Rhode Island’s cultural diversity is one of our great assets, but our communities often experience different opportunities to engage and enjoy. If we want our state to be more equitable, we require courageous leadership and intentional investments in racial and economic equity and access.
As organizations committed to racial justice, we feel the issue of race has been missing from the discussion about Kennedy Plaza. We all want to see vibrant community commons that support our economic and community development. But we recognize that strategies like increased policing will continue to disadvantage the poor, especially people of color, and siphon dollars away from social safety net programs that uplift those most marginalized.
New England communities were built with public “commons,” but despite their name these public spaces have always excluded the most disenfranchised: the indigenous people whose land was stolen, the enslaved Africans who quite literally built our communities, and those who did not fit society’s image of proper decorum. This continues today, with increase policing and criminalization of black and brown bodies, those exhibiting impact of addiction or mental illness, and the poor and homeless.
As our allies who are advocating for the homeless pointed out in their excellent “Reclaiming our Public Spaces” report, we cannot simply sweep away the poverty that many don’t want to see. Poverty and homelessness have disproportionate impact on communities of color, in large part because of public policies that exclude particular racial and ethnic groups from the supports that help build wealth and economic stability. Public policies fit together like bricks to shape our society, and our vision for racial justice requires some shifts in thinking. More people with criminal records, out of our workforce and warehoused at public cost, doesn’t help us build the society we envision.
Rather than seeking to invest our resources in short-sighted efforts to remove people we have deemed “undesirable,” let’s make real investments in the type of community supports and assets that eliminate the need for panhandling, support mental health and addiction recovery, and provide living wage jobs for everyone, including those with criminal records. Let’s engage our business community support in increased wages, publicly funded detox and recovery support, development of affordable housing, and compliance with First Source and Ban the Box laws. Let’s provide meaningful, well-paying work opportunities for adults with moderate education, and support public access to skilled training and higher education for our youth. Let’s recognize that amenities like public restrooms, drinking fountains, increased seating, and charging stations will support many types of users. And let’s bring love and compassion to the struggle of all those in our community, even those whose circumstances or behavior might make us uncomfortable.
Mike Araujo, Executive Director, Rhode Island Jobs with Justice
James Vincent, President, NAACP Providence Branch
Chanda Womack, President, Board of Directors, Cambodian Society of Rhode Island
On behalf of the Racial Justice Coalition.
A 
On Wednesday morning, reporters and activists were prevented from attending real estate developer Joseph Paolino’s press conference where he was to announce his plans regarding the issue of homelessness. The behavior of the security guards and police officers at the Providence Convention Center, where the press conference was held, became a preview of what many fear might become the norm if the wrong policies are instituted in downtown Providence.
A march from Kennedy Plaza to the Providence Public Safety Complex, with a brief, tense stop in front of the Providence Place Mall was held in Providence Friday evening in solidarity with a 
On my way back to Kennedy Plaza after the event Lt. Perez told me, half jokingly, that “those kids kind of hurt my feelings.”
Rosa was waiting near the end of a line of about 30 people when I found her at 8:30am in the Kennedy Plaza terminal building Wednesday morning. In her hand she held a senior/disabled bus pass that was due to expire in September 2020, but a driver told her that the pass was no good anymore and that she had to get a new bus pass if she wanted to continue to ride at the reduced fare.
Further up the line Frederick, a disabled man in his late thirties, told me that he had waited in line for over two hours the day before. “They cut off the line at ten people, and told the rest of us to come back tomorrow,” he said. He added that it is difficult for him to get around without a bus pass.
“There was no way to determine if a pass holder had died or moved away; their passes remained active and in use in our system until they expired. So we knew we needed to lessen the time the passes are valid. They will now be valid for two years, not five. The passes being issued now will expire on a customer’s birthday after the two-year mark, so everyone will not have to re-qualify at the same time again – it will be staggered.”
In the rotunda of City Hall advocates for the homeless gathered to release a new study validating the harassment and discrimination being felt on the streets and to demand that Mayor Elorza immediately instruct the Providence Police to stop their practice of criminalizing homelessness and harassing homeless individuals.
A table set up in Kennedy Plaza to distribute needed supplies to the homeless sat empty for over five hours Tuesday morning because the police claimed that not having a permit, or being affiliated with a religious group, made such charity illegal. Religious groups are in Kennedy Plaza and Burnside Park nearly every weekend and many week days.
Artemis told the officers that she had permission to do this kind of work in the past from Providence Public Safety Commissioner Steven Paré. The officers told her she would have to wait for the Commissioner to drive by and approve her efforts before she could proceed, and if she gave out any supplies before that, she would be arrested, said Artemis. So she waited.
In the minds of some Rhode Island politicians and business leaders, the empty and unsellable “Superman” building hangs like a millstone around the neck of the City of Providence. Rather than come to grips with the fact that the building is rundown and overpriced and that new economic thinking is needed to reinvigorate the Capital City, Providence Mayor Angel Taveras and Warwick Mayor Scott Avidesian (who currently heads RIPTA, the Rhode Island Public Transportation Administration), have pushed through a plan that scapegoats the poor, disabled, elderly, homeless and people of color.
The new vision for a modern and vibrant downtown does not include a busing hub. So Kennedy Plaza has been fenced off and is being destroyed as quickly as possible, before an outraged public can mount any kind of coordinated defense. Already the shelters have been taken down and trucked away, and the expensive heating system that automatically melts the snow is being dug up and scrapped. This work is leaving a giant pit in the center of downtown, even though there is no money allocated to completing the project. The plan seems akin to digging a hole in the hopes that someone will come along and build a house there.
