The Providence Eye

01/17/2025

A Brown University student designed an interactive art installation at Thayer and Angell that lets passersby see urban life through the lens of common eye conditions.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/new-interactive-art-project-shows-providence-through-a-blind-lens/
✍️ Story by Lauren Clem
📸 Photo by Rishika Kartik

When Daniel Solomon first arrived at Brown University, he noticed students had few opportunities on campus to interact with blind or visually impaired people. The junior from Miami, who was [...]

01/15/2025

A former School Board member argues that legacy laws from the 1960s and 70s, modeled after auto industry contracts, are outdated and limit flexibility in hiring, pay, and school decision-making.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/legacy-laws-are-hurting-providence-public-school-students/
✍️ Story by Julia Steiny

Failing urban students is a time-honored habit in Rhode Island, first documented exhaustively in the 1993 ProBE report. The equally depressing 2019 Johns Hopkins report also focused on toxic provisions [...]

01/14/2025

's 2024 Comprehensive Plan identifies renewable energy as a key strategy, making the history and impact of the city’s waterfront wind turbines essential to understanding plans to phase out fossil fuels.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/the-future-of-wind-energy-in-providence
✍️ Story by Emily Smith

Whether approaching Providence on the I-95 northbound or braving traffic on the Washington Bridge, it’s hard not to notice six wind turbines as a key feature of our City’s waterfront–. [...]

01/08/2025

's eight independent bookstores have weathered the rise of Amazon, the decline of physical book sales, and the challenges of COVID-19 to emerge as vibrant spaces for community and culture.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/providence-bookstores-a-boon-to-readers-and-the-community
✍️ Story by Lynn Holstein
📸 Photo Courtesy of Riffraff Bookstore

In July 16, 1995, a strange hurricane began to form, one that – initially at least –– would aim only at bookstores. It was then that a former Wall Street [...]

01/06/2025

Communities in are debating how to best preserve the city’s historic character as neighborhoods face the pressures of development and neglect.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/historic-districts-in-providence-how-they-work-what-they-do-and-why-there-should-be-more
✍️ Story by J. Hogue
📸 Photo courtesy of Art in Ruins

In Providence, we have seen Historic Districts lose properties to fire, lack of maintenance and neglect, developer speculation, or just the forward march of progress. As the saying goes, “You [...]

01/02/2025

Activists and community members have challenged the legacy of Esek Hopkins, the first commander of the American Navy and a slave trader, fueling ongoing debate over whether a school should continue to bear his name.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/the-rise-and-fall-of-esek-hopkins
✍️ Story by Jane Lancaster

Esek Hopkins (1718-1802) lived a long life as a public figure and sea captain and served as the first commander-in-chief of the American Navy. His current reputation is poor, however, [...]

12/30/2024

Exciting News! 📣 We are thrilled to announce that Report for America has selected us as one of their pilot accelerator newsroom partners for 2025! 🎉

Since 2017, has empowered over 400 newsrooms, helping them raise more than $30 million to sustain local journalism. Together, we are set to innovate a more diversified and community-centered approach to funding our vital local services.

We want YOU to be a part of this journey! 💪 Curious to learn more? Visit reportforamerica.org

12/24/2024

filmmaker Michelle Le Brun's Optics of Aging profiles five influential Rhode Island elders and asks viewers to rethink what it means to grow older.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/leave-your-old-ideas-about-aging-at-the-door/

✍️ Story by Ellen Welty
📸 Photo from the film Optics of Aging

Mildred Nichols, founding member of the Rhode Island Women’s Political Caucus: “I’m an elderly woman, I guess, though I don’t feel elderly.” Linda Miller, the woman behind what is now [...]

12/16/2024

Explore fascinating statistics and facts about the Washington Bridge and 's numerous other bridges in our Providence Counts series.

🔗 Learn the numbers on our bridges: https://pvdeye.org/bridges/

✍ Story by Nini Stoddard
📸 Photo from the Rhode Island Department of Transportation

On December 11, 2023, the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) announced it had “closed the west bound side of the Washington Bridge due to the finding of a critical [...]

12/13/2024

Mary C. Wheeler, founder of Providence's Wheeler School, defied expectations in surprising ways, setting herself apart from the women of her era and leaving a lasting legacy in women's .

🔗 Read more about Mary Wheeler's life: https://pvdeye.org/mary-colman-wheeler-1846-1920-visionary-artist-educator-and-founder-of-wheeler-school/

✍️ Story by Jane Lancaster

12/10/2024

Southside Community Land Trust’s network of urban farmers is turning small harvests into big solutions for Providence’s many food supply issues.

🔗 Read More: https://pvdeye.org/pvds-urban-farmers-are-feeding-the-city/

✍️ Story by Brooke Warner
📸 Photo from Southside Community Land Trust

The term, ‘produce aggregation’ doesn’t really conjure up a picture of healthy kids and families and farmers bringing good food to communities facing food insecurity. But Southside Community Land Trust’s [...]