I don't know if they look at my clubs in the oh you're good.

You're good.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Thank you for joining us.

Tonight we are at the Providence Housing Price Task Force.

Tonight is September 15th.

Madam Clerk, please call Mariah.

The woman Eric Harris, present by Sherman Feder, I see now.

Right.

Present.

You have high president.

Let the records show that we also have our legal department here, which is I'm gonna call Leo Linor.

And we also have our people from policy have June rules and we go down.

And as always, we have our one for one concurrent.

Um at this time, I'm going to ask that uh number one.

Oh, yes, right.

Yeah.

It's been a long time.

I know that's the moment.

Um Madam Clerk, please read the items.

Um records.

I am number one.

Discussion involved in a housing crisis back for thank you.

It was easy.

At this point, uh, I want to ask for a motion to cover two exhibits, and we'll get decided way, and we'll get a lot of discussion.

One is this report, and I would like to get a motion uh to identify it as nine are in the records.

Councilman Green, second by Espinal.

All in favor, I have it.

Uh the second one is a testimony, it's only one testimony.

Um from Dave Susan, and it is uh read into the record at 10j.

Oh, it's two.

Yes, two.

Okay, two, all right.

Two and double wins.

Uh and it's reading at 10j and 11k.

11k.

Okay, 11k.

Um 11k.

10j and 11k.

10j and 11k.

Okay.

Now that we get that all out of the way.

May I have a um may I have a motion, please?

Second.

Motion made by Roy, second by now.

All in favor.

All right.

All right.

Just to begin this report, I would like first to start with uh Miguel Young.

And the reason we want to start with Miguel Young, we just want oh, that's right.

That's right.

I forgot we have June roles at the table, so you guys got a least nine years.

Um we have June roles and June is gonna give us like a highlight of how we all started.

Okay, this thank you.

Of course.

Hi everybody, I'm Jim Rose, Chief of Staff for the Public City Council.

Uh when I started with the council last January, um, I was told about this group of counselors that we had this task force with a couple of landlords sitting on it and some young homeowners, um, that there were new counselors who had just been elected and then long time legislative legislators finishing um their last term, um, and that they were deeply engaging with experts um from throughout the city.

And I was told that those experts were coming in with binders of information and with research and data and polls and ideas and strategies that there was kind of comparative analysis of what's going on in other cities when it comes to the housing crisis, how are other folks addressing it?

And then that there were landscape analyses of what the housing market and housing crisis looks like here at home.

And when I heard this right when I started, I thought, wow, that is exactly what we need.

And I saw you know, this task force dig deep into the multi-layered uh housing crisis, which, as we all know, is a crisis of costs and of supply and of safety.

Um, and in doing so, I saw the task force um put forward tons of information that we can use to turn into a report.

Um, and we've spent many months digging through all that information that came out of the meetings this task force has held.

Uh the task force worked with and heard presentations from the Providence Housing Authority, Providence Redevelopment Agency, the Rhode Island Continuum of Care, the Rhode Island Department of Housing, Center for Justice, Mayor Smiley's administration, Crossroads, Rhode Island, and your own policy staff.

And this was all done in this room out in the open in front of the cameras in front of your constituents.

Um I think that that deserves to be uplifted as a model for good governance and public research.

What you have in front of you today in this report summarizes the deep work that you all did in your time on the task force.

It explores the statistics that we heard in those meetings when we looked back, um, such as that Providence experience is the experience the highest rent increase in the nation from March 2023 to March 2024, or that Rhode Island ranks 50th nationwide in new housing permits.

The report highlights the extraordinary work this council has already done, um, such as putting zoning reforms and anti-displacement measures in the 2024 comprehensive plan, making a massive, massive investments in the affordable housing trust, um and ban a rent setting algorithms most recently.

Um, and it captures the policy recommendations that we heard in this room that resonated the most with task force members.

I especially want to uplift um the leadership and the exceptional work of Chair Harris, um, for whom this beautiful report and it really is aesthetically beautiful as well as beautiful at a content level.

Um, you know, I really think that this is a true legacy piece for the chairwoman.

Um so I want to uplift that.

She put a ton of time into getting this right.

We saw it as staff.

Um, and um, you know, so did uh Vice Chair Espinall and every member of the task force of whom we've all had conversations with over the months and years that this task force is met.

Um I think that deserves a lot of praise.

The report demonstrates that the housing crisis is complex, that there's not any one singular solution as much as we might try to find one.

That creating a more affordable city and stopping the tide of displacement uh that is pushing working class residents out of their homes and neighborhoods requires a full buffet of approaches.

Not everyone is going to agree with every single recommendation.

I think we all know that.

Uh, but what this report is captures all those various recommendations that that may very much help our city and sets us on a course for the real work ahead, which is the legislative.

This task force demonstrated how to work together to put out something powerful.

Uh, but I think it's important to note that today no law is going to be changed, no incentive is going to be creative, no bad uh behavior is going to be curved.

That work is everything that follows.

Uh, and it will have to be done in a smart way that is tailored to the very specific needs of our very diverse city.

Um, and with that, you know, as a Providence resident and renter, um, I just want to say I'm I'm very personally grateful to the hard work this task force.

And I'm gonna hand it over to Miguel Young, so no, I'm before you to Miguel, thank you so much for that presentation and definitely letting us know how far we came.

And you just led right into what I would love to say to this committee.

There's nothing more committed to than being around people who really care about uh the issue that we have.

You guys really, I have never worked, and I've been here 10 years with a cruel people are group of people who have seen the need and know that we in a crisis right now and really taking it serious.

This work would not be what it is today.

If you guys wouldn't have been committed to the table, I want to thank him for all the from you.

I want to thank both you, Councilwoman Green, and uh Vice Chair Esplanore for making it clear that it's more than just um just um build new shelters as well, but we also have to think about landlords, rentals and all of that.

So you guys were very clear on how the education we brought to the table and you really emboking on the fact around you know um the encampment and how important it was that we really take care of people.

The dive that you did in so many other things, even coming out with a policy already.

So we are really really fortunate to have such great workers here in the city of Province, especially here in the city council who have taken this work very, very serious.

So that's my skill.

Now we're gonna dive right into what is in here, and we're gonna think here from Miguel Young Subdub.

We have the tools.

Great.

Thank you very much, Chair.

Um and members of the task force, thank you for uh letting me come before you again to talk about this.

I was trying to think of the last time.

Um, I think I presented it now a few times to this task force, and um just sort of what I hope to do now is sort of jog your memory and uh how I always view my work and when it's whether it's task force or other matters of council business is I try to uh reflect back what I hear from you all, and even like respond to questions, input and um I'd say of all the work I've done with this council, this has been one where I've gotten so much detailed feedback, and it's actually been really good.

It felt so collaborative.

Um, and I hope each of you, when you sort of flip through this, you see a bit of your own perspective reflected back at you because I heard from all of you, and every single thing in here is either something that was presented to you, or something that um you all generated on your own individually and then discussed as a group.

Um, if you remember I was before you, I think it was in March, and we had uh an outline, and we really broke down the outline.

And I had a red pen with me that day.

And I think I remember sitting right here, and I left this room with so much red ink on the page just based on the feedback.

So um, I guess we can just kind of move through what you have before you now, and um, you know, discussion, questions, anything can sort of blossom from this overview.

But you'll see right at the beginning, there's a really nice table of contents that kind of breaks it down basically.

This is all of it, um, in four sections.

Um the executive summary, I would encourage all of you to sort of read on your own if you haven't.

That covers it all.

We do get into the numbers and uh think about numbers and think about statistics is they obviously always change year by year.

And these numbers have held true, and some of the precise figures, especially dollar amounts have frankly increased since this was written last year, but that's sort of the nature of statistics.

I think that it um really captures the trend, and all of sort of Rhode Island has been either first or last in a lot of a lot of categories.

First in like uh, or I guess it depends on how you look at it, like last in new housing development, first in like increase of housing cost, value, rent, all of that sort of trickles down.

So it's it's going to be that Rhode Island has defined itself on the sort of fringes of all these designations, and you see that in housing prices by the youngers.

Um as you flip through, you begin to see um I think an important clarification that was made, and this is something that was came out of the amount of presentations you already, which is acknowledging that a lot of these recommendations are some of them are long-term actions.

Um, I think that to address a housing crisis, it is a balance of both.

There was uh it took a lot of years to get us to this point, and I it's not unreasonable to realize that it may take a lot of years to fix some of the sort of hole we found ourselves in.

So that clarification comes clear.

And then you get into um, well, I think I just missed an important part that actually talked about the comprehensive plan just for a second.

That um page number, use the page numbers, page 10.

Yeah, nine and ten.

So I thought it was also very important because this comprehensive plan process, as we were working on the outline of this report, and as you all were um receiving presentations, you're also working on a comprehensive plan.

But I feel like every time I bring up the comprehensive plan, I see like feeling eyes like, oh my god, because that was such a process.

And many of you sit on the ordinance committee.

I know we have the chair of ordinance committee, the comprehensive plan was took up so much time, and what was produced was this like sort of really incredible collaborative work and a plan that when I was looking at the presentations you all received in the housing task force, it really dawned on me that the work that went into the comprehensive plan really addressed exactly what you were.

So I thought it was very important to acknowledge that that like um work has been done, that you all have done a lot of work.

And so this sort of acknowledges that.

This is where you get into things like the sort of zoning.

The I think the word that always went in that comprehensive plan was like thoughtful density is sort of imagining what the city can look like and what it should look like, stuff like that.

So that is also reflected in this report.

And then you get into uh what I would say on page 14 is a part of this report that's really talked about supply and housing supply.

Um, something that came up a lot in the presentations around housing, talks a lot about housing supply.

Um, our own department housing talks a lot about it.

And um at one point, uh trying to remember which of you, I think it might have been you, counselor Royus really had this real idea about an affordable housing plot.

Something that really mapped out what the trends are throughout the city.

And when I think about this now, I even think about um sort of this budget cycle that we just went through.

And we have this big document that showed trends in housing prices in each ward.

And I think that is a step in the direction of what an affordable housing report.

That's the type of information that would be inside of that.

And of course, it would be expanded, but I think you all remember that big sort of packet of tables, and you're looking through how the tax rates, what are the um valuations, how do they impact each of your wards.

And I remember watching each of you like flip to your own ward just to like see what's happening in your neighborhood.

And that to me, I think is emblematic of what an affordable housing report could look like.

So that really sets the stage for seeing the city, seeing what's happening around the city, and um number two in this section on page 16.

I think also came this especially came out of the presentations you outreach.

Um, this was a perspective of builders, really reflecting back what we're hearing from builders in this city and how um challenging it can be to go through the sort of permitting process.

And I also find that this perspective is shared by members of your community.

And when I say that, it's because I think when the process is clear about how an affordable, how a development comes to be, it helps everybody.

Um, I've also been at a lot of community meetings with you all, and people are like, when did this, when was this approved?

How was this approved?

Those questions coming from the community, I think also benefit from a clear um permitting process and incentives for affordable housing.

And then inside this, and number two, I think something that's very, very, very interesting that's come up a lot, and you'll see it's about halfway down the page, it's in bold, um, a bridge TSA.

Uh, this I can personally state being in the office, um, is something that uh is requested a lot because the what we hear from builders and we hear from developers is the even the ability to plan out a project with the random increases, I want to say random, you have things like suddenly tariffs all of a sudden are in our life, and the cost to build suddenly changes dramatically and really impacts the plan to finish a process, uh to finish a building, and it puts them in this sort of weird place where all of a sudden they're getting a tax bill that and a bridge TSA would be a short version of the TSA that would allow a project to come to uh fruition before um you know it really the tax rates really land on it.

And uh I've been in ordinance committee meetings when this sort of tension has come up a lot throughout the city.

So that's something specific I want to point out.

But moving along, um, another conversation that has been had a lot by this task force is this creation of a land aid.

Um I think this conversation often comes up on here all of you talk about places in your ward where you have just sort of land that's sitting there, and it's like it's this frustration that I hear reflected out of community meetings at committee meetings where you say to yourself, okay, we have this lack of affordable housing, but I see places in my board where there's like there's there's there's like possibilities elsewhere.

But I see places in my ward where there's like there's there's there's like possibilities elsewhere.

And this this land bank is a way of sort of organizing that and sort of preventing speculation, people sitting on land until it's like good to build on, stuff like that.

So that's where this came in.

Um, you know, when you read through this, another thing we really try to integrate are um examples from other cities, something I think you know is very important to all of you here.

Um, Atlanta, Atlanta does a lot of really interesting work um similar to this.

And you know, Atlanta is one of those metro areas that's the size of Mariah.

So, you know, um they're keep that if they're able to do it, it's the type of thing that you know, Providence feels really well positioned to be able to accomplish.

So moving even further in this section on supply, we've got public developer social housing.

This is a really big conversation.

This is a really big plan.

Um we spent a lot of time working on this in the report, um, a lot of conversations, even in previous task force meetings about this idea.

Um, there's it's in fact, it's a conversation that happens in the state house a lot as well.

And if you go to the state house and you bring up Montgomery County, that uh Montgomery County, Maryland alone sort of evokes this concept of a public developer.

And it's uh just one approach that the city could take to sort of take control of the housing supply, specifically the affordable housing supply.

And this is a very detailed section and a case study in Montgomery County in Atlanta, I think is really um uh it's just like really profound and insightful.

And it's as you can see, it's one of the longer ones, three three pages.

Um, and last but not last in this section, but I think um something that I heard counselors talk about.

I think it's something that this council can be proud of is I think the city, the council with the administration, I think can be really proud of the Providence Housing Trust Fund in the last couple of years.

Um I know that the department of our uh planning department and housing came before you all and spoke about the housing trust fund and how money sort of moves through it and the amount of gap funding that went into various projects.

And um, I guess speaking personally, I've been working with y'all since 2023.

And from when that conversation happened of Providence Housing Trust Fund, ARPA dollars, gap funding projects from that point to now.

We can now walk into neighborhoods and see full-on developments that are done, affordable housing involvements, uh general movie.

Some great ones on Broad Street over there that are amazing.

And it's like before our eyes, they were built, and it's like using these tools the city has.

Um, so I think that's uh really kind of worth celebrating for the city, just my opinion.

Um then finishing out this section, you have uh inclusionary zoning.

This was something that was discussed in the comprehensive plan.

And uh just to give you all, you know, I guess you probably waiting.

You know that uh the zoning ordinance, which the comprehensive plan is meant to inform, is being tackled in two phases.

That second phase is coming.

So uh inclusionary zoning is going to be mentioned or discussed in that second phase.

So I think that this section is important for the coming days, especially again for those of you on ordinance committee when the second phase of the zoning margins comes up.

So that's supply.

That's sort of how we break this up, supply, and then this next section, we I kind of moved ahead here, page 26, and I guess I want to pause every now and then.

Um, I want to allow questions, conversations you all are on the task force.

Yeah.

Um so this next section, I would say the first was supply.

This section kind of really looks at demand, rental market regular regulation.

Um, I kind of want to move quickly because this is a long report, and I'm babbling a bit.

I think you all are the ones we want to hear from.

So you're gonna see things that you all recommended.

I remember vacancy tax being a big conversation.

Um, and what I think is so cool is number two in this section, rental algorithm price setting ban, that's already happened.

You all did that since this report was even worked on, which I think is great.

Um, page 28, uh, Councilman Peterson.

This one really came about with all the conversations we have with you and the work you've been doing on student housing in your ward.

And I know there's a lot of work to be do there.

And I think this speaks to that.

Then you get into some big big items like a rental registry, rent stabilization.

Rent stabilization on page 30 is another pretty big section in this report.

And if you really read through it, you're going to see that it really is worded as you know how how can rent stabilization lead work for Providence.

And there's a lot of examples of different cities to use it.

And taking um different components from different cities and really working to what works best for Providence key considerations, I think, is um uh how this section is really phrased and how it was structured to not give one blanket recommendation but get a lot of options that can be worked on to make whatever's best for all of the residents of province.

And then the final section has to do with tenant protections.

Um it's actually not the final section.

Uh there's one more after this, but tenant protections.

This was also a big topic of conversation in the presentations you all reached, or you all received.

And this section really went hand in hand with the homelessness and the unhoused uh presentations and discussions you all had, which were numerous.

And you know, one thing that was stated time and time again to this task force is the best way to sort of address homelessness in the city is prevention, preventing homelessness.

Um seen how challenging it is to address it in real time on the streets and preventing homelessness was said time and time again to this task force is across the nation proven the best approach to a homelessness crisis in the city.

And you know, tenant protections are a big part of um that prevention of homelessness.

And the final section is homelessness and emergency shelter.

That's on page 30.

Um this is where crossroads you know came in, and there was a lot of conversation here that this task force had.

And this section really tries to encapsulate all of that conversation.

Um, the whole report is forward looking.

I think this section, especially so it's trying to think about like what is the future of the city?

How can we sort of get this under control?

And how can the city support?

How can you all as a council?

I remember there are a lot of sort of almost, I don't want to say frustration because I don't want to project that onto you all, but there's a lot of questions about like what can you do as council for this issue.

Um, this section uh sort of tried to capture and reflect that a lot of where your conversation there went.

So that's it.

Those are all the recommendations.

I kind of flew through that.

Um then the report really does end acknowledging all of the stakeholder engagement you all did.

Um I think uh, you know, I met with each of you individually about this report and as a group.

And this section, I think um, we really uh heard a lot of feedback about how important this is, because this is where the sort of uh validity of this whole report comes from is that you heard from experts.

And with that, I think I'm gonna say something that I said to you before when we were talking about the online.

You know, the amount of presentations you all reached or you received from some of the best experts the state has to offer, you know, people pay for that, and they get like an associate's decree for that amount of presentation.

So you all almost like qualify for degree to some extent with the amount of information and notes you all receive.

So that's uh that's 45 pages in 10 minutes.

So um, yeah, if there's any questions or any discussion.

I also want to um definitely acknowledge and get credit to us, um, seeing staff for being so on and all we must have changed this.

I don't know how many times as you know, committee tiers, and then sometimes we have three weeks change, but you beared with us as staff, and you were able to get us to this report at one time.

I think it was 90 something pages.

So you know, I'm so um happy that we were able to just uh you know be able to bring it and um yeah and sync it down in a way that we can be able to work with it or see exactly some of the main things that this that you received from us as you were helping us put this together.

So we want to thank our team staff.

We want to thank council president as well, along with the work that we've been to one long.

So with this, I we've heard from Miguel.

I'm gonna open the floor and please raise your hand for any statements.

If not, I would like very much to hear from councilwoman Peterson on the work that you definitely did here, and why you felt it was important to work in student housing, right?

So it's important to talk about yes.

You have to dive into this stuff.

This is like grass.

I mean, we had to go like roofs, you know, like yeah, down to the roofs of the poor.

So please tell us about your um so where do we begin?

I want to thank everybody.

This is a really well thought out report.

Um there were, I remember we were all sitting in these meetings um month after month and really listening into the advocates and the people that were talking to us about the key, the niche issues that they were dealing with with respect to whatever it was they were dealing with in housing.

And um it makes a lot of sense that this is this as robust as it is, and encapsulates pretty much everything that we talked about.

So I want to thank you guys for really taking this on.

Um, it is a big undertaking.

And um, with regards to how it kind of um culminated in my neighborhood, you know, one of the things that I um I encountered when I walked my neighborhood to run, and it was something that I originally um I had originally not necessarily put a hundred percent of my attention to, but it was something that there was no other way but to go into it to be able to address the continued concerns of neighbors.

Um you guys all know, and councilwoman graves, you live right next to us, so you understand.

Um ward 14 is represents Elm Hurcy Massa, and we kind of abut where that is, but the entirety of a college is right in the middle of the ward.

And for a really long time, the density of what student housing was kind of relied on it was stayed within four or five streets mainly.

Um, and over the last I would say 10 years, you've seen it increase.

It's kind of gone outwards, it's really kind of splattered all in different places.

But I think one thing that really was the most captivating was that, and it and it really all started with quality of life issues.

It really all started with just behavior and um conduct and not a whole lot of support from the college when you said, hey, we could really use some help kind of trying to figure all of this out.

And so oftentimes in the very beginning, I think when we walked when I walked in, I was like, hey, looking to see where we can kind of figure out and partner on some of these things.

Um this one pointed its finger to the other one, the other one pointed its finger to the other one, and then that was it.

Like nobody else was really addressing the main quality of life issues there.

And then slowly but surely we ended up seeing that all of a sudden one dead end street was kind of taken and purchased up for student housing, and then the other side of the street, little by little, and the amounts and what when we started, we established a student housing task force to try and alleviate or at the very least address some of the concerns that neighbors had when we opened up the floor to everybody.

We invited students, developers, school, and neighbors, and the only people that came were neighbors, the schools and one developed.

Sometimes a couple of developers would be there every now and then.

But um, when we asked for student support or student reaction or student feedback, it was more of a well, we don't actually know how neighbors are going to react to the students, so we don't want them to be there.

Okay, so we need to be able, this is our community, right?

We need to be able to address these things, but there's a larger conversation at play.

Um the school continues to expand, right?

And where are the students, where are the students going to go?

And what does that look like in the kind of the grand scheme of things of what our neighborhoods look like?

Um in fairness, in fairness to the neighbors, they're just exhausted.

They're over it.

They don't want to deal with the issues.

They would rather just find a way to leave instead of wanting to stay and maintain where they've been for decades.

And that for me is probably the biggest problem of all is where we can just throw money at a situation and say, hey, no, it's good, you can leave.

It's okay.

But and where do you go?

And um, I think there was a picture that a neighbor had sent me where there was a development on liege, um, where he's just looking at the demolition of his property.

After he agreed he was going to sell it, but he's just watching the demolition of his property.

And I have to, I have to tell you that that gave me an enormous amount of sadness because this man had spent decades there, right?

And while I understand that students need a place to live and all of these things kind of need to coincide, there is a larger conversation that needs to be had when it comes to what that does with the rentals in the area.

Um, the gentrification of a neighborhood that was a working class neighborhood, and how do we adapt to all of it?

Or what actually does an adaptation to this look like, right?

So we met for two years, roughly, just about two years, um, and trying to figure out what other places did.

And um places like Cambridge did something, places like Philadelphia did something else, New Orleans did a different thing.

And it was a really robust conversation with city counselors from all over the country of saying, hey, what'd you do?

Did it work?

What were the hiccups?

How is this moving forward?

What do you think are the what was the plus and the minus of this?

Um really understanding what the takeaway was for them to be able to then say, what can we do to move forward here?

So we addressed it by doing quite a few things.

And some of them are up for conversation now.

We've presented them and we're looking forward to public hearing on that.

Um hopefully we'll do that sooner than later.

Um but really what it comes down to is really just figuring out a way to address all of it.

And, you know, I I'm seeing, I'm hearing from my neighbors that there's now this sudden urgency from the developers in the neighborhood to petition out against what's happening and um send out Google forms to people and saying, hey, how is this working out for you?

Do you like the students?

And it's not about that.

It's how do we address the growing concerns that we continue to have in a way for all of us to grow together?

It's not about anti-student versus pro-student.

It's not versus anti-school or anti-enrollment.

It's really just about how do we continue to grow together.

And I believe that the ordinances that we've presented help us do that.

I'm not saying that they're perfect end all be all solutions to it, but I am saying that they are opportunities for us to grow.

And so we've addressed it by doing a probably a variety of five that address um overlay district as well as nuisance issues, as well as the licensing of student housing because it's specialized housing.

And I believe that if you are going to be very specific and only catering to one demographic, then you should you should be classified as such.

And onward, um, an impact fee, which is something that we've promoted, I mean we've pushed forward.

So these are just small solutions that I think are the start of a larger conversation that will allow us to um enhance the conversation of what student housing is.

We have anywhere from eight to 12,000 students that come off campus every single year.

If that if we're not talking about the impact that it has on our neighborhoods, well, I'm sorry, but we should have been doing this at least 10 years ago.

So this is like I said, just an opportunity to kind of build off of what um or start the cut, um start the process of really honing in what our regulation should look like on such specific housing.

Um, and with regards to everything else in here, um, you know, I'm uh I'm a person that believes that we should always um we should always find a way to create a um an okay medium for everybody.

And one thing that I do always worry about, and this is really just in my background of the different boards that I've sat in, um is home ownership and affordable homeownership.

Um one of the things that I noticed in here that I'm I wish we could do more of is really talk about what homeownership looks like, right?

We're creating these spaces for rentals and rental units and tenants, and with the way the price of apartments are, I don't think anybody's gonna have an opportunity to ever be able to save to be able to become a home homeowner.

So those are real very realistic things, and um that I think that we should also kind of pay attention to.

But this is um this is a really great um start to a larger conversation that needs to happen within this council.

So I really thank you guys for that.

Thank you so much for sharing this is an example of what our staff heard from us and was able to get and then be able to take in this message and have such a report that we're able to say these are the things that's impact in our neighborhood, right?

In our neighborhoods, and our constituents are the people who are coming to us and saying do something about it.

I mean um we we uh we know this is not perfect.

Yeah, we're not saying it's a perfect document, but what we are seeing is to begin.

I'm gonna stop talking and allow some of my other uh committee members to speak up now and just share your you know, your thoughts, your work, because you did a lot of work.

It's all right to brand.

Um what you did, and we deserve it.

We deserve it.

Three years is a long time, and you know, having space and all the documents that we've looked at and going back and forth.

So, yeah, absolutely.

Um everybody talk at the same time, but I didn't oh I'll just say chairs.

Um it's been so long that I forgot it looked like uh to be honest.

Wow, this looks pretty impressive.

Um I just any tool that I can possibly think of to solve the housing crisis is in is in this report.

So I'm I'm thrilled with it.

Um I can't uh wait for final passage of it and um uh for the uh rest of the residents to take a look and when um look at all the hard work this this uh task force did as long as as long as our along with our council's back.

Thank you, sir.

I see thank you, uh so uh it I am grateful to everyone that has such a tremendous input uh to come up with this um report.

It is the uh culmination of uh three years worth of work.

And as counselor Roy uh said, uh there are things in here that could be useful tools to address the housing crisis.

Um so I am really glad that we had a response discussion because uh we have discussion.

Uh but the final product here, or what appears to be defined product has not been uh presented to the public at large.

And I'm glad everybody said tonight uh and those on our watch for home.

Uh Miguel and Jul did an excellent uh presentation about this report.

Uh they took a lot of the components and elements that we uh together started to go through.

But I just go back to the uh comprehensive plan which address uh began to address many of the areas that we need to start needed to address in order to uh enable us to uh cure this issue of lack of house uh starts with the flexibility that the comprehensive plan have uh we put in over a year worth of work in that and over that comprehensive plan is gonna expand uh the essentially grown new sort of limit a necessary uh requirements or we've been building all housing uh with our resistance improvement and drawing, uh limited real development and a whole host of uh steps uh that we took and covered in the balance of the plan.

Um because it is about building more housing.

Uh we can also uh highlight the uh housing front fund and the work of the PRA, which through the gap finances mentioned earlier, uh over the last I believe three years has been 55 million dollars that we have provided that has to produce or maintain uh close to 2000 units.

And I think that you begin to see and feel the impact of all those units now for the first time.

I'm actually starting to see uh signs or parents for rent.

Uh and that is a good sign because uh we uh begin to meet the uh demand that exists.

So along with that, uh, there are certain areas within the report that still gives me a little pause and I want to be cautious about that.

Uh, because when we know that the solution is to build more housing, uh, we want to incentivize to encourage those that produce more housing, uh, because I think that uh the ability for residents to be able to live in providence and raise the family here uh is the result of a partnership, and that partnership is between an owner and landlord and tenant.

So um we don't have we will not have any more units uh unless we have investors that are willing to choose providence to invest here.

So when it gets me in reports, if I see uh some of the uh tools that are here, then I'll highlight one, and that is because uh we the letters are being sent in uh conversations that we can have, and I will really like to discuss different problems uh because we need uh at the point where we need to talk about that, and that is the uh tenant uh first uh first of these okay, yes, uh first by the refusal, it's 35 uh big five is also that is when I rated is that uh if you were to sell your house, if you're an investor, you uh reach a point uh you a mom and pop you simply own a tenement house, uh, and you reach upon that you want to sell it.

Uh then you know you have to offer it to the tenant if this was and if the tenant would have I believe it's what it's uh like 90 days to decide if they want to uh go ahead and express an interest.

But if that doesn't go through, then you have to go over to the nonprofits, and that'll be an additional pretty much in my understanding unless I'm wrong.

Uh, and also if that doesn't go through, then you go to uh other partners and the nonprofit sectors.

So you could kind of approach a scenario where uh someone wants to sell their home for whatever reason, whatever the circumstances are they're going through in their lives, but now you gotta wait at least close to a year to be able to book a house on the market.

And in my view, I think that that could be uh that could actually have the ability to discourage uh investors to discourage people from buying and investing in providence.

Uh better law with the uh rent stabilization, which can be misunderstood.

Uh, but also know that in the book that says that the council should explore the possibility of rent stabilization, it's not telling you that you left it.

It opens up the door for the discussion, I don't have an issue with that.

Um when you look at this uh tools that are in here, uh it really makes you think it that is part of what we're trying to accomplish.

It all makes me feel like we're defeating the purpose because we're putting measures in place, uh, such as the comprehensive plan and that uh other measure that Miguel and Joe uh spoke about, uh, but at the same time, that the all of that is going to be the result of the partnership, it's gonna be the result of people having an interest of investing in the city or province.

If that doesn't happen, then everything falls apart because you need people to invest in province.

So that is uh one of the concerns that I have uh uh with which I uh question the result of that.

Um you could come across again a uh hypothetical scenario from one that is more realistic, uh, with a tenant or if a homeowner has an issue with a tenant that could probably be in the process of the eviction, uh, and that tenant, uh that landlord wants to sell the house, but now that owner has to get an okay from the tenant that he or she is a victim.

That's a conflict right there.

So when you combine some of this, um it gives me pause, because that was to be enacted in such a way.

Also, I want you to keep in mind that when you talk about the price over a unit, uh is not just the owner that comes up with the price.

There is a formula, you know, you got to take into consideration the cost of acquisition.

Um until today, which is a year, the last couple of years, you could buy a tenement house in Providence for 200 or 100,000, 250.

Uh, but unless you come up with around 700,000, you're not going to get that.

Uh so when you talk about 700,000, 10% that you gotta come up with $70,000.

That's a large investment.

But the uh $630,000, that mortgage is gonna be up for around $5,000.

Now, when you take that $5,000, you need to divide it into three units or into two units.

That right there is going to tell you what the initial rent is going to be.

Uh, then you that's just the mortgage payment.

You also have to take into consideration uh water, sewer, taxes, insurance, cost of maintenance, cost of operation, advertising.

Uh, you know, some of those there, you have no control of case, right?

Uh utilities, uh, but sometimes that doesn't take like anywhere.

We just had a tax increase.

We end without having to do that in order to be able to balance the budget.

So insurance is through the roof, or it's I don't know what they think provenance is, but an average uh revenue insurance, it's even a five, six thousand dollars, and that's five thousand dollars a month.

Uh there are factors that contribute to the cost of an apartment.

It's not just a landlord that says, well, next month I'm gonna ask for so much for my farming.

There is a formula, there is a need that needs to be met, because when that need is not met, then you have four closures.

Because people just walk away uh from their investments.

I mean these are life savings, this is a life investment, it's a long investment, it's uh an investment for uh for your family to keep it in your family.

So I want everyone to take that into consideration.

So there are landlords, yes, that they're I mean, it's like a society, there are a little bit of everything.

You you do have a lot of, you know, we'll increase your rent a couple of times a year.

But but the majority don't uh there are a few people out there, and again, I'll emphasize on the need of uh investors and the need of people to buy homes because they are the ones that are gonna make units available for the tenants.

Uh the conditions, it's something I will look at.

So I'll start from now, my chair.

Thank you so much.

Um, before the councilman race, I want to first of all thank you for your leadership on the comprehensive plan, because this was the same kind of thing where you know, so many people had so many opinions, and even the public, but you had to make a decision in order for us to be able to change the landscape of being able to create more housing.

And because of the uh decisions that that committee made on the one is committed under the leader share, there is houses popping up in my neighborhood, they look tiny, but you know what?

Somebody can live in it.

It'll be one less person on the street.

You know what I'm trying to say in that house.

I'm I'm very passionate about the fact that everybody deserves a right to a house of what they had our shelter.

I'm very serious about that.

However, I feel like there's a lot of things that we have to work out according to your conversation with that.

And um, I'm not doing saying you're not against match stabilization.

What you want to do is make sure we get it right.

Am I hearing that?

And sorry.

Uh we need consider all factors, not just the uh results factor that a landlord is just any crucial rent because here she doesn't care.

Okay, thank you.

I just wondered, yeah.

Um blind in Rhode Island.

There was only five minutes about representative.

One night and then went uh I was like two or a thousand.

So it's so a lot in the market beginning to increase.

Right.

And that's because this uh uh city council started to take housing very serious, you know, for years and years.

The reason we in the mess with him, then it is a it's a I mean, right here, just even this is hard to do, but we cannot continue to keep as politicians kicking can down the road and not dealing with the worst.

There's gonna be good and bad in everything, right?

However, I think the work that we have done, I'm so proud of you guys.

You know, I'm leaving, but I'm just like celebrating, celebrating this, something because you guys took this serious.

I came in here in 2015 yelling, there's a house and crisis in my neighborhood, people living in the street, nobody was listening.

Then later on, we started having creative leaders who stepped up and said, you know what?

This is a very serious thing.

Politicians should.

We started holding the state accountable.

We brought the state to the table and said, No, we wanna see this really be real for the people.

We cannot continue the way we're going.

We have to continue in a way that we are creating opportunity housing for everybody.

Everybody deserves a right to a house or a place to live or roof over their head.

So your work encompassed plan, your clear clarity and your thoughts on how you think about things is very, very important.

And we're gonna continue sitting at the table because I just wanna say, and Councilwoman Phrase, I'm gonna hear from you when they're saying no, no, no, go ahead.

Go ahead.

Go ahead, please, madam.

I hear what you're saying, but we need to look on the other side of that.

The reason we're in a lot of this thing is because we allow people to come in and start buying up these houses that were only 100,000 people, 200,000 as at these race up so thing that everybody said, oh yeah, let me just jump on that bandwagon, and they're the ones that's got the rent sky.

The issue with the students, you know, they brought up all that land.

Those were families that have been here for decades, but they start buying them all up or children so much things and then everybody's property value went up, and our taxes went up, and our insurance went up in this ridiculous.

We're gonna need something to balance it out.

If we don't stop it now, stop something right now, then we're gonna be saying this a few years down the road because there's gonna always be somebody that can say, okay, well, we're gonna buy it for a million now, you know.

And then we're gonna still be in the same boat, and people are gonna still not be able to afford not only to own the house, but to rent a house.

My neighborhood has almost became a transient neighborhood.

At one time I knew that at least 89% of the people by sight, by speaking to I'm lucky if I know 50% of my community now because the people out there have been priced out there, and that's the tenant.

And that's the people that wanted to hold them that they say, okay, well, I might as well just go ahead and wrap this because everything's going up.

And the reason it's going up is because even though those same those are the same houses, some of them have not changed at all.

You know, but they didn't know this, you know, somebody's paying this amount of money now.

Now my property value went up, and I haven't done anything for my house now.

You know, I was like, my house was too much.

Now my house doesn't have a late.

Nothing's been changed.

Haven't changed a single.

So I don't know how my stuff went up that high.

So we have to look at it.

I agree with you, we're gonna have to work together and look at it.

But we're gonna have to have something in place and something with some teeth in order for us to stop things.

We don't want the city of Providence to be the city of young professional homing and college students.

We want the families.

We need the families.

We need the people that are going to be staying here for decades, the ones that are putting in the roots, the ones that plan on being here and maybe leaving their home too, their children, their grandchildren, whatever, you know.

And right now, we're scaring people away.

We really are.

There's a reason why it's a certain people who like property.

If you come here saying I love providence, oh, I love the thing, then why are you trying to change it?

If you come here saying, Oh, oh, I like this.

I like my community.

I love my community because of the way it looks.

It's not the interest.

It's not side scriptures.

It's a community.

And so we need to figure out a way to keep all that in there because nine times out of ten, the big city people that come here, they say they came here because oh, I love province.

But then it came in and they want to change it into Chicago.

Well, we should have stayed in shit.

That's my feelings.

So we have to figure out how we're going to do it.

Kudos to the staff, kudos to the you know, the um committee.

And all of those people that came, and I mean we had people came come in, and they really express all the things that they need, all the things they want and all, you know.

Almost all those people that came in were the people that were there for them, the voices.

They're not worried about the invested, they're just wearing the house.

They want a house that can be fixed up and done.

If we just worry about trying to get somebody put in me and build up everything beautiful, no, let's make it so that mom and pop and sister and brother can buy that house and fix it up slowly, but have someone in me, you know.

Um, so we gotta do, we gotta balance this out.

I've always been one for balancing it out.

There's gonna be people that don't want home.

There's gonna be people that you know that want a home, but they want something small.

You know who we put all the burden on if we did our tax thing?

The person that just went that wanted our one family home.

They're carrying the heaviest load out of all of us, you know.

So we want to make sure that that never happens again, that they'll be able to stay in their home.

So I hear everything they just say.

You and I both home on the phone.

We know what it would do, all the things that is going on.

But we got to look on at every aspect of this, and we have to listen to the voices of the people that not only are homeless, but those on the verge of being homeless.

But we also need to listen to the ones that you know, hey.

Um, I want to buy the houses of my first house and sat up.

I want to do this, and I'm good, I'm not an better.

So we have to listen to everyone and come up with a good balance.

I think this book, this right here encompasses all of that.

And a lot of the things that I think it would be worried about, I think that the language is leaving room for us to have some flexibility, and that's what we really want.

We really need something, we need it in here, but we, you know, if you look at it, it's nothing in black and like saying, oh, this needs to be this, this, and this that's this, that's the and I think the way we word it, and the way that they worded it, shows that.

Um my brother.

I agree with you.

We do need a lot of side, but we also need to protect our communities from you know, all the neighbors being put out and it becomes a comfortable student.

We need to protect our neighborhood from all of the small homeowners that had to um move up because they can no longer afford it at this point.

Some people have brought their homes outright, but the taxes and insurance is so.

So we have we have to make it so it's like that's like so it's needed, it's balanced.

Nobody's gonna be happy in anything we do.

I mean, not everybody, right?

Somebody's gonna be happy, but not everybody's gonna be happy with anything that we do.

I think this is probably the most balanced thing I've read in a long, long time.

And I think it's because all of us came to the table with our own little things.

And I think it's because we listen to them the people out in the streets, and we heard them, and and their voices, they can see that we heard them.

And I and I really do like this.

I just don't want an investor to come in and buy the street.

We don't want that.

I don't, I don't want anybody buying it for holding the street.

Oh, I know.

That's the kind of people I want to live in.

You know, so I think we can, you know, but that's for my community.

There's going to be something I want to have.

We all have our own little flavor.

And that's one good thing about water.

Every community has its own little flavor.

But let's not let's not milk it down.

Let's not change it.

That's just getting ready how it's up, but it wants that don't get them in there.

Let's let's try to make sure that all those water house and needs a house and have a house.

And we all know with them almost all of them don't want some of them have some wishes that they gotta go through and work out before they can get for that point.

We need to have something in here, which we do that covers that.

So um again for everybody, you know.

That's all right.

Thank you so much.

Now, I want you to know this is not a legislation, you know.

This is not anything that is in a law.

Let's look at this.

I borrowed this today, and I'm gonna use it.

What you guys have done was put a menu together.

You got a menu.

All right, the community, the public, and the people who are involved in uh sitting down to take this further into making it into a policy, a law or whatever.

Let's look at the public as the cooks.

Yeah, let's bring everybody to the table.

It's nothing wrong with you know having those conversations, and that's I I for me the whole entire time that I've been here.

That has been the rule.

You bring people in, you have the public hearing, you you even have committee meetings where people are able to go back and forth with their opinions about things that do not, you know.

Oh, maybe we might learn something even bigger after the cooks, which is the public help you develop this policy, help them develop it into a policy, then your full body moving myself will become the server to be in.

You come out with the best policy of whatever that would be able to fit our city, not just one side of the city, not just on student housing, not just on the encampments, but to fit landlords, everyone.

Those are difficult conversations because sometimes people yell at you.

That's all right.

Have those conversations and come up with a real law.

I'm asking you tonight to pass this to vote this out of the mid so the public can see it, so the public can start to cook because this is just the menu.

Let the public start to cook.

Let them cook, let them send in letters, let them do whatever they have to do.

Because this is just the menu.

I'm asking to vote it out so the public can have access to it.

I'm asking you to vote it out of committee because when it becomes when it gets back in front of us, it's not a vote on it.

We're just you gotta accept it.

And it's gonna become either a working document or it's gonna be something that you edit and change around and work with the community, but we've got to get started.

We cannot continue to keep the kids down the road and sit around and complain about we don't have house.

That we're being priced out that big developers are eating up everything, all the land.

We gotta get started.

With that said, I'm gonna ask for a vote.

I'm gonna ask for vote, make a motion.

A motion is uh made by motion to approve.

Motion to approve and uh and second by council motion made by council grave approved by um second by councilman.

And um, yeah, I think for discussion, folks.

But a motion is made and secondary.

Well, I unfortunately I'm gonna be voting now as I feel that um uh I don't see the need to rush it.

Uh I think that it was a uh working progress to me that we feel more input.

I I never heard from uh actually the people that we all know, people are always saying um didn't get their opinion this side of this because they will be impacted.

I mean, we're talking about uh it's a report, but it's a report that potentially legislation will be uh derived from it.

So we'll have an impact on an industry and industry as the wide house that we just forward in.

I mean, the uh solutions to the housing prices that we have, uh regardless of how you how we can first it up is the solution is to build more houses.

And we uh already doing that, uh said earlier.

I sit on the VRA board and um I voted on those two figures about 55 million dollars that we provide uh a scap financing for different entities account for us, and we have been able to do that much housing.

Uh our legislation uh has already that is in the book in it and it's uh reference and it's in the main to uh I just don't think that the entire solution uh like that here uh that you immediately don't see relief for housing because you have rent stabilization and because you have then first ride or refusal, which is a two things.

I think that I'll intend the consequences to me.

I think that the opposite could occur uh once uh the class and it's perceived out there that uh the council is moving towards these two items here.

Uh you could probably see some uh orders already begin to raise right, uh they will probably feel that something's coming down that it's gonna control what uh the not the profit about what they need in order to make ends mean on their property.

So that is uh caution about um I I want to close by also highlighting the loss of value uh for our studies that when you implement this, uh there is a loss of value because you have less people interested in investment in the city.

Uh so therefore the supply draws, which means the prices will start coming down.

So when the problem is then there's a loss already to the city through taxes, because you will no longer be able to um uh collect taxes on the $600,000 average property in private instead of burnt down all the three hundreds, you could see perhaps a 50% reduction in property taxes when you have a major reduction in property taxes, the less money that'll be available for hours in production.

So any spec that would take has its consequences, positive and also negative.

Um this which is why I am so cautious about this because I am in the business and I see both sides of this, and I practice this.

Uh, you know, I I do brand uh the I could say most economical province because I understand the people and I know the people that live in my properties, so I am very cautious.

I have not released rank in the last 10 years.

You can ask any of my tenants, so I am conscious when it comes to that, but I'm also conscious of what landlords have to go through and tenants, and we're also having a business or granting out.

I know what the expenses are.

I you know I look through this, uh, and there's a lot more than that we could just craft in a report.

Uh well, we need to put these things in practice because we're gonna get that so but I understand, you know, I don't have any interest for that, but I want to be on right for that, because I feel that is already I want to be on right that I'm voting out.

So we're not over.

Yeah, yeah, but um sorry, just in follow-up to the um majority leaders' comments.

I want to say that I really valid your opinion on this, especially as um a person who does this in their further profession, and I too share many of your concerns.

Um, I'm most worried about our um our homeowners or multifamily homeowners, and only have that one or maybe two properties.

I really do.

I um it's something that um I continue to listen to as the homeowners share, like what is this gonna look like.

I do, however, believe that and this is something that is extremely important to remember is that this is while these are recommendations, and there is still opportunity for all of this to be crafted.

And I absolutely do believe that landlords need to be at the table to kind of address what all of this is.

It's part of the most important piece of this.

And so I support putting this forward with my hesitations included, to be able to start that dialogue on an individual basis of each thing that we're presenting.

And it may be that these some of these things are not put forward.

I don't, I truly don't know.

But what I do believe is that an opportunity needs to be had to really start crafting um and really really crafting with all of the voices at the at the table to be able to understand where we're going.

And then so I really do support that.

I I do support the opportunity for the public to be able to see this in an effort to really start gaining some of that additional feedback.

It is not um, it isn't it does not fall on deaf ears that landlords need to be a part of this conversation.

And I do think that this is now a chance for us on a case by case basis as we pick apart these things to see where we can find a way, a path forward to meet in the middle.

That's just my opinion.

So there's a motion on the floor, and uh motion had been made and then second, we went in discussion.

Um instead of just um uh calling the name place role tall, please.

So go on record.

I chairman Pedro Espino.

Aye.

You have four eyes, one mushroom classes.

Thank you.

And again, uh this will uh go before the council just to be received.

And I appreciate everything that you guys have done because it's really important that we not no longer continue.

We don't have no time.

This is a serious time in our life in in history right now.

We don't have time.

I appreciate the fact that you do want the public to be at the table, and this is the best way to do it.

Get the report out there, get to committees going, and yeah, let's hear from people.

And we we can come up with something in some of the province.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Um I'll take a motion to quote on to adjourn.

Oh, motion been made by councilman.

He is sent by councilman Brace.

Is all in favor?

Aye, aye.

Thank you, yes.

I know I know.