The East Providence City Council convened to address a wide range of legislative items, including the tabling of a controversial e-bike ordinance, the finalization of park improvement projects, and the establishment of community initiatives. Key deliberations focused on balancing public safety with responsible e-mobility, approving infrastructure contracts, and celebrating recent school district achievements. The meeting concluded with a personal tribute to a fallen local community leader.
Madam Clerk, could you please call the role of the council? Councilman Fogerty. Yeah. Councilman Lawson. Yeah. Council Vice President Regal. Yeah. Councilwoman Susa. Yeah. Council President Rodericks. Here. The record show. All five members of the council are present. Thank you. Please rise for the pledge. Thank you. Uh without objection, uh, before we begin uh the formal order of the agenda, I'm going to ask that we call up or the first item on page four of our docket. Item number three. And Madam Clerk, if you could just read the uh ordinance in question, the summary. An ordinance and amendment of chapter 18 of the revised ordinances of the city of East Providence, Rhode Island, 1998 as amended entitled Vehicles and Traffic, Section One, Section 18-421 entitled definitions of Article 14 entitled Bicycles of Chapter 18 is replaced and amended to include electric bicycles, Section 18-424. Is amended to prohibit the riding of electrical bicycles on sidewalks or public walks and creating a new section 18427, 18428, and 18429 related to the regulations and enforcement of electric bicycles in city parks and recreational areas introduced by Council Vice President Regal and Councilman Fogerty. Thank you, Madam Clerk. This is uh basically the e-bike ordinance. And uh after consultation with the mayor and the police chief um who agree with me, I'm going to ask the council to um hold off on this, take a step back, a breath back, and and table the issue, not to uh do away with this, um, but to tweak the language. Um, I think that we're all are in agreement. We want to hone in on safety and preventing vandalism, and I and I think some misnomers have been spread. So we have time here. Let's take a breath, step back, table it for one of the next two meetings or so and get this uh worked on quickly. Uh so councilman Fogerty, do you have a motion? I would like a motion to table it. Second second, second by uh councilwoman sousa. Also uh councilman Lawson. Uh Madam Clerk, could you just call the role? Councilman Fogerty. Aye, councilman Lawson. Aye, council vice president Rigo. Aye, councilwoman Sousa, aye. Council President Roderics. Aye, thank you. So we'll we'll table it hopefully within the next couple of meetings. Uh we'll we'll have this language tweaked and we'll we'll move ahead. There's there's no rush. When the mayor came to us, it was about vandalism. Right. Exactly. So that's what we'll we'll fine-tune it. Thank you. You all said on that, madam clerk. Okay, we can uh resume the rest of the agenda now from the beginning. Thank thank you, council members.