Zoning Board approves one dorm for Salve Regina University, rejects the other

NEWPORT — One of two dormitories Salve Regina University initially applied to the city to build over five years ago was approved by the Newport Zoning Board on Thursday evening.

"We’re grateful to the Zoning Board for the many hours they’ve put into our case and the patience with which they've heard all the elements of the case,” Salve Regina University President Kelli Armstrong said. “We want to be good neighbors, so we hope the future outcome of this project will be something that works well for Salve and also works for our neighbors."

The university applied to build two dormitories along Victoria Avenue in late 2017 but the project met several hurdles, including a rejection from the Historic District Commission, which was overturned, and three lawsuits, which are still pending trial. Over the course of eight special meetings between September 2021 and December 2022, the Zoning Board heard Salve Regina’s case in favor of building the dorms as well as arguments against the dorms from three opposing lawyers. In total, the board heard from 19 witnesses.

Watts Dormitory, which is proposed to sit at the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Shepard Avenue, was approved at the final meeting on Thursday in a 4-1 vote. It is expected to house 214 beds for juniors and seniors at the school.

The board added two conditions onto its approval of Watts dormitory. First, the Watts dorm's lot coverage must not exceed 10%, and second, Salve Regina must perform a comprehensive traffic study, which was one of the Planning Board’s original conditions for recommending the project’s approval to the Zoning Board.

The traffic analysis provided by Salve Regina during the initial fact-finding process was a main point against the dormitories among the board members and ultimately led to the board's disapproval of Wallace dormitory, which was rejected in a 3-2 vote.

Notably, when Chair Samuel Goldblatt voted against Salve Regina's petitions for both Watts and Wallace dormitories, he said the “crux of his issue” with the application lies in the traffic analysis submitted by Salve Regina. The Planning Board had recommended the application be approved with the condition the university conduct a full traffic study to gauge the impact of the dorms on traffic flow and safety within the area. However, Goldblatt said the traffic analysis performed by James Cronin of Crossmen Engineering was not a traffic study, but rather a less detailed traffic analysis, and was therefore insufficient.

"In the context of the matter that’s before us, I find it stunning that this comprehensive traffic study wasn’t conducted," Goldblatt said.

More: The issues raised at prior meetingThe Salve Regina dormitory plan appears to be in its last stretch. Here's what's happening

The traffic analysis was also conducted while Salve was out of session during the COVID-19 pandemic, which Goldblatt also said counted against its legitimacy.

The ambiguity of how traffic might impact the area around the dormitories, especially around the proposed Wallace Dormitory, was also cited by fellow board members Russell Johnson and David Riley as part of the reason they could not approve Wallace Dormitory.

“It’s impossible not to just admit that, in building these dormitories, there will in fact be more traffic in the immediate neighborhood,” Riley said. “Salve, in meeting this criteria, does not have to show that there will be no increase in traffic, it would be impossible to get a special use permit in that case, or to satisfy this criteria, but they do need to show that the dormitory will not intensify congestion or create a hazard.”

Goldblatt also said Salve Regina had failed to prove the dormitories would be in harmony with the neighborhood, one of the other seven criteria applications need to meet in order to receive approval from the Zoning Board. He said the neighborhood in question has an equal balance of institutional and residential uses, and the "intensification" of institutional uses in that area could throw that balance out of proportion.

Board member Bart Grimes, having voted in favor of both dormitories, disagreed with this opinion. He said the dormitories are in character with other buildings around the campus (including the Breakers and the library), the buildings are consistent with the character of a university campus, and the neighbors are far away enough to not be impacted by their presence.

"This is a small university,” Grimes said. “It's not the University of Michigan."

Both Grimes and board member Susan Perkins' arguments mainly focused on the positives a dormitory would bring to the campus and the city as a whole, especially in the possibility they could free up housing in the area for long-term residents.

Perkins also lamented the apparent lack of compromise between the two parties and said she hoped to see collaboration to fix potential issues with the project in the future.

By the end of the meeting, Goldblatt said he was glad to see this five-year-long process come to an end and wished both parties well. With only half of her university’s proposed project receiving approval, Armstrong said the university had planned for a different situation and looks forward to going back over the plans with her team to forge a path forward.

“We’ll go back to take a look at them now and see what works best for our needs but also, now that we’ve heard a lot of concerns from the neighbors over time, that we can find a good compromise for all of us,” Armstrong said. “We have common interests. We all want to make sure we don’t have a lot of traffic in the area and we keep everyone in that neighborhood safe and that we continue to be good neighbors in terms of offering a good setting for everyone in the historic district of Newport. I think we can come to common ground.”

This article originally appeared on Newport Daily News: Newport board's verdict on Salve Regina University dorm proposal