Rhode Island House Minority Leader Mike Chippendale blasted the state’s housing department at an early Wednesday afternoon press conference for not sending invoices detailing the $4.6 million spent on the ECHO Village pallet shelters in Providence.
But the Foster Republican reversed course about an hour later even as he criticized the state’s demand for $495 to collect and release emails relating to the project.
The Rhode Island Department of Housing actually did send Chippendale the information he requested, the minority leader acknowledged in an email after the press conference at the Rhode Island State House.
The files in question revolved around Chippendale’s Access to Public Records Act (APRA) request for information on the 45-pallet shelter village that was approximately $1.3 million over budget when it opened in February. Curious as to why the project cost so much more than intended, Chippendale requested from housing officials the complete list of contractors and subcontractors involved in the construction, plus purchase orders, project budgets and any email correspondence from state officials relating to the project on Feb. 14.
Chippendale said to reporters at the 1 p.m. press conference that the state had only sent over one invoice for electricity costs. But after the press conference, the Minority Office’s legal counsel reexamined the files sent over by the housing department and found staff had not unzipped everything.
“It appears that I did receive a file from Housing that includes some invoices attached within it,” Daniel P. Reilly, a former state rep and the minority leader’s legal counsel wrote in an email to Chippendale Wednesday afternoon. “It appears that the file did not transfer over initially when I received it via Dropbox from Housing and was not sent to you.”
Reporters received the documents after Providence Journal reporter Katherine Gregg repeatedly asked Chippendale for the files he had received from the housing department. At the end of the press conference, around 2 p.m., Chippendale sent an email to all the reporters in the room with the folders, which were all compressed as ZIP files. The largest zipped folder was over 60 megabytes, which exceeds the attachment size limit for some email providers. Providers like Gmail automatically convert files that are too big to downloadable links. Other email providers may strip the attachments from an email if they’re too large.
“While I asserted that no invoices were received other than the RI Energy invoice, I was clearly mistaken,” Chippendale wrote in a 3 p.m. email to six reporters with whom he shared the zipped files.
The housing department had informed Chippendale that it would take 33 hours of labor to gather all the relevant correspondence — which would result in a $495 bill for the legislator, as APRA requests are charged at $15 an hour. Chippendale offered to pay the money, but rescinded the APRA and attempted to rely on his authority as a member of the House Committee on Finance.
A housing department spokesperson said Chippendale’s attempt to invoke statutory authority nullified the APRA rules.
“It is important to note that this change in request meant APRA requirements — including any time limits or extensions for gathering and reviewing the information — were no longer applicable,” spokesperson Emily Marshall wrote in an email Wednesday.
Marshall said the state sent Chippendale the requested documents on March 13 — or, at least, what they were able to send the lawmaker, who had also asked for a “list of any financial sponsors or other benefactors for the Echo Village project,” Marshall said. She added that the housing department does not possess such documents, as they belong to the project’s main contractor House of Hope, which is “a nonprofit entity, and…not obligated to provide this information to us.”
Marshall did not immediately respond to a follow-up question about how the housing department sent the files to Chippendale.
While Chippendale admitted the file confusion, that didn’t absolve the state of its responsibility to be transparent, he thought.
“While I answered the question ‘Did you receive any invoices?’ with ‘no’ and I now realize that I was wrong, the remaining assertions during the press conference remain relevant,” Chippendale said in his follow-up email Wednesday.
Despite her success in rallying for the documents, Gregg apparently never received them.
“Can you send the attachment again please. It did not arrive,” Gregg replied to all on the email thread in which Chippendale clarified that he had in fact received the documents.
“That’s part of the problem Kathy, it’s too big to transfer. It won’t come over in an email,” Chippendale wrote back.
1,320 emails still under review
The documents forwarded by Chippendale included at least three PDFs with meticulous itemizing of project costs. One PDF contained three pages fully redacted, but most pages are more revealing, including information on supplies, laborers and hours worked. The largest invoice was a 165-page PDF, 17 megabytes large. The file’s size likely derives from the numerous full-page images it contains, like photocopied black and white photographs of supplies, scanned invoices on yellow paper, and even photos of Home Depot receipts on a laborer’s work pants.
Chippendale said after the press conference that the Minority Caucus will continue to review the documents. Meanwhile, the housing department is “still reviewing the 1,320 emails to determine which can be released based on confidentiality,” Marshall said.
The minority leader wrote in the email admitting the mistake that his main points about transparency in Gov. Dan McKee’s administration remain relevant.
Asked by reporters at the State House about his relationship with McKee, Chippendale characterized it as a constant cold shoulder. The minority leader said he’s reached out to the governor’s staff. He said he’s tried to schedule meetings.
“And I’ve only been granted one meeting, and that was in 2020,” Chippendale said, trailing off and pausing as he tried to remember the date. “2021? Or [2022]-ish, and it wasn’t a very productive meeting, and it was a frustrating meeting.
Chippendale recounted the numerous scandals of McKee’s tenure, like the ILO bid fixing and Washington Bridge sagas, as ample proof of the administration’s tendency toward what he called “opacity.” Chippendale said he didn’t intend to discuss DOGE, but couldn’t resist the temptation in the context of discussing scrutiny.
“We’re living in a time now where there’s this unique entity called DOGE in Washington, D.C., which is sending shivers through state governments across the country because a lot of things are being looked into,” Chippendale said. “In a time where a deep blue state like ours is potentially in the crosshairs of this presidential administration on conditional funds being withheld, you would think that this administration would not do anything that would further elevate their lack of concern for transparency, but evidently, that sort of savvy is not present right now with this administration.”
Marshall offered an alternative take in the conclusion of her email. “The department is cognizant of the importance of transparency and accountability in State government,” she wrote. “We continually strive towards achieving our mission of solving the State’s housing shortage and homelessness crisis, while also fulfilling the public’s information requests.”
This story was originally published by the Rhode Island Current.
