East Providence Raises Taxes to Nearly State Limit, Providence and Cranston Hold the Line
GoLocalProv News Team
East Providence Raises Taxes to Nearly State Limit, Providence and Cranston Hold the Line
For a community to raise above 4%, it needs the approval of the Rhode Island General Assembly. East Providence was right on the edge.
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While East Providence taxes are rocketing, Providence and Cranston have no tax increase, and Warwick’s is less than 2% — 1.97%, to be exact.
Bob DaSilva, who first ran for Mayor in 2018 and promised fiscal “accountability,” says there are a number of factors impacting the budget.
DaSilva said, “This is a challenging time for all of our residents as well as our municipality. Both our residents and the city face the same inflation pressures as everyone else. Our residents voted to approve a $149 million bond to build the new Martin Middle School and that is one of the main driving factors for the increase.”
“This is why my administration is both focused and actively engaged in expanding our tax base by working with people to develop former industrial sites and underutilized parcels into revenue-generating properties,” DaSilva added.
DaSilva has promised to expand the city's tax base and, specifically, promised to develop the city's coastline, but that development is slow going.
According to DaSilva's office, the driving factors for the tax increase are "education costs, debt service, refuse disposal, increased costs in the fire department, and the cost of the tax assessment" -- see details found in the table:
DaSilva's office did not cite any cost containment efforts that his office had initiated to try to minimize the tax increase.
In the past six months, both the director of administration and the finance director have left the DaSilva administration.