, they’re vested. They understand the people and their needs because they are neighbors. Opponents say residency rules limit the pool of qualified candidates for certain positions – a number that we don’t believe could exceed 5 percent. If you are a Providence employee, you should believe in the city, and the whole purpose of residency requirements is to give public employees a real stake in the city. Adding incentives might be a good way to jumpstart residency. The Home Rule Charter of 1981 required all city employees to live in Providence. This was even upheld by the Rhode Island
Supreme Court. In 1990, residents voted to remove the requirement. Two years later, they brought it back, despite strong opposition from most of the city’s labor unions. The legislature subsequently banned residency altogether. For the record, the US Supreme Court affirmed the legality of residency requirements in 1976. When residency requirements ended, the majority of public employees who moved out of the city were police officers, firefighters, and teachers, and their departure has decimated many neighborhoods. It’s time to bring back residency, and there are some immediate and simple rules that can be implemented. Let’s start with the obvious. All department directors, the Mayor and City Council staff, all Board or
Photo by Josh D
An argument for reestablishing residency requirements as the city charter is up for review
