Jonathan Jacobs has personally seen how quickly things can change (for better or worse) in local government.

Currently a member of the East Providence Zoning Board of Review, Jacobs was sworn into office on what would turn out to be the day that the Washington Bridge was suddenly shut down to traffic on Monday, Dec. 11, 2023.

But the Rumford native and resident — who announced earlier this year he would be challenging incumbent Ward 1 City Councilman (and current Vice President), Frank Rego, for his seat on the council — has also seen how slowly things can take to happen as well.

A self-proclaimed Progressive Democrat, Jacobs said in a recent interview that one of his primary reasons for running for city council was to support a local governmental approach that fosters more efficient development and investment in the city.

“What the zoning board can't do that the city council can do is relieve the burden of regulations and ease the red tape friction and incentivize on a local level for developers to come in and build,” he said. “I definitely fall on the pro-development side. I definitely fall on the abundance end of things. I think that people need a place to live.”

Jacobs believes that this approach will not only help address the local housing crisis by providing more places to live, but also improve the lives of East Providence residents who find it increasingly difficult to afford to live in the city they love and have long called home.

“When you look at it, [housing] really is a supply and demand issue. So, if we can increase the supply…we thereby increase the total pool and reduce the cost to homeownership for people who want to come in and move into the city,” he said. “And for the people who are already here, it can keep those local real estate taxes down if their housing prices, their housing costs, their assessments aren't going up so quickly…The more people who are here, the more taxes that we collect, the more resources that we have.”

Jacobs said he understands the aversion to development (and to change, in general) that is commonly expressed among some residents, but he said that not all development is created equally, nor is it something that can be resisted forever.

“Development doesn’t just mean big, ugly things,” he said. “Development can be thought of as something that beautifies, that makes things more pleasant, and makes these transitions which are, in my opinion, inevitable, to something much more palatable to the people who may initially resist that change.”

Investments in a ‘pleasant’ place to live

Jacobs mentioned that, above all, his goal would be to help ensure Rumford and the city in general would remain a pleasant place to settle down and live — like he did, and like his parents did. He lives a short distance away from the childhood home his parents still reside in, in Rumford.

Crucial to doing that, he said, was investing in the city’s infrastructure. He mentioned the city council’s recent approval of a resolution for the city to adopt a Safe Streets for All program that would strive to make the city a more friendly place for cyclists and pedestrians. Jacobs said that such an approach is critical in making Rumford a more coveted place to live in the future.

“I want East Providence, and I want Rumford specifically, to be a nice place to live. If you look at the cities in the U.S. that are really considered the best vacation spots, they're really just walkable cities. They're really just places where you don't necessarily need to be using your car as much,” he said. “I think that making Rumford a pleasant place is really the best way to do that.”

Investments in resiliency are also important to him to ensure the city doesn’t find itself in financial difficulties when disasters, like the Washington Bridge, occur in the future.

“Investment in infrastructure and in being a more resilient community is something that needs to occur just to avoid the inevitable deficits that occur from unexpected calamity and emergencies,” he said. “If we develop that infrastructure, we make it a resilient place to live, when we are able to develop more and bring in a larger tax base, we can see exactly where those taxes have been invested and we're ready for the inevitable calamities, as well as bringing in more people to live in our city.”

Jacobs — who has worked for 16 years at the Rhode Island Department of Labor and Training’s income support office helping people with unemployment insurance and adjudicating TDI claims — said that he was making this first foray into running for political office because he was asked to do so by multiple people.

It is not, however, his first step into the political arena.

Jacobs has been a political organizer for the local SEIU union, assisting on various campaigns in the state and the region. He worked for Elizabeth Warren’s U.S. Senate campaign against Scott Brown in 2012. He has even been a political reporter, working for GoLocalProv in 2012 and 2013.

Jacobs said that he has spoken to many people who seem to be frustrated by their inability to address concerns that have stemmed from political decisions made at high levels; from the White House, down to the State House.

“But they can access their local city council person, who I'm hoping to be,” he said. “They can access them with concerns that can be immediately addressed.”