Judge dismisses Narragansett rental housing limits

Narragansett can no longer restrict the number of non-related people living together, a court has decided./FILE PHOTO.
Narragansett can no longer restrict the number of non-related people living together, a court has decided./PBN FILE PHOTO

NARRAGANSETT – A municipal court judge has ruled against a town zoning restriction aimed at limiting the number of college students who could share houses, saying it violates the state Constitution.

The prohibition, which limits to four the number of non-related people who could share a house, unfairly targets “otherwise competent” adults from living with whom they choose, wrote Judge John DeCubellis Jr., in an opinion released Tuesday.

“The prohibition bears no reasonable relationship to the stated goals of the town regarding ‘quality of life and safety issues,’ ‘the intensity of land use’ and or other concerns relating to ‘fire and building safety’,” DeCubellis wrote.

The Narragansett ordinance was approved in May 2016, and followed the town’s establishment of a commission that examined student rental housing issues, following a period in which town residents had complained of the high concentration of student rentals in certain neighborhoods.

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That ordinance had followed an earlier attempt, dating to the late 1980s, to restrict the number of unrelated people living in apartments or houses to three. In 1994, the court had found that restriction unconstitutional.

In his decision, DeCubellis found that the facts of both cases were similar. In the most recent litigation, the town had charged 34 people with violating the town ordinance restricting the number of people living together.

The decision was cheered by the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island, which had pursued the case, and which has filed a similar lawsuit challenging a Providence ordinance that also targets student rentals.

Executive Director Steven Brown, contacted Wednesday, said the court has made clear that a zoning ordinance cannot be used to restrict who people can live with or why.

“It’s arbitrary and capricious to attempt to deal with alleged nuisance problems by preventing people from living together based solely on their [relationship status.]”

Mary MacDonald is a staff writer for the PBN. Contact her at macdonald@pbn.com.

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