Good evening. My name is Helen Anthony. I'm the chair of the committee on finance. I'm calling to order a regular meeting on Thursday, 03/13/2025 at 05:37PM. Madam Clerk, could you please follow the rule?
Chairwoman Anthony. Here. Vice Chairman Taylor.
Councilor Anne Boyle. Here. Councilwoman Durex. Here. Councilor Sanchez.
We have five present. We have
a form. Thank you so much. I'd like to recognize we have many members of the council here this evening. Thank you so much. We have council president Miller.
We have councilor Espenald, councilor Conferno, councilwoman Ryan, counselor Vargas, and counselor Peterson, and counselor Gonzales. I'd like to thank you all for coming tonight. Absolutely. Stomated. I'd also like to thank our and the city solicitor's office.
And who else am I missing? And I always like to, you know, special thanks to Don and Carissa who does such a good job standing this morning.
Okay. Health and not. We have our our auditor and, also, we have our chief policy here at Eastern Gardner as well as the entire policy team. Okay. Okay.
Alright. With that, I am going to take some things out of order today. I would like to take item number three. Seconded by counselor Sanchez. Aye.
All opposed. Alright. With that, madam clerk, would you please read agenda item zero five?
Resolution endorsing and urging passage by the general assembly of House Bill twenty twenty five h dash five five one two and senate bill twenty twenty five s dash zero one nine one, an act relating to taxation. Property subject to taxation.
Okay. And is there anyone here from whoever renewed that is here presenting on this this evening? Hey. Hi. How are you?
Well, please note at the end of the table, and we will swear you in.
Patient authority, please bring on the penalty
of surgery that the test line you're about
whole tooth and nothing record.
I do. And please state your name
for the record. Anna Jane Wilkin.
Thank you so much for calling. Before we start with you, I am going to mark as exhibit one. We have a letter. So we need to start with the support for this resolution, and it's whenever renewed. And I would like to mark this as exhibit one.
May I have a motion? Second. Second. A motion made by councilor and about a second councilor Aye. Aye.
Aye. All opposed? Wonderful. Louise, if you would continue. Thank
you, chairwoman. Thank you, members of the finance committee, so many other members of the city council. I know you have a pretty robust conversation, it seems like, tonight, so I'll try to be quick. My name is Anna Jane Milken. I'm the director of strategy at Project Webber.
I just wanna talk a little bit about what Project Webber does and why we're coming seeking property tax exemption. So for folks who don't know, Project Webbering is a nonprofit based in South Providence right next to the Rhode Island Hospital campus. We've just recently purchased a building at 45 Woodland Avenue. We serve mostly people experiencing homelessness, people with substance use disorder, and very low income people. So last year, we searched over 3,000 peep individuals, unique individuals, from the city of Providence.
80% of those people were experiencing homelessness, and 99.9% of them will carry more income. We provide a full range of services. We have a drop in center that has plumbing and cooling services, basic needs, food, laundry, clothing, hygiene supplies, case management, referrals to recovery housing, peer recovery supports. We do outreach where we go out into the community, it's in Kennedy Plaza to encampments to provide services as well. And at our new location at 45 Willow Avenue, we also have on-site medical services, which are really amazing.
So people can walk in, and they can get access to behavioral health services. We have a full time nurse who can provide physical health services and foot time doctors who provide specialty care. And then also at that location, we have the country's first state regulated overdose prevention center, which is a place where people can come in. And under state law, state regulations consume substances on-site and be saved in overdoses. So far, we've seen over 400 visits since we opened in mid January, and we've done 20 overdose injections.
So we that's a little bit of what we do.
have to be answering questions. But, basically, we purchased this location at 45 Millard Avenue last year. We are a nonprofit, and we are seeking property tax exemptions. So we went this is a resolution in support of the state state legislation that's being proposed with Barbara Battista and Senator Mac to give us property tax exemption. This would help really with financial sustainability of our programs, especially right now when we know that public health measures and especially measures that support people experiencing homelessness and people who use drugs or under attack.
It would really be a direct investment in some of the city's most vulnerable residents. So that's why we're coming to the council and the state legislator that have the answer in.
Thank you very much. House committee members first. Does anyone have any comments or questions?
Maybe real quick. Well, what is the figure for the tax?
So it depends a little bit on how it's reassessed. Right? But right now, it's still around $20,000 a year. About 110,000.
Alright. Do you know if Kodak to them? Do they get tax abatements as well or no?
So we currently there's three organizations that are located at our facility. There's product where we're renewing, which is, you know, nonprofit for the state of Rhode Island. We also rent to Sojourner House, which as you all know is another nonprofit. They do have property checks exemption as we move through their other properties. And then we also rent or we don't rent, but we host the clinic by Victor, which is another service provider.
So all of the entities within there are charitable organizations. But other I'm assuming that I I can't speak for all of the different organizations in their property tax exemptions, but NTG does quite a lot for other nonprofit sort of treatment providers in this field service.
Does anybody Larry, do you know the the code act?
Or are they Counsel. I'm sorry. Could you direct the question to anybody?
I would like to know. Correct. Yes.
Yeah. Are you seeking a policy of credit?
Correct. Over on Yes. Because it says yes.
Mister Mancini or I'm sorry.
Napolitano, we have to have you sworn in place.
Let's make sure he he swore in the plan for the impertinent testimony you're about to give us
the truth. Whole truth, nothing but the truth.
