As a downtown Providence business owner, Guido Silvestri is no stranger to petty crime.
There has been occasional shoplifting, vandalism and even a brick thrown through the window of his Westminster Street skateboard store, Civil.
But he never felt unsafe.
Not until June 2, 2020. That’s when a Providence protest over the death of George Floyd while in Minneapolis police custody became violent. Awakened by a call from his security company that the storefront windows were broken, Silvestri sat up and anxiously began texting a friend who lived downtown for updates as looters smashed windows downtown, stole merchandise and torched a police cruiser outside Providence Place mall.
The damage to his store – windows shattered, the front-desk computer destroyed and $50,000 worth of sneakers and skateboards stolen – was quickly cleaned up, and insurance covered the losses.
But Silvestri remains haunted by the memory of that night.
The mob that stormed downtown was a turning point in perceptions of safety in Providence among many residents, business owners and visitors. For some, it confirmed their fears. For others, such as Silvestri, it heightened their awareness of even the slightest threat.
By the numbers, the downtown appears to be safer than it has been in the past.
Crime across the city, including in Police District 1, which covers most of downtown, dropped dramatically from 2019 to 2020 (when far fewer people than normal were on city streets) in nearly every category, including violent crime and property-related crime. Also, arrests and calls for service downtown dropped to one-third of the prior year, according to records released in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by Providence Business News.
But often perception trumps data.
“In public safety, perception is reality,” said Providence Mayor Jorge O. Elorza. “If people don’t feel safe, then they’re not safe.”
While the COVID-19 pandemic has dealt a heavy blow to businesses, many downtown owners fear that a worsening public perception of safety has added greatly to the pain and might make it more difficult to recover when the coronavirus crisis passes.
Just how much public perception about the downtown has changed is difficult to quantify. Most of the evidence is anecdotal, gleaned from customer and social media responses. A PBN.com poll last October found a clear majority of 182 respondents had some concerns about safety in the city. The poll found that 55% of respondents didn’t believe the city was safe enough to visit to shop or eat, and that more police were needed, especially downtown.
In response to such concerns, several organizations have teamed up to develop a marketing campaign touting downtown as a safe destination.
But at the same time, there is friction among business owners about the way forward, specifically about how to react to future threats.
Some property owners have rushed to board up windows when rumors of protests and looming violence have spread. Others argue that the sight of plywood-covered storefronts can leave an indelible impression of danger and keep customers away.
“One boarded-up window is all it takes,” said Bradly VanDerStad, president of the Downtown Hospitality Group LLC. “Someone takes a photo, puts it on social media and then all of a sudden, everyone thinks all of Providence is not safe.”
[caption id="attachment_365362" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
DOWNWARD TREND: Despite a significant decrease in 2020 crime statistics due to less people being on the streets because of COVID-19 quarantines and lockdowns, Providence Police Chief Hugh T. Clements says the longer-term trend still suggests crime is decreasing in the city. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
‘SAFETY IN NUMBERS’
The June 2 rioting may have been a turning point in perceptions about downtown safety for some, but concerns over crime began long before that.
When David Bertolini first opened Providence Coal Fired Pizza on Westminster Street eight years ago, the area looked different. It was dimly lit, flanked by parking lots and office buildings that emptied at night, creating an eerie sensation of quiet that may have raised fear in customers.
But by 2019, the lights were bright, the stores were filled, and throngs of diners, theater-goers and shoppers weaved their way along the sidewalks even after the 9-to-5 workday. WaterFire Providence had reached a pinnacle, drawing tens of thousands of people to events and often to businesses throughout downtown.
“It really seemed like 2019 was a peak year for Providence,” said Bertolini, who also co-owns nearby Union Station Brewery and Barnaby’s Public House downtown. “Then COVID happened.”
And with the pandemic, which shuttered offices, banks, entertainment venues and – for much of the year – indoor dining, the downtown became a ghost town.
Fewer people meant less opportunities for criminal activity, which is why crime has declined, according to Providence Police Chief Hugh T. Clements.
But that quiet may also feed a sense of unease.
Neil D. Steinberg, CEO and president of the Rhode Island Foundation, said he felt like he had to be more aware when walking from the foundation’s Union Station building to the parking lot at night.
“It’s not like I feel there’s danger lurking,” Steinberg said. “But there’s safety in numbers. When [people are] few and far between, you get the impression you need to be on your toes.”
E. Anthony Santurri, owner of The Colosseum nightclub and Free Play Bar Arcade, noticed immediately how the block around his adult arcade bar emptied of foot traffic after COVID-19 hit. The Pine Street businesses were already separated from other shops and restaurants downtown, but without students from nearby Johnson & Wales University, the isolation was more acute.
Santurri, who lived downtown until this year, boarded up Free Play in late May. The bar was closed at the time anyway, and after seeing protests turning violent in other cities in the wake of George Floyd’s death, he did not want to take chances.
When looting engulfed downtown on June 2, Santurri watched from his apartment window in Regency Plaza. At 5 a.m., he walked the glass-strewn streets, surveying the aftermath. Free Play was safe, having already been boarded up.
By nightfall on June 4, many followed suit. Downtown appeared encased in a protective layer of plywood that stayed up for days in anticipation of more protests.
Most never turned violent. Of the more than 50 demonstrations in 2020, Clements recalled only a few that could be characterized as “contentious.”
[caption id="attachment_365359" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
WATCHFUL EYE: Guido Silvestri is the owner of Civil, a skateboard shop with a downtown Providence location that was heavily damaged during a riot on June 2, 2020, forcing him to close the store for several weeks and make several thousand dollars’ worth of upgrades to his security system, including cameras and a TV. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
SPREADING RUMORS
If violence on June 2 ignited a flicker of anxiety among property owners, downtown businesses and their customers, social media stoked the flames.
“Technology, and social media, has helped law enforcement immensely in carrying out our mission, but it also has increased the ability for criminal groups or those looking to cause fear to round up people in a short amount of time,” Clements said.
Perhaps no better example came than in September when a flier warning of a violent “Providence Purge” circulated on social media. While law enforcement and city leaders characterized it as an annual Halloween prank, others didn’t take it lightly.
Joseph R. Paolino Jr., a former mayor and now prominent downtown property owner and chairman of the Providence Downtown Improvement District, issued a press release calling on government leaders and police to safeguard against an attack.
Silvestri, too, was bracing for disaster.
For two nights, he painstakingly removed rows of sneakers, hats and skateboards from Civil’s window display, setting them back up the following morning.
Nothing happened.
Silvestri was relieved. Had there been another attack, he might have abandoned his location downtown for good, he said.
Paolino defended his stance, saying he had no regrets for sounding what turned out to be a false alarm.
“If only police and the National Guard and other people had taken social media seriously on Jan. 6, maybe we wouldn’t have had the Capitol attacked,” he said, referring to a protest against the presidential election results that led to the deadly storming of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.
[caption id="attachment_365363" align="alignright" width="296"]
ABERRATION OR TREND? Providence crime statistics show that calls for police and arrests in the downtown area declined during the pandemic in 2020. Authorities say that’s due, in part, to fewer people visiting the area. / Source: Providence Police Department[/caption]
Others looked at the reaction to the rumored “purge” differently. VanDerStad said that while he wanted to be sensitive to business owners’ fears, there was also the long-term damage to downtown’s reputation to consider.
Indeed, while there was no physical damage that Halloween weekend, the fear hurt Santurri’s business. After reopening a few months earlier, Free Play was preparing for what is typically a lucrative weekend. But that Halloween, numbers were down – half of what they were even the prior weekend – which he blamed on the “purge” hype.
“I was irritated at that nonsense,” he said. “It seemed like we had turned a corner, were finally coming out of [the pandemic] and then to have that happen.”
Bertolini, too, saw a noticeable drop in business after the June 2 riots.
Before that night, the patio seating at Union Station Brewery had started to fill with outdoor diners. After the images of mobs breaking into Providence Place mall, torching a police car and storming downtown hit TV stations and social media platforms, those crowds vanished.
News coverage about crime in Providence in general often feeds negative safety perceptions, downtown business owners say.
Providence Place, in particular, often gets tied to stories about crime that have nothing to do with the mall itself, said General Manager Mark Dunbar.
Because the mall is a landmark even those unfamiliar with downtown can recognize, it’s often used in news coverage and social media as a point of reference.
Dunbar said when protesters tried to shut down an Interstate 95 on-ramp in September, news stories referred to the event as “next to” the mall, even though the mall was not involved, he said.
While the mall is not without incident – a teenager was fatally stabbed in the third-floor food court in September – Dunbar emphasized that safety is the mall’s No. 1 priority.
As he strode past shoppers flocking to stores on a recent weekday afternoon, Dunbar touted a 24/7 camera system, which includes coverage of every spot in the parking garage; and a cellphone app that lets mall-goers communicate instantly with security to express concerns or even just ask for someone to walk them to their car.
Arrests and calls for police service also dropped at the mall in 2020 compared with 2019 because there were fewer visitors. According to police records, arrests were down 26% and calls for service declined by 41%.
While 2020 crime statistics were an “aberration,” the longer-term trend still suggests crime is decreasing in the city, Clements said. Aside from 18 homicides in 2020, the highest number since 2014, nearly every other category of crime has been on the decline over the last five years, according to crime data.
[caption id="attachment_365360" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
PREPPING FOR THE WORST: Workers install plywood over the windows of the Rhode Island Housing offices on Washington Street in Providence on June 4, 2020, just days after protests over George Floyd’s death devolved into looting. At the time, property owners and businesses feared more damage. / PBN PHOTO/WILLIAM HAMILTON[/caption]
WHAT TO DO?
Some downtown business owners say the police presence downtown seems smaller, less visible, and that more officers would make people feel confident to visit as the weather warms.
Clements acknowledges that manpower has been a problem.
The department has pushed for more foot and bicycle patrols downtown, but to do that, more officers are needed. Plans to start a new police academy to train 50 recruits, with $1.4 million set aside in Elorza’s original fiscal 2021 budget, are at risk because of budget shortfalls.
Calls to “defund the police” don’t get more officers on the streets, though Clements said that sentiment doesn’t seem widespread in Providence. “Community groups, business communities, neighborhood associations, they all want to see and call for greater presence of uniformed police,” he said.
For those who find a bigger police presence intimidating or even unwelcome, there are also the yellow-jacketed “ambassadors” of the Providence Downtown Improvement District. The sight of the street-sweeping and graffiti-cleaning staff can also help people feel more comfortable, said John F. Palmieri, the district’s interim executive director.
“We can be a resource – for directions, for masks, for anything really,” he said.
Palmieri, who was slated to step down on April 1, hoped to double the staff of 15 workers through government grants. He was also eying grants to install surveillance cameras at key street corners.
Palmieri insisted the group, financed by fees paid by businesses, was by no means an alternative to law enforcement, nor a sole solution to safety perceptions.
Aside from the larger police force, Elorza stressed the importance of the city and community to push back on false or inflammatory information spread on social media with “truth and transparency.”
To that end, The Providence Foundation has joined with Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau to market downtown through digital advertising and social media to encourage people to patronize businesses and participate in organized public activities, said Cliff Wood, the foundation’s executive director.
Wood said a unified effort among business owners and community groups aimed at luring crowds back to downtown is the best way to combat safety fears.
“It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy,” Wood said. “The busier a place, the more people feel comfortable.”
Nancy Lavin is a PBN staff writer. Contact her at Lavin@PBN.com.