By Alex Kuffner, Providence Journal
September 13, 2007
In the first accord of its kind between the two, the town and Roger Williams University yesterday signed an agreement that will provide the community with an estimated $42 million in compensation for municipal services over the next 20 years.
The centerpiece of the deal is a $150,000 annual payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) from the school that will increase by 1.5 percent a year.
In addition, Roger Williams will give the town $100,000 every five years to help defray the cost of a fire or rescue vehicle, will donate $25,000 per year to civic activities and events, and will increase the value of scholarships to local students to a total of $37 million over the life of the agreement.
Town Administrator Diane Mederos, Town Council Chairman Kenneth A. Marshall and RWU President Roy J. Nirschel signed the document after a brief meeting in which the council unanimously voted to approve it. The university’s board of trustees endorsed the offer in a meeting Aug. 30.
THE CEREMONY AT the Bristol Statehouse yesterday afternoon came after nearly four years of sometimes contentious negotiations. Mederos called the agreement a “new beginning.”
“I am delighted that the town and the university have persevered,” she said. “Today is a good day for Bristol and the university.”
Nirschel acknowledged the rocky relationship with the town, calling it “a wonderful, occasionally turbulent, four-decade marriage.” He also reminded those in attendance that the university is a tax-exempt institution that isn’t obligated to provide financial compensation to the town.
“But I believe in the importance of being a good neighbor, above and beyond the requirements of the law,” he said.
Negotiations between the town and the school opened in 2003 after a landmark accord was announced in Providence in which Brown University, the Rhode Island School of Design, Johnson & Wales University and Providence College — like Roger Williams University, all tax-exempt educational institutions — would contribute a total of $50 million to the city over two decades.
Talks continued in fits and starts over the next four years. A deal appeared imminent when the university announced a large increase in scholarships to Bristol students during a celebration of the school’s 50th anniversary at Linden Place in May 2006. University officials said the scholarships would eventually rise to $2.5 million annually.
But the talks fell through, and it wasn’t until this summer that both Roger Williams and town officials said they were getting ready to sign something.
What was ratified yesterday is the first PILOT agreement between Roger Williams and the town since the university moved to its campus overlooking Mount Hope Bay in 1969.
THE TOWN COUNCIL pushed for the deal, largely motivated by frustration with the cost of emergency services to the university campus. For example, in 2005, about 160 fire and rescue responses to the school cost the town $126,000. The police runs cost an additional $71,000.
Although the town receives about $500,000 a year from the state in compensation for lost taxes, council members wanted the university itself to make payments.
“Since the university opened here, people have been hoping for this agreement,” council member Mary Parella said.
THE AGREEMENT ALLOWS the two sides to negotiate an increase in payments for every increase of 100 students in enrollment at the university. It also provides for additional payments to the town if the school purchases additional property that is on the tax rolls. The school would pay the equivalent of real estate taxes on the property for five years and would gradually reduce those payments thereafter.
Along with the payments and scholarships, the university and town will form a “cooperative committee” that will meet on a monthly basis to discuss issues that are of mutual interest. Nirschel said yesterday the committee will also look at ways that Roger Williams faculty and students can offer their expertise to the town. He talked hypothetically of the university’s respected architecture school consulting on projects for the town.
“The committee will consider whether there are strategic issues that we can partner on,” he said after the signing ceremony.
The agreement will be reviewed by both sides every five years.
Until last year, Councilman David Barboza represented the town along with Mederos and former Council Chairman Richard Ruggiero in negotiations with the school. Barboza said yesterday that the town will not be the sole beneficiary of the accord.
“It’s also an opportunity for the university,” he said. “The tremendous amount of ill will will now subside.”
A beaming Marshall, who has done much work to bring the agreement to fruition over the past year, joked about the length of time it’s taken to reach consensus.
“It has certainly been a long time in the making,” he said. “I’m happy to see it happen in my lifetime.”