The East Providence Taxpayers’ Association (EPTA) is a nonpartisan civic organization dedicated to promoting good government, excellence in public education, and the general welfare of the entire community.  We believe our city government should provide citizens with the highest quality services efficiently and cost-effectively.  

EPTA was founded in 2005 by a group of concerned citizens who believed that our city government was not serving the best interests of the people.  Fiscal mismanagement, political corruption, the negative influence of special interests, and unaffordable public employee contracts all had been contributing to out of control government spending, a problem that has grown worse every year since.  Property tax increases had reached such high levels that they were causing significant harm to some of our citizens, and had become an excessive burden for all of them. 

The EPTA follows a global best practices approach to promoting excellence in the performance of our city government and public schools.  This means that we do intensive research to identify the best practices of the highest performing governmental and educational organizations worldwide, and then promote policies to help East Providence government and schools achieve those same high performance standards.   

Promoting effective public policy is central to our mission.  We are staunch supporters of fiscal responsibility in government spending, and work hard to ensure the disciplined, efficient use of taxpayer money for the benefit of the entire community.   Our core mission is to make a reality that great American ideal President Lincoln declared in his Gettysburg Address that our citizens benefit from a “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” 

EPTA members work together to achieve our shared goals by getting actively involved in community affairs and effectively participating in the political process.  We are all volunteers who are not paid for our time and effort.  We have no other interest than to see that city government acts in the best interests of the community. We are a non-partisan group, do not represent the views of any political party, and welcome all citizens concerned about good government to join our cause. 

We believe, as did Thomas Jefferson, that, “Information is the currency of Democracy.”  Accordingly, we are working to improve the openness and honesty of our city government.  We have a vigorous Open and Honest Government Initiative underway that consistently presses East Providence city government to fully disclose its activities for the benefit of our fellow citizens and neighbors.

The EPTA is beginning to open up city government to the light of day. We are challenging the old way of doing business in East Providence. On a number of critical points, we are challenging the establishment that has run our city for decades--individuals and groups who have a vested interest in unaffordable public employee contracts and the unsustainable expansion of our city government.  In contrast, we believe that we do not need ever-larger government and relentless tax increases.

We believe the climate of local government in East Providence is such that an individual is rarely heard, and that to be effective we must speak as a group. Together we can effect change; individually we will be ignored.

EPTA maintains official affiliations with major government reform groups such as the Rhode Island Statewide Coalition, Portsmouth Concerned Citizens, the Voter-Initiative Alliance of Rhode lsland, and the Affordable Rhode Island Coalition. We have aligned ourselves with these statewide reform groups in order  to gain access to the best research and analysis available about critical issues influencing the lives of East Providence taxpayers.  Our affiliations with these groups also increases our ability to influence statewide policy issues that affect the citizens of East Providence.

22 Metropolitan Park Drive, Riverside, Rhode Island 02915