Eugene Quinn for East Greenwich Schools

Home
Tax Rate Comparison 100 Year Tax Rate History (coming soon)

Why are East Greenwich property taxes higher than many other towns?


The lowest residential tax rates are about a quarter of the highest.

A difference this large cannot be due to differences in operating expenses, because personnel costs represent the bulk of municipal expenses, and no town can hire teachers, police, and firefighters at a quarter of what other towns are paying.

The explanation lies in three factors that vary widely across cities and towns:
  • The relative size of the tax base (assessed value per capita)
  • The amount of state education aid the town receives
  • The relative number of public school students (public school students per capita)




TownPopulationFY2022
Assessed Value		FY2022 Assessed
Value per Capita		FY2022 Residential
Tax Rate		Revenue Produced
by $1 on Tax Rate
New Shoreham916$1,697,744,297$1,853,433$6.86$1,697,744
Little Compton3,489$2,235,871,379$640,834$6.04$2,235,871
Jamestown5,493$2,676,518,279$487,260$8.28$2,676,518
Narragansett15,501$6,091,459,767$392,972$8.86$6,091,460
Barrington16,133$3,483,815,256$215,953$19.15$3,483,815
East Greenwich13,081$2,764,243,129$211,317$21.01$2,764,243
Providence179,484$11,590,684,014$64,578$24.56$11,590,684
Central Falls19,417$574,255,133$29,575$23.76$574,255

In terms of assessed value per capita, some towns are much wealthier than others.

Since expenses should be roughly proportional to population size, it makes sense to look at assessed value per capita when comparing tax rates.

By this measure, East Greenwich is not particularly wealthy, ranking 11th.

Barrington ranks 10th.

Many shorefront communities have between two and nine times as much assessed property value per resident as East Greenwich.

This is the main reason why their tax rates are so much lower.

A dollar on the tax rate always produces a levy or revenue equal to 1/10th of 1 percent of assessed value.

So a dollar on the tax rate in East Greenwich produces $2.8 million in revenue, while a dollar on the tax rate in Narragansett produces $6.1 million.

This allows Narragansett to cover the expenses for its population, which is only slightly larger that that of East Greenwich, with fewer dollars on the tax rate.


TownPupils
(RADM)		Fy2022
State Aid		Residential
Rate		Adjusted
Rate
Central Falls2,733$38,557,253$23.76$110.94
Providence21,968$272,489,702$24.56$65.26
West Warwick3,607$30,857,785$23.17$40.54
East Greenwich2,572$4,305,850$21.01$22.97
Lincoln3,179$15,940,955$20.29$30.49
Coventry4,502$24,066,104$19.40$26.76
Barrington3,416$7,924,118$19.15$21.63
Warwick8,615$39,218,717$18.73$24.14
Cranston10,166$68,482,484$18.00$27.97
North Kingstown3,747$11,216,037$17.50$20.56
Pawtucket8,585$95,061,517$16.58$40.27
Cumberland4,593$20,401,578$14.74$20.54

There are many municipalities that have both lower assessed value per capita and lower tax rates than East Greenwich. How do we explain that?

Support for public education is the largest component of the budget of most cities and towns.

The State of Rhode Island strives to provide a free, high-quality public K-12 education to all residents. It recognizes that many municipalities lack the property tax base to support this, and provides financial aid to education to make up the shortfall.

Wealthier communities receive less aid because they are judged to be better able to support public education through local property taxes. Aid varies greatly from district to district according to a funding formula.

This graphic shows what the tax rate would be if every community had to raise what it gets in state education aid through residential property taxes.

Our adjusted tax rate would rank 19th.


TownPupils
(RADM)		PopulationPupils
per Capita		Residents
per Pupil
Barrington3,41616,1330.214.7
East Greenwich2,57213,0810.205.1
Lincoln3,17921,7300.156.8
North Kingstown3,74726,2320.147.0
Coventry4,50234,6310.137.7
Cumberland4,59334,8440.137.6
West Warwick3,60728,9410.128.0
Jamestown6555,4930.128.4
Smithfield2,37821,6930.119.1
Warwick8,61580,9990.119.4
Narragansett1,21115,5010.0812.8
Statewide128,9801,057,4360.128.2

Young residents enrolled in public schools are arguably the biggest "consumers" of local tax revenue.

Barrington and East Greenwich have the most public school students per capita.

I like to think this is a result of the high quality of these two systems.

The Rhode Island Department of Education reports the number of students as Resident Average Daily Membership (RADM)

The statewide average (total RADM/total population) is 0.12, or one public school student for every 8 residents.

We have one for every 5 residents.

For a community the size of East Greenwich, this translates to 990 additional students.

For 990 students, the RIDE Core Instruction Per Pupil ($10,635) alone represents more than $10 million in additional costs.

This is equivalent to $3.80 on the tax rate.