Why Nobody Lives in ECHO Village: A Case Study in Lousy Leadership

When Regulations Excuse Inaction

Last Thursday’s hearing of the Special Legislative Commission to Study Housing Affordability left one with the impression that it’s nobody’s fault that, after years of hard work, still nobody lives in ECHO Village. In reality, it’s a textbook case of lousy leadership.

As usual, among those with the authority to address homelessness—particularly unsheltered homelessness—there was nobody with the courage, foresight, or moral conviction to take decisive action.

In Rhode Island, no one in a position of authority has stepped up to suspend regulations that condemn people to death under the guise of life safety. True leadership requires recognizing when rigidly enforcing regulations—like the fire code—results in patently unintended consequences. Such consequences became tragically clear just weeks ago, when RJ froze to death in his vehicle in South Providence.

The acronym ECHO stands for Emergency COVID Housing Opportunities, a name that speaks volumes about the timeline: this project dates back to 2020. The hearing revealed little new information beyond what has already been reported, as these publications demonstrate:

• Steve Ahlquist, UpriseRI, July 2021

• Steve Ahlquist, Substack, January 2024

• Christopher Shea, Rhode Island Current, May 2024

• Patrick Anderson, Providence Journal, August 2024

House of Hope Executive Director Laura Jaworski summarized the timeline with the following chart:

For more detailed homelessness data, follow this link. This is for those who have trouble reading the small print:

• 2019: 1,055 Persons

  • Winter | House of Hope begins exploring the use of tiny homes for PSH

• 2020: 1,104 Persons

  • November | PROJECT ATTEMPT #1 – Congress Street, Pawtucket

  • August | ECHO concept emerges as strategic intervention for House of Hope

  • June | Street outreach used surveys to identify constituent needs, barriers, and solutions

  • March | Pandemic hits – shifted focus to emergency/crisis response

• 2021: 1,267 Persons

  • December | Cottages at Shattuck Open in Boston, MA

  • March | PROJECT ATTEMPT #2 – Hartford Avenue, Providence

  • July | PROJECT ATTEMPT #3 – Prairie Avenue, Providence (Indoor Concept)

• 2022: 1,577 Persons

  • July | ATTEMPT #4 - Lincoln/Cumberland

  • October | ATTEMPT #5

  • July | Secretary of Housing Elevated

• 2023: 1,810 Persons

  • November | ECHO project kickoff

  • May | ATTEMPT #6 – Congress Street, Pawtucket

  • February | Pallets in Burlington, VT opens

  • January | Dept. of Housing Created

• 2024: 2,442 Persons

  • January | ECHO Construction

The acronym PSH stands for Permanent Supportive Housing. which provides long-term housing assistance coupled with supportive services to help homeless individuals with disabilities live independently.

To summarize:

• The number of homeless people in Rhode Island has nearly doubled, increasing from 1,055 in 2019 to 2,442 in 2024—an increase of almost 200%.

• Meanwhile, the commission spent an hour and a half discussing the failure to provide a solution for just 45 people—barely 2% of the growing need.

An hour and a quarter into the hearing, House of Hope Executive Director Laura Jaworski—showing superhuman restraint—respectfully yet decisively cut through the fog with this pointed observation:

I shopped this project around the state. And not, I'm not talking like just like for location purposes, but to identify an individual that could take this up, because I realize as a nonprofit, I have really no power. And when I was doing this research and looking at what people were doing across the nation, I found that these projects were only successful in communities where somebody in an elected body —board of supervisors, a selectman, a mayor, a state rep, a governor — where they were in the the lead position dictating the go in the room and figuring it out. And I would see this play out, this is how it was in Los Angeles, where you had a selectman that said, “I'll beg forgiveness,” where you had a mayor in Minneapolis that declared a state of emergency, where then you also saw EOHHS [Executive Office of Health and Human Services] Secretary Sudders in Massachusetts be given a directive, by the state, the governor and Mayor Wu to say: “Take up this initiative and make it happen.”

So these projects have only been successful when that happened. I tried to take a page out of all of those playbooks. I was cold-messaging Secretary Sutters on LinkedIn of all places to say: “Hi, can you please tell me how you did this in Massachusetts, because I need to bring it here. We need to make this happen and to shop it to every single department. The bench is deep of supporters, for sure.

Governor McKee has been repeatedly asked to declare a state of emergency for homelessness. Beating the Drum to End Unsheltered Homelessness in Rhode Island, organized by the Rhode Island Homeless Advocacy Project, is just the latest such effort. These calls began in April of this year, over eight months ago: Advocates press Governor McKee to declare a state of emergency due to unsheltered homelessness.

So far, Governor McKee has failed to respond in any meaningful way. His only comment:

We can’t short-circuit the safety issues …

But the governor is not alone. No one in a position of leadership has stepped up to take responsibility or act. As Laura Jaworski’s testimony makes clear: the cap fits many, yet nobody wears it.

To reinforce her point, here is a more comprehensive list of declared states of emergency that illustrate what true leadership looks like:

• Portland, Oregon: In October 2015; Read more.

• State of Hawaii: In October 2015, Read more.

• Seattle/King County, Washington: In November 2015, Read more.

• Los Angeles, California: On December 12, 2022, Read more.

• Denver, Colorado: In July 2023, Read more.

• Massachusetts: In August 2023, Read more.

Enough is enough!