Jim Tarbox is a Westerly resident who’s closely watched beach access issues since the 1990s. Today, he’s continuing to advocate for public access to disputed rights of way, like the blocked-off Spring Avenue in the exclusive Weekapaug Fire District, which is currently being reviewed by the state. As part of our ongoing series One Square Mile: Westerly, Jim Tarbox spoke with South County Bureau Reporter Alex Nunes.
Listen to the interview or read the transcript below.
ALEX NUNES: How would you compare the attention around shoreline access in town today versus at other periods of time since you’ve been following this issue?
JIM TARBOX: It’s a great question. When I first became involved, there were still a lot of older gentlemen that had been using the shoreline to fish, clam, for many years, and they could see it coming. There was a pretty, pretty good number of people that were outspoken about it and were educating themselves about it. And then what happens is people get apathetic and they get on with their lives. And so things cooled down for quite a while. Then, I believe, in about 2008, there was some question about the parking on the west side of the Quonochontaug Breachway. And again, at that time, people mobilized. And then again, there was a lull–people get back with their lives. But the problem is that the fire districts never stop. The positive thing is that for the last two to three years, it’s the most informed group of people that I’ve seen in my lifetime regarding rights of way, and the most mobilized, the most energized.
ALEX NUNES: With all this mobilization, what has been the response from the town council? Have they said, “Okay, people, we hear you. Here we go. This is what we’re going to do”?
JIM TARBOX: Sure. I mean, they say it. That’s absolutely what they’ve said. But it was like pulling teeth just to get the Spring Avenue right of way brought up to CRMC. But we got it done. And we have a new council to be seated here in November. And we are really, really carefully assessing the positions of all of the candidates. So I think going forward, we could be in a good position.
ALEX NUNES: When you watch town council meetings, you hear the councilors say, “People say we’re not doing anything. But if you go down to some of these rights of way, we’ve cleared the brush; we’ve put up granite markers. What do people want from us? We’re doing something.”
JIM TARBOX: Right. These are fantastic. But unless there’s parking, where people can access these rights of way, you’ve essentially erected monuments for future generations to look back and say, “Oh, look. These are the people that served in the interest of the wealthy.” So they can say that they’re working on behalf of the public to open up rights of way, and they have. They have cleared some rights of way that were long abandoned and neglected–kudos. But at the end of the day, they know as well as the public knows that if you have rights of way, and then you put up signs that say “no stopping,” “no standing,” “no parking,” you’ve essentially rendered those rights of way useless.
ALEX NUNES: So I don’t want to sound like I’m being subjective or picking sides or something like that. But when I have sat in on town council meetings or watched them on Zoom, during the pandemic, I noticed that when someone from the fire district, or an attorney representing a fire district, speaks the counselors, they have this like deference and respect for the person as they’re speaking. And when members of the public who are advocating for shoreline access speak, you don’t get the same reaction. I remember one where Councilor Karen Cioffi–someone had presented pictures showing what they felt demonstrated that there was a public right of way. And she responded, I mean, I think you could objectively call it contemptuous.
KAREN CIOFFI [recording from Town Council meeting]: The pictures which you sent of your family, which are lovely, do not substantiate a right of way. They just don’t. Your family may have picnicked there. You may have walked down there since the 40s. That’s great. But that doesn’t mean that it is a legitimate right of way. So don’t expect to get my approval on that.
ALEX NUNES: What’s your reaction when you see the council acting this way?
JIM TARBOX: There’s no surprise anymore, because they’re not the first council that has treated the public that way, with that amount of disdain. And I believe that if you look at some Zoom footage from during the pandemic, I believe, Mr. Ryan, a local resident, was speaking. And you could watch the town council president in the little Hollywood Squares, Zoom thing, rolling her eyes, like sort of “Here we go again. We have to sit through this comment period.”
SPEAKER DURING PUBLIC COMMENT: I can see you all, and there’s smirking and head shaking while I’m talking. So it seems to me that my thoughts, suggestions are not being well received. So there’s little point in me continuing. I’m done.
JIM TARBOX: Was that intentional? Maybe not. Maybe something was going on in the background that we weren’t aware of. But that has been my my experience also–that the council, this council, and other members, not all of them, but other councils in the past, have treated the public with contempt on issues that they just don’t want to deal with.
ALEX NUNES: The people who own property in the coastal communities, the fire districts, and these communities, they make the argument: “We have this popular uprising of people who think they should have more access. But, you know, we live in a nation of property laws; we own the deeds to these areas; so we get to say what people can do there. What do you make of that argument? I mean, they say, “We acquired this land legally. Go check the deed, title history. This is ours.
JIM TARBOX: And we have. There’s been a lot of misrepresentation, I believe, over the years. What we’re questioning is stopping us from accessing public rights of way, not walking through your front yard to get to the beach.
ALEX NUNES: One thing I’ve heard talking with people is they’re very interested in this issue. But then at the end of the conversation, they go, “But nothing will ever change. That’s the way it’s always gonna be.” Obviously, you’re someone who is involved in this issue. You want to see things change. What do you think’s going to happen?
JIM TARBOX: I think it’s going to be very slow. I think that if people can sort of group up together to go after these things, I believe progress is going to be eventually made. A good example of progress is Narragansett. There was a lot of pushback against the surfers parking near rights of way where they could easily access the ocean, and Narragansett eventually made the right call and said “No, these guys are not creating a public safety hazard,” because that’s always the default. You know, “You can’t have parking, because it creates a safety hazard.” And they made the right call there. You go to Newport, there’s parking to get to Cliff Walk. So with those things having been done, I’m positive that along the way, with a lot of hard work, I think we can make some progress.
ALEX NUNES: Jim Tarbox, resident of Westerly and shoreline access advocate, thanks very much for speaking with me.
JIM TARBOX: Thanks for having me, Alex.
Alex Nunes can be reached at anunes@thepublicsradio.org
