Assembly changes to land-use regulation modest

In 2014, the General Assembly considered new legislation to address environmental and land-use regulation in the state. Some of the new laws that passed follow in the footsteps of last year’s efforts to minimize the impacts of regulation, environmental and otherwise, on business. Such efforts continue to be important and critical to our economic growth.
Against this, are new laws that help strengthen the state’s ability, albeit modestly, to protect and exercise enforcement over its resources. Finally, legislators continued their work on climate-change planning, codifying the governor’s directive to vest responsibility for this important work within the executive branch.
Highlights of the new laws include:
• Last year saw the passage of a number of new laws designed to streamline environmental regulation and facilitate economic development. This included efforts to standardize and centralize authority over wetlands and septic disposal, a two-year extension to the already extended tolling law applicable to state and municipal land-development permits, and a commission to design and implement statewide e-permitting. While less robust in scope and extent this year, legislation introduced and passed in the 2014 session continues this trend.
As part of regulatory reform, state agencies are required under current law to review their existing regulations every five years. The purpose of the review is to perform an economic-impact analysis and determine whether those regulations should be continued, amended or rescinded.
In 2013, more than 1,000 rules were reviewed for economic impact. Of those, the Office of Regulatory Reform recommended 14 to repeal, 57 to amend and 16 for accommodations to be made for business.
New legislation aligns this mandatory periodic agency review with the secretary of state’s rules and regulations refiling law. Under that refiling law, as of 2002, state agencies are required to file certified copies of all adopted rules in force with the secretary of state. Starting in 2002, and every five years thereafter, the secretary of state prepares a public list of adopted rules that have not been refiled and repealed to transmit to the agencies. Agencies must review the list and repeal those rules that are no longer operative. The next secretary of state list will be prepared in 2017, which will be the same year that the state agencies will have to perform their next five-year review. Hopefully, this harmonization of rules review will ultimately result in a collective set of properly tailored and less burdensome state regulations.
• In 2013, the General Assembly passed a joint resolution authorizing the creation of a five-member commission whose mission was to consider the impact of Rhode Island’s zoning and subdivision enabling acts, as well as the specific practices of municipal boards and commissions, on economic development in the state. The commission was to generate a report of its findings by January of this year but the due date was extended to January 2015. With this extension, the General Assembly demonstrates its continuing commitment to critically examine current land-development practices and address barriers to economic development within the state.
• In 2013, the General Assembly expanded the authority of the R.I. Department of Environmental Management to set uniform standards for septic and wetlands regulation in the state. It also empowered DEM to enforce its environmental laws and regulations through a new expedited citation process. This year, legislators similarly passed legislation expanding the state’s enforcement jurisdiction, as well as its statewide planning authority. New legislation expands the authority of DEM, as well as conservation officers, to enforce its fish and wildlife laws and regulations to properties leased, managed or used by DEM.
• The executive director of the Coastal Resources Management Council has now been added to the State Planning Council, responsible for strategic planning for the state and the promulgation of the Comprehensive Planning and Land Use Regulation Act. The council had already included as members all major state agencies.
• In recognition of rising sea level, changed weather patterns and ocean conditions, increased coastal erosion, and other indicia of climate change in Rhode Island, the General Assembly has passed legislation over the past few years calling for the study of Rhode Island’s vulnerability to and mitigation techniques to counteract the effects of climate change.
Acknowledging the seriousness of the issue, during this year’s session, legislation elevated the issue to the executive branch to begin to take action to address and prepare for ongoing climate change.
The new law authorizes the creation of an Executive Climate Change Coordinating Council, codifying Gov. Lincoln D. Chafee’s Feb. 21, 2014 executive order forming an Executive Climate Change Council.
The council is populated by the heads of all major state agencies. Its charge is to assess, integrate and coordinate climate change efforts throughout state agencies to reduce emissions, strengthen the resilience of communities and prepare for the effects of climate change.
The council will be assisted by a 13-member local government and policy “advisory board” and a nine-member “science and technical advisory board.” •


Jennifer R. Cervenka is a partner at Partridge Snow & Hahn LLP and chair of the firm’s Land Use and Environmental Practice Group.

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