Title 37
Public Property and Works

Chapter 5
Department of Transportation

§ 37-5-7.1. Parking cash-out programs.

(a) Each employer of fifty (50) persons or more, located within one-quarter (¼) of a mile of Rhode Island public transit service who provides a parking subsidy to employees, shall offer a parking cash-out program. “Parking cash-out program” means an employer-funded program under which an employer offers to provide a RIPTA monthly transit pass to an employee instead of the parking subsidy that the employer would otherwise pay to provide the employee with a parking space.

(b) A parking cash-out program may include a requirement that employee participants certify that they will comply with guidelines established by the employer designed to avoid neighborhood parking problems, with a provision that employees not complying with the guidelines will no longer be eligible for the parking cash-out program.

(c) As used in this section, the following terms have the following meanings:

(1) “Employee” means an employee of an employer subject to this section;

(2) “Parking subsidy” means the difference between the out-of-pocket amount paid by an employer on a regular basis in order to secure the availability of an employee parking space not owned by the employer and the price, if any, charged to an employee for use of that space.

(d) Subsection (a) shall not apply to any employer who, on or before August 1, 2003, has leased employee parking, until the expiration of that lease or unless the lease permits the employer to reduce, without penalty, the number of parking spaces subject to the lease.

(e) It is the intent of the general assembly, in enacting this section, that cash-out requirements shall apply only to employers who can reduce, without penalty, the number of paid parking spaces they maintain for the use of their employees and instead provide their employees the monthly transit pass described in this section.

(f) Any city or town in which a commercial development will implement a parking cash-out program may grant to that development an appropriate reduction in the parking requirements otherwise in effect for new development. At the request of an existing commercial development that has implemented a parking cash-out program, the city or town may grant an appropriate reduction in the parking requirements otherwise applicable, based on the demonstrated reduced need for parking, and the space no longer needed for parking purposes may be used for other appropriate purposes.