olneyville – RI Future

October 26, 2016

Providence’s parkway proposal: the essence of community development

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Please join me in giving a round of applause to Mayor Elorza and the Providence Department of Planning and Development for their hard work and due diligence every step of the way during the 6/10 Connector’s community engagement process.

The city has been extremely transparent and open, taking the public’s input into consideration while drafting their design for the future of the 6/10 Connector. It is reassuring to know that the mayor and the planning department are actively listening to the needs and wants of the community. By taking a bottom-up approach, the City of Providence is conveying that its interests align with that of its communities, and appreciates the ideas and solutions that its residents bring to the table. Who else knows what’s best for the City of Providence other than the residents that live, work, and thrive here.

On Monday, October 3, the City released their draft plans for the future of the 6/10 Corridor at a public forum held at the Doorley Jr. Municipal Building in downtown Providence. While the City’s plans do not call for a surface boulevard that I and other community members would have liked to see presented, I can tolerate the parkway design. The parkway concept addresses the concerns of both sides about the looming question, “What should the future of the 6/10 Connector look like?” The plan addresses the need to fast-track the reconstruction of the structurally deficient Huntington Viaduct, out of concern that the structure might collapse. The plan appeases auto-interests as well as those citizens who want to see a concept that is more pedestrian and bike friendly, although we would much prefer a pure boulevard instead of a parkway.

The proposed parkway plan frees up land for development (approximately 50 acres), expands the footprint of DePasquale Square, adds two new off-street bike paths, creates a new exit to West Exchange Street, adds additional connections to the existing street grid, and reconnects parts of Olneyville to the urban fabric of Providence, among other things as well. The proposed “halo” elevated rotary where Route 6 merges with Route 10 allows for the potential to incorporate boulevard elements into sections of the route further down the line. While the entire length of the 6/10 Connector isn’t the pure boulevard that many of us had envisioned, the two-phased parkway plan allows the City and State to revisit the compelling arguments made in favor of an intermodal boulevard.

The most important aspect of the plan isn’t the plan itself. Rather, it is culmination of everything that has led to the plan being drafted in the first place. It is the countless hours spent by engaged citizens, who took it upon themselves to get involved, speak out, and voice their opinions about the project; citizens who persevered even when things weren’t going their way because they knew that this is a critical, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to turn the 6/10 Connector into something truly special. Without vocal citizens and lots of vigorous discussions, RIDOT would probably have elected to refurbish the highway a long time ago, and that wouldn’t have worked for motorists, bicyclists, pedestrians, and city residents alike.

The future of the 6/10 Connector will single-handedly change the physical, social, and economic makeup of the city for generations to come. It is up to us as citizens to decide whether or not we want to make Providence a more livable community for our children, our children’s children, and ourselves. Or, if we want to sit idle, content with the current economic conditions in our Capital City. The choice is ours. RIDOT has the final say about the project’s design, and I strongly encourage my fellow Rhode Islanders to continue to be actively involved in the process, and vocal about the future we envision for a livable, thriving city for decades to come.

September 29, 2016September 29, 2016

Spencer Grassie- Let’s reconnect Olneyville to the city’s urban fabric

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Spencer Grassie is a senior at Providence College, majoring in Management and minoring in Finance. He has written the following op-ed:

As a current Providence College Friar and a native Rhode Islander, I am passionate about our state and capital city. As a millennial, I want to ensure that future generations have the building blocks necessary to thrive and make a living right here in the Ocean State. That is why the ProJo Editorial board’s piece, “Smart decision on bridges” is short sighted. The idea of turning the decrepit 6/10 Connector into a surface boulevard is about much more than safety.

College students and millennials rely heavily on alternative modes of transportation such as biking, walking, ride-hailing (Uber, Lyft), and public transportation. This is not to say that I, or my millennial counterparts, want to get rid of the automobile entirely, but we are drawn to places that offer a unique sense of community. We thrive in cities that have an array of transportation options, ample amounts of interconnected green space, retailers, and restaurants for social interaction and the exchange of ideas. These places provide people with a genuine emotional connection to the community, one that the car simply cannot replicate.

I attended three public forums on the future of the 6/10, and the general consensus does not want to reconstruct the 1950s style limited-access highway. At the last forum my group envisioned the 6/10 as a tree-lined boulevard, equipped with bike lanes, walking trails, and bus rapid transit running through Providence’s newest mixed-use neighborhood. If Rhode Island is serious about making the state more conducive to millennials and attracting talented individuals and companies, our state leaders should reconsider their position on the 6/10 Connector and recognize the immense value and countless upsides the boulevard concept has for the city and state as a whole.

San Francisco, New York, and Milwaukee deconstructed their highways in favor of boulevards. These cities have proved that replacing a highway with a boulevard has the potential to create a focal point for civic pride while increasing nearby property values and promoting a higher quality of life.

At another forum, Peter Park, a city planning expert, stated that, “The 6/10 boulevard idea is not a technical issue, but a political one.” There are urban planners and transportation engineers who have successfully rolled out projects of similar complexity. The public should not worry about the technical details because these professionals possess the knowledge and skills to get jobs like this done all the time.

We, as Rhode Islanders, have two options: 1) we can continue to do the same thing over and over again and expect different results or 2) we can facilitate strategic action among private, civic, and public sectors to reverse the dismal public policy decisions of the 1950s by replacing the limited-access highway with an intermodal boulevard.

Let’s choose to reconnect the strangulated neighborhood of Olneyville to the city’s urban fabric, provide opportunities for disenfranchised residents, lower our infrastructure’s annual maintenance costs, and add properties to the city’s tax rolls. But most importantly, let’s choose to build a civic point of pride, one that makes us proud to be from Rhode Island because we are no longer bound by antiquated thinking.

Let’s build on Providence’s commitment to being the Creative Capital and showcase that the smallest state in the Union is looking for innovative ways to grow its economy and sense of community. Let’s build a boulevard.

August 3, 2016August 4, 2016

It takes a village to clean Woonasquatucket River

When the Providence Police Department, the Woonasquatucket River Greenway Project, the Olneyville Housing Corporation, and the community joined forces, it was all for the love of a river. The banks of the Woonasquatucket were strewn with trash, the soil was toxic from the mill industry of a bygone era, the underused and overgrown area was a perfect invitation for drug deals and other nefarious activity.

And the children of this community, which is rich with diversity and hardworking folks trying to provide safe recreational opportunities for youth, were getting the short end of the environmental stick. It isn’t an unusual situation. But truth be told, kids and adults everywhere love nature whether in cities, suburbs or the country, whether poor or well-to-do if given an opportunity to revel in its beauty.

When the Woonasquatucket restoration began, everyone knew it was not going to be an easy job. But the benefits of the eventual payoff provided a strong incentive.

The scene then wasn’t pretty, and the work ahead was hard. The area needed to be rid of highly contaminated soil, a toxic legacy of the industrial past, new soil put in, and old soil capped to prevent exposure to lingering pollutants. The area was strewn with trash and debris that required removal by heavy manual labor.

Plantings of trees, shrubs and gardens went on unnoticed at first, until a local community group took root and started a bike shop next to a blooming community garden. All of these were small but critical steps to returning health to the river and the surrounding community.

These actions were informed by the broken window theory, which proposes that lower levels of disorder in a community lead to higher and higher levels of disorder.

Trash signals a lack of concern for residents and leads to degraded care for property, which leads to greater levels of devaluing the community and higher-level crimes. Olneyville was an example of this theory in action. Through it all ran the Woonasquatucket River, a forgotten treasure that once attracted the Huck Finn in all of us.

Once community-minded partners got together and restored the riverbanks as a haven for recreation, there arrived a burgeoning volunteer force ready to maintain it. Over 1,300 volunteers many of them local residents lent a helping hand last year alone. Today, there are bike programs, educational activities, art competitions, and Riverside Park. The area once buried beneath pollution and crime is an intergenerational gathering point for healthy play, conversation and relaxation. Criminal activity has dropped sharply and the community, its housing and environmental agencies, and the police are partners in an urban success story where a winding river now flows past peaceful banks on its way to Narragansett Bay.

The success of the Woonasquatucket River and neighborhood restoration project was featured in the recently released 2016 Watershed Counts Report, an annual update on the health of the bi-state Narragansett Bay Watershed that guides future actions. This case study focused on how the collaborative work of individuals, communities, private organizations, and state and federal authorities is critical to the protection of Narragansett Bay, one of New England’s greatest natural and economic resources.

Clean environments that support the love of nature are ubiquitous among people of every background, and should be central to uplifting efforts as dedicated citizens, advocacy groups and local governments work with communities seeking to calm troubled waters throughout the nation.

July 26, 2016

Neighborhood improvements coming to Olneyville

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Olneyville is getting an upgrade as two new commercial spaces and 36 new affordable housing units, in 14 different buildings spread throughout the neighborhood, will be developed by next summer as part of a new $10.4 million project being called Amherst Gardens.

“We are excited to be starting construction,” said Wendy Nicholas, the executive director of ONE Neighborhood Builders, formerly known as the Olneyville Housing Corporation. “Amherst Gardens has been in the works for several years, and we are delighted that all of the pieces – the properties, the designs, the construction crew, and the funding – are now all in place.

The project, Nicholas said, is part of ONE Neighborhood Builders “campaign to improve the neighborhood, block-by-block, making it a better place for families to live, to raise their children and to find employment.”

ONE Neighborhood Builders described the project as a “scattered site housing development, with the new or rehabilitated homes scattered throughout the residential core of Olneyville, primarily along the Amherst Street corridor. The development will reinforce the small residential scale of the neighborhood, provide much-needed affordable housing, and resolve long-standing areas of blight.”

Cynthia Langlykke, of ONE Neighborhood Builders, said the scattered site design of the project allows for many properties, encompassing 10 blocks of Olneyville, to be improved. “The acquisition process for a project like this never easy,” she said. “But we think it has the biggest benefit to the community.”

Nicholas added, “In addition to creating much-needed affordable housing, our goal also is to improve the whole neighborhood as a good place for everyone to live, to raise their families and to work. We tackle the deteriorated or otherwise troubled properties scattered in our community.”

The apartments will be rented to people who earn annually less than about $30,000 a year, depending on family size. The two commercial properties do not have affordability restrictions. “Neighborhood businesses will be encouraged to apply,” Langlykke said.

“On behalf of the Olneyville community, I’d like to thank ONE Neighborhood Builders for rebuilding and reimagining Amherst Street,” said City Councilwoman Sabina Matos, who represents the Olneyville neighborhood. “Quality affordable housing is paramount to a thriving urban community. This development expands our housing options, creates a safer, more vibrant neighborhood for Olneyville families, and further improves the area around one of our most important assets—William D’Abate Elementary School—and directly benefits the students who learn and play there.”

The Amherst Gardens development, slated to break ground in January and be complete by August, “will reinvigorate blighted properties into vibrant, much-needed housing for families,” said Barbara Fields, the executive director of Rhode Island Housing, which contributed more than $700,000 to the project plus an $800,000 loan. “The Amherst Gardens initiative builds upon other investments in housing, commercial development, parks and the arts – all of which are enhancing the quality of life in the Olneyville neighborhood. Amherst Gardens is a great example of the kind of transformational development that the proposed $50 million Housing Bond will support.”

April 5, 2016April 5, 2016

My critical support for the 6-10 boulevard

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In theory, I think the idea of a 6-10 Boulevard has the potential to be a great project. However, knowing very well how capital in Rhode Island, particularly based around real estate interests in Providence, functions in a way that subverts all good ideas to benefit the rich and disenfranchise the poor, I would like to suggest to legislative steps that need to be taken so to prevent some major issues. To be absolutely clear, I have no ill will towards anyone involved in these efforts and wish them all the best in their efforts, I just also wish the best for the vast majority of people who will be effected by this project if it is actualized. I totally believe these two things are not exclusive and that a synthesis of the two is quite tenable.

Get rent control and community land trusts in place
This effort has a great chance to benefit the vast majority of poor black and brown people who overwhelmingly find themselves utilizing public transit and bicycles to get around. However, looking at the ethnic demographics of this effort’s leadership and their website, I see a lot of white faces and not a lot of concern for the potential of this effort to serve as a vehicle for gentrification.
Last fall, I had the opportunity to go to Washington DC and spend an evening with my friend Ronnelle, a black gay man who went to RIC under the auspices of in-state tuition due to his DC residency. He has been in DC for decades and watched his home gentrified, jesting with me “First comes the gays, then comes the bicycles, then comes Becky with her baby stroller and then it is all over.” Watching the migration habits of the hipster class in Providence is quite disturbing in how it mirrors Washington.
I have spent the past eleven years now watching “development” on Broadway and in the West End. In 2005 I started a high school internship at the Columbus Theater when Broadway was run down, dirty, and had a street that resembled the craters of the moon. By 2010 the street was repaved and business was coming back. But this entailed an ethnic cleansing of the neighborhood that continues. I do not want to see that further consolidated by this boulevard. The last six years have seen this further develop before my eyes.
There are many things that are possible to fight back against gentrification but the two major ones are institution of rent control and creation of community land trusts. They do not take much effort and have extremely valuable benefits for any effort because it indicates to these impoverished residents that you actually care about their plight and not just their taxes.
What about climate change?
In 2010, Rhode Island was inundated by massive flooding across the state. Warwick saw the Warwick Mall totally destroyed by the flood waters and the low lying Shaws supermarket on Warwick Avenue was ruined.

This happened because just adjacent to both sites is the Pawtuxet River. That flooding is going to happen more and more in the next decades due to climate change and the storms it creates. Are we going to have to worry about similar issues caused by the rivers in Olneyville? The Environmental Justice League has been doing some important work in the past few years that shows the neighborhood has some serious pollution issues. Let us also not forget that, as a post-industrial city, there are chemicals in the waterways and grounds that are not forced onto the roadway of the 6-10 connector because it is currently suspended in the air. The type of pollution forced onto such a roadway would not just be chemical, it would include the garbage thrown into these waterways. We need to be certain we have in place mechanisms that will help clean these messes up as they occur.
Get a Spanish language and grassroots presence
Looking at the current website, this effort seems totally based around the English language and white faces. I find this problematic because the communities surrounding the 6-10 connector are well-known for their civic engagement and community activism. The Olneyville neighborhood alone is one of the most vibrant Latino political centers in Rhode Island. It strikes me as odd to have an effort that is going to totally flip these neighborhoods upside down in terms of major commuter routes and it no se habla espanñol. Why not? This community could be one of their greatest allies. This speaks to a greater question, who exactly is asking for this thing? Are we seeing a movement of longtime residents who see this as another element of their emancipation or is it a tool of capital being advocated for by those who either do not know better due to their lack of seniority in community residency? I have tried to ask these questions in private correspondence with some and asked other activists about this effort. The first group have been rather unsatisfactory in their response while the second, composed of those who know everything important to know about issues important to the community, have never heard of this. Both are signs indicative of something that gives me serious pause and concern.

The notion of critical support is a posture which advocates for a cause while also suggesting positive adjustments that can benefit the majority. I want to see a 6-10 Boulevard that helps the many while not giving comfort to those who have failed the black and brown communities on the West End. Gore Vidal once quipped that we have socialism for the rich and free markets for the poor. I hope this roadway might invert that dynamic.

January 15, 2015August 9, 2016

Workers protest ex-boss’s home at dawn; demand $17,000 in unpaid wages

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About 40 people showed up before sunrise at Juan Noboa’s 23 Julian St. residence in the Olneyville section of Providence this morning to demand the payment of over $17,000 in back wages to six employees.

According to organizers, Noboa and his partner, Jose Bren, employed around 15 workers to help open Café Atlantic, a restaurant located at 1366 Chalkstone Ave. between August and September, 2014. Some employees worked up to 70 hours a week, but, according to organizers, “by September 28th, Noboa and Bren closed the restaurant just months after opening and walked away without paying workers their full wages.”

The workers have organized through Fuerza Laboral (Power of Workers) “a community organization that builds worker leadership to fight workplace exploitation.” They have filed complaints with the Rhode Island Department of Labor and have attempted many times to contact the owners with their concerns, but have received no response.

Juan Noboa was a volunteer for Buddy Cianci during his unsuccessful run for mayor last election. During the election Noboa reported Representative Scott Slater to the state police for possible voter fraud after taking video showing Slater, “leaving Kilmartin Plaza, a Providence high-rise for the elderly, with what looked like a ballot.” The police investigated and cleared Slater of any wrongdoing. Slater issued a statement saying that he recognized the man filming him “as someone who had threatened him in the past.”

According to the Providence Journal, Noboa “is a convicted felon and has been arrested 10 times dating back to March 2000.”

This morning’s action follows last month’s protest outside Gourmet Heaven on Westminster St. downtown. “We see a pattern of Providence-based food establishments intentionally cheating workers of their wages,” said Phoebe Gardener, Community Organizer with Fuerza Laboral.

“It makes me so angry that I am doing everything I can to provide for my family and do my job the best I can and Noboa doesn’t care about anything but making money for himself,” said Flor Salazar, former employee of Café Atlantic in a written statement, “Some of us are single mothers and are barely getting by.”

After chanting in Noboa’s driveway and pounding on his door for about fifteen minutes, the Providence police arrived and moved the protesters onto the sidewalk and into the street. Protesters handed out fliers to neighbors accusing Noboa of theft.

Noboa never came to the door or showed his face in the window.

July 20, 2012July 20, 2012

ONA Says Business Stole Rather Than Wired Money

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ona — A previous action by the Olneyville Neighborhood Association.

Saying the owner of a local money-wiring business stole thousands of dollars from them, a group of Olneyville residents who frequently send money to family members in other countries will hold a rally at near the corner of Chalkstone Boulevard and Academy Avenue Saturday at 2pm.

“I work two jobs- usually 16 hours a day- just to support my family. Losing my hard-earned money had a huge impact on my family,” Eduardo Gonzalez, a customer of the business and event organizer, said in a press release. ” I am working with other … customers not only to get my money back, but to make sure that no one else goes through what we went through.”

The owner of the business could not be immediately reached for comment.

Susan Beaty, of the Olneyville Neighborhood Association, which is helping to organize the action, said some people have lost as much as $5,000 and others between $1,000 and $2,000. She said it’s hard to quantify the number of victims – which is one of reasons for the protest – but the group has held three informational meetings since learning of the potential crimes about a month ago and each meeting has attracted about 20 people.

Olneyville residents with family in other countries often utilize such businesses as a way to send money to their families back home. Undocumented workers often pay in cash. This makes them an easy target because they may fear going to the police with their problem because it could spark questions about their immigration status. Police have not been contacted yet.

“Many of these customers are Latino immigrant who used the service to send their hard-earned dollars home to support their families in Guatemala, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and elsewhere,” according to the press release.