The report outlines the causes of the state’s worsening housing crisis and offers recommendations on how to address them.
Many of the details in the 183-page report prepared by the Boston Consulting Group will be familiar to people who have followed the growing mismatch between the supply of housing and what people can pay for it in Rhode Island.
For example, the report found that Rhode Island’s housing crisis hurts the quality of life, limits the state’s economic competitiveness, and hinders efforts to attract new talent.
The report is based on information collected earlier this year and it offers a detailed prescription of the steps necessary to make progress.
Among the findings:
— Rhode Island produced only about 1,150 new units in 2021.
To close the gap in affordable housing, 24,000 more units are needed.
— More than one-third of Rhode Island households are defined as “cost-burdened,” meaning they pay more than 30% of their income for housing.
— The cities of Providence, Cranston and Warwick have the highest number of cost-burdened households.
— The number of unsheltered homeless people in the state has grown by 56 percent since 2020, the second-highest increase in the U.S.
— “There is a lack of statewide long-term goal-setting, planning, and coordination on housing.”
Despite the magnitude of overcoming these challenges, the RI Foundation report — coming as housing has moved to the top of the state’s political agenda — also offers a hopeful note.
“This is a moment of opportunity for Rhode Island given the ongoing creation of the new state government Department of Housing, the availability of multiple federal funding streams and the easing of the COVID-19 pandemic,” the report states in its introduction. “Capturing this opportunity will require coordination and collaboration across state government, municipalities and community organizations to invest in the creation of new housing, reform policies which are no longer workable and evolve homelessness services.”
The most recent state budget directed $250 million toward housing, with about $170 million of that for housing production, although the state has sometimes moved slowly in spending allocated money.
Among other recommendations, including “65 potential policy levers,” the report calls for investing more money in housing, loosening restrictive permitting policies, and enhancing the capacity of state government to address housing and increasing coordination between the state and municipalities.
Disclosure: The Rhode Island Foundation is a financial supporter of The Public’s Radio.
Ian Donnis can be reached at idonnis@ripr.org
