Special Committee on H.O.P.E. | Regular Meeting | May 11th, 2026 | 5:30pm

Good evening, everyone. I would like to call the Special Commission on Health Opportunity, Prosperity, and Education, also known as HOPE, for Monday, 05/11/2026. Madam clerk, would you mind calling the role?

Chairman Juan Pachado?

Present.

Vice chairwoman Shelly Peterson is absent. Counselor Sumiendable is absent. Counselor Justin Royes is absent. Counselor Miguel Sanchez? Present.

You have two present, three absent.

Any informational meetings being held.

Thank you. And just for clarification, yes. We don't have quorum, but we'll proceed just with informational. This meeting is not intended to take any votes just for us to also call attention, but also know and find out what's going to take place for the FIFA World Cup coming to Providence in the Parliament. So it's already here as I saw as I walked down the Waterplace Park.

So with that said, Madam Clerk, would you like to read the first item?

First item is discussion relative to the FIFA World Cup preparations. The following have been invited. Ali Barry, Rihanna Riley, Alexis Gorilla Grin, Courtney Hawkins, and Lieutenant Parra.

Welcome. Is everyone here? Excellent. And also, we have a public comment if there's anybody also that would like to make any comments. I also like to recognize Councilwoman Jill Davidson.

So now

Who's joining us. And obviously our team, thank you. So why don't we start off with who would like to start? Courtney? I see that also I also see Joe Wilson, who's the director of ACT.

Make sure that he's on the record that he is present with us.

So noted.

So I think the ACT team

can start, and then

we can back up the schedule.

There you go.

You're up in the front, please. We won't be sweating you in today. Okay. Actually, can we have the lawyer law department,

please? Yes. Please.

Oh, thank you.

Thank you. Thank

you.

Thank you, Ali.

Director, whenever you're ready. Thank you so much to the committee for allowing us to present today. Tonight on our plans for what is the largest sporting event on the planet, and that is FIFA World Cup. Again, my name is Joe Wilson junior. I am the director of the department of agriculture and tourism.

And my department, along with the province tourism council, are working together to produce what will be, as we are titling this, one city every match. We are producing an officially sanctioned FIFA fan zone starting June 11 and going until July 19 in Station Park. Again, Station Park, as you all know, is the park that's adjacent to both it's a it's right on Waterplace Park and is surrounded by the Province Place Mall, the State Capitol, and the train station. What I will say to start is that to be a host city and being able to get the FIFA designation to be able to produce this event is a big deal. We are one of the few cities that are not actual host cities being given this FIFA fan designation.

Show is the giant jumbotron, which will sit at the corner of the Gatsby and and the exchange. And Francis. Sorry. And so that screen will be playing every day, and we are tailoring the games, what games we show based upon looking at local interest. We also have many teams that have a particular interest in this region, whether it be a team Ghana who is being hosted here in Providence, whether that be the House of Portugal, which is gonna be in Waterplace Park, the Skyline Building.

But in addition, there are other fan bases that will be present in Providence, including the Tarleton Army, which is a group of about 7,000 folk who are both local and from Scotland will be here in the city of Providence. And once we were granted this designation by FIFA, we have been reached out by several delegations, including Canada and Germany, about being present and included on the fan zone. Not only this fan zone will be a place to watch the games, but there will be a beverage service, both nonalcoholic, alcoholic drinks on the footprint. We are lucky that we are being sponsored all by FIFA sponsors in this beverage area. This this footprint will also include a gamification activities for fans to be able to not only watch the games, but to kick a ball around.

This fan zone will also include some activation in terms of local talent on the stage because this is not only a screen, it'll be a stage as well. And this footprint will include a marketplace and and as well as food vendors. And so we have a a website that we've stood up about three or four three weeks ago called pbefanzone.com. And on that fan zone, we put out a call for vendors. We put out a call for folks who want to be involved in the marketplace.

We put out a call for those who want to work with us as far as employment over the course of of these thirty nine days, and we're also collaborating with United Way of Rhode Island to help mobilize volunteers. And that'll be soon added to our our website so folks can sign up and and be a volunteer for the fan zone. So this will be the center of of fan activity outside of of what's happening at Gillette Stadium. The most important thing that we'll be doing apart from watching the games and feeding people and getting people a refreshing beverage and providing gamification is that there will be player activations as well at House of Fortune per week. They'll be bringing in Portuguese Federation stars in that in that activation.

But one of the most important things I learned recently about what we're doing is that we'll be one of the few places between here and Gillette Stadium that you're actually able to purchase FIFA sanctioned jerseys from all the teams who are participating in World Cup. We'll have several activations of the footprint that will allow for those kinds of sales, and so it really is gonna be destination. Not to mention, we are obviously, this is a busy busy time of year in the city of Providence. We'll be playing host to three signature festivals during that time. Four, really.

When you think about June 20, it's the fiftieth anniversary of Pride. June 21 is Juneteenth. We'll be celebrating the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the birth of our country on July fourth and fifth, culminating with our fireworks celebration at India Point Park, and we also are partnering with another cultural festival on the July 5 to celebrate their Independence Day as well. So it'll be a very busy time in the city of Providence. Not to mention, obviously, our immediate footprint is in Station Park, but we're really thinking about how we can activate the entire downtown area from Kennedy Plaza all the way to Station Park.

And so we're also collaborating with Track 15. They're doing several activations which will center the Ghanaian community, including a watch party when Ghana Ghana plays England on the June 23. So that's also if you, you know, do your calendar. That's also that's also right after the weekend of Juneteenth and Pride. So that'll be really five days of that of of dense activation downtown.

And, of course, water fire will play an important part with one major lighting on the July 4, but there there will be additional basin lightings during that time as well. One in there'll be a basin lighting in celebration of the English and the Ghanaian delegation being in town, and there's also a Juneteenth fire that would be over by RISD and the Memorial Park area. So there's gonna be a lot going on. We're really proud to be a city of our size chosen to be able to host these games. I think part of what has so far made us successful in what we in my opinion of what we've been doing is that we are we often like to say and and and feel a certain kind of way about being the smallest state in the union, but actually our size has been an asset in this process.

We we've been able to be nimble, to be responsive. We all know each other. We we're able to pick up the phone, really understand what our resource and capacity are. And so there really has been a wonderful collaborative spirit among our city and our state partners as well as other cities across the region. So just wanna shout out and be thankful, first of all, to Boston FIFA and their leadership in securing the state

state

to to make make sure sure that we put our best foot forward as we welcome the world to this region and more importantly to the creative capital in thirty days. Sorry. There's countdown literally calendar on our little bit of option, but we're excited and it's gonna be a really great time for our city.

This day is gone already, so

twenty nine minutes. Yeah, right.

Thank you for that overview. Any questions for now? You want to get more presentation or I just have a

couple questions for the queue director and team. Is is there a cost either to us or to FIFA for being a designated fan zone? Is that what it's called?

Yes. Like, is this

it like, we have to pay FIFA or is FIFA paying us

is what I'm asking for that? There was no cost. But

it was a grueling process. Yeah,

that's really the only question I have right now.

May I ask

Yes.

Does that

additional public safety and other resource costs that Providence will accrue?