The Public’s Radio — House commission to invite public comment in South County on shoreline access

Property owner Keith Wilcox, second from left, speaks with shoreline rights advocates during a seaweed gathering protest, on June 26, 2021.
PHOTO BY ALEX NUNES

Aug 26, 2021

By Alex Nunes — A State House commission set up to study access to Rhode Island’s shoreline will take one of its meetings to South County later this year to get public comment from communities where disputes over beach access have been most contentious.

The suggestion to take the commission on the road to Southern Rhode Island was made at the group’s first meeting on Tuesday by member Michael Rubin, a former assistant attorney general for Rhode Island who recently became involved in a dispute over a contested right of way in the Weekapaug section of Westerly he believes should be open to the public.

“That might facilitate public input,” Rubin said of holding a meeting in South County.

Disputes between beachfront property owners and public beachgoers have intensified in Southern Rhode Island since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, when shoreline restrictions stiffened.

Commission member Dennis Nixon, a professor emeritus of marine affairs at the University of Rhode Island, said it makes sense to seek public comment in an area where the subject is especially relevant. 

“This is such a high interest topic,” Nixon said. “To the extent that we can be out there in the field where the actual conflicts are occuring I think would lend some greater credibility to the work that we’re trying to do.” 

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