10/2/2024 Update: The rental registry is now live. The Providence Journal reports that fines will not yet be levied, but will later on.

New rules to strengthen enforcement of lead safety in Rhode Island’s rental units go into effect this fall in an effort to reduce the rates of elevated lead levels among children and other residents in the state.

About three-quarters of housing in Rhode Island was built before 1978 — meaning the paint on doors, windows, cabinets, and siding is likely toxic. In Providence specifically, almost 70% of the housing stock was constructed before 1959.

In Providence’s Historic District Overlay Zones, landlords are expected to comply with this lead regulation in addition to restrictions instituted by the Providence Historic District Commission, which may cover replacements and repairs. This means simple solutions for common lead hazards, such as replacing wooden windows with vinyl alternatives, may not be an option.

Wooden windows with lead paint often trigger failed inspections after years of chips and deterioration while opening.

The Providence Preservation Society spoke with several experts on the challenge posed by lead paint on historic wooden windows — and whether it is possible to balance public health and child safety with the maintenance of historic material.

New Legislation and Consequences for Non-compliance

Rhode Island has had lead safety laws in place for landlords since 2002, said Rhode Island Department of Health’s Chief of Program Development for Lead Judah Boulet. While this recent legislation package extends the scope of lead restrictions, the new laws largely ramp up the enforcement and fining of non-compliant properties.

One law mandates the creation of a statewide registry where landlords must register and “for each dwelling unit, provide the Department of Health with a valid certificate of conformance.” For rental units built before 1978 — the year lead paint was banned in the U.S. — properties must pass a lead inspection. Landlords must “fix any lead hazard within 30 calendar days if the property fails inspection” and get the property reinspected to receive a Certificate of Lead Conformance, according to RIDOH.

Owner-occupied two- and three-unit rentals were previously excluded from prior legislation. Now these properties must pass an inspection and renew their certification every two years. Every landlord in the state must register with RIDOH or be fined $50 a month per unit beginning Oct. 1, 2024. There is an additional fine of $125 per unit without a lead compliance certificate per month.  

“Landlords not in compliance with the requirement to have a lead certification will not be able to evict tenants for non-payment of rent,” according to the HousingWorks RI 2023 factbook.

An additional law in the package allows tenants to hold rent in escrow while unaddressed lead hazards are in their units. The legislation also permits families whose child contracts lead poisoning to be compensated “up to three times their actual damages (known as treble damages) if their landlord is found to have violated lead safety laws,” according to a press release from the attorney general’s office.

Buyers who purchase buildings with the intent to rent them out for multi-family or owner-occupied use are responsible for getting into compliance. Lead-safe certification needs to be renewed every two years or each time new tenants move into a rental unit. 

Lead Inspections: What Inspectors Look For

With the Oct. 1 deadline looming, some owners are worried about how to get their properties into compliance.

When consumed, lead is particularly harmful to young children. Children may accidentally consume chipped paint or ingest particles in the air or soil.

“It’s inert until it’s made into a fine powder, dust, airborne, moving parts,” said Harry Adler, co-owner of Adler’s Design Center and Hardware, adding that windows can break off particles when opened or closed.

With the new legislation, landlords need to get lead-safe certification for their rental units or else face penalties from the state. “Now everybody’s panicking,” said Sharon Barr, owner of LeadSafe Inspections and Consulting, Inc. Barr explained that wait times for inspections from her company have doubled and tripled in recent months. Barr said that she is training three new inspectors to join the six already on her staff to meet this increased demand.

When conducting a lead inspection, Barr focuses on a few spots. Windows and doors — places with frequent friction or contact between painted materials — can be especially hazardous because friction can release airborne particles. Some built-in cabinetry in older homes may also have lead paint or backing. An inspector may also take soil samples near the house foundation and search for chipping paint outside, which needs to be repainted often to maintain the lead-safe certification.

Barr explained that inspectors can also do “rub tests” or use a handheld lead paint analyzer. “We can also take soil samples or water or any type of sample that we want to,” she said. “We still try to do it as a visual inspection, because the more we have to do with the machine… [it] is expensive for the landlords.”

Boulet explained that if windows in a home do not pass visual inspection, that constitutes a failed test.

Even if a wooden double-hung window, for example, is in good visual condition, it is unlikely to pass a lead inspection test. “I’ve been doing this for over 20 years and I’ve tested a ton of windows,” Barr said. “I have not found [a wooden] one that has not had lead.” 

Wooden windows operated by rope and pulley with wooden sills “never pass an inspection,” Barr explained. And even if the inside of the window has been stained or stripped, the exterior often still contains lead.

Boulet outlined three ways to mitigate the lead risk from wood-on-wood contact for historic windows. A slider can be inserted to avoid the friction that creates lead dust, or the window could be stripped down to the wood and repainted with lead-free paint. Barr and others said that at times, stripped wood will still test positive for lead content and fail the inspection. 

“Stripping a window is not sufficient,” according to Rob Cagnetta, founder of Heritage Restoration, Inc. “You could do all this work and still fail.”

The final option is to replace the window entirely.

“Once the windows are out of the way, compliance is relatively easy,” Cagnetta said. Barr explained that typically doors, cabinets, and other sources of lead have relatively simpler lead-safe solutions.

Most often, the cheapest solution for landlords is to completely swap the window for a vinyl replacement. But some owners in Historic District Overlay Zones may not have that option due to restrictions on alterations to their home’s exterior and considerations of historic integrity. 

The Providence Historic District Commission (PHDC) enforces regulations to preserve the historic fabric of neighborhoods encompassed by Historic District Overlay Zones, which are set at the municipal level. The Commission has to approve applications for construction and development in Local Historic Districts (LHDs), considering historical integrity and aesthetic beauty through a design review process.

Usually, replacing wooden windows with vinyl counterparts is frowned upon in historic preservation practice. The City’s Preservation Planner, Jason Martin, explained that “there are these two laws. One says we preserve these things. This one says we want to get rid of some of the things that we’re preserving.”

Simply put, “new laws trump old laws” in this instance, Martin said, so owners in LHDs will need to find solutions.

Though it is “not a cheap endeavor” to replace wooden windows that comply with requirements for Historic District zoning, the Department of Health is solely focused on the lead risk. “The laws don’t have accommodations for historic homes,” Boulet said.

Historic Windows 101

Historic windows are usually operated with a rope and pulley system. The sashes may rub against each other or against the wooden tracks on the sides, releasing lead particles. Barr added that contact with the window sill can also create friction. And even when the interior is sufficiently stained or lead-safe, the window’s exterior often is not.

Many windows in Providence are double-hung. These windows have two sashes — moveable segments of glass surrounded by wood — operated by ropes. The two sashes can move independently, though older double-hung windows may have a stationary upper sash.

Some contractors specializing in heritage construction have innovated to make wooden windows lead-safe and compliant with historic district regulations. These fixes, however, are often costly. Replacing windows with custom, lead-free windows can be extremely pricy, ranging from hundreds to thousands of dollars per window.

Stripping and restoring windows can also be expensive with no guarantee it will pass a lead inspection. “Full restoration is not cheap — there are no shortcuts and it’s labor intensive,” said Jessica BouRamia, founder of Providence Window Works. BouRamia also took and taught Building Works Course with PPS. She said that there is not sufficient funding from the government or other agencies for landlords seeking compliance and remediation. 

Some cities and towns are eligible for financial assistance for lead remediation from Rhode Island Housing. Providence additionally has loans available through the Lead Safe Providence Program. The Public’s Radio reported in February that the City has to spend the rest of the $5 million granted by HUD in 2020 by the end of this year; about half of that funding had been spent by February 2024.

Providence residents can join the RI Housing grant waitlist if they do not qualify for financial assistance from the City of Providence; the city’s program is for households below particular incomes depending on household size. 

According to RIDOH, there is also a state income tax credit of up to $5,000 per unit for lead remediation using Residential Lead Abatement Income Tax Credit Form RI-6238.

Though BouRamia can fully strip and restore wooden windows as a restoration carpenter, she cannot make them lead-free or guarantee that they will be lead-safe. “I’m getting tons of calls all the time and there’s nothing I can do,” BouRamia added.

But folks who own rental properties in LHDs still have options to get lead-safe certified with varying degrees of effort, cost, and longevity.

Making Wooden Windows Lead-Safe: Compliance in Local Historic Districts

Martin explained that ultimately the PHDC doesn’t want these historic windows to be a “deal breaker” for people renting out their units. “We’re going to accommodate people,” he said.

Windows should be “architecturally compatible with the building and the district … what we’re looking at is loss of glass area. We want the window potentially to look as close to what it did,” Martin added. 

“We’ve come to a decision that if we’re losing a total of less than three inches side to side on a new window unit, then that window meets our guidelines, in essence,” he said.

Window jamb liners can cover the edges of the window to eliminate friction, Barr explained.
The window may need to be shaved down on all sides to accommodate the width of the liner, which if it is covered in lead-based paint could be hazardous in itself. The non-uniform sizes of historic windows mean the jamb liners may also need to be cut or altered to fit the needed dimensions.

Still, there are options. “They sell them in metal and vinyl,” Barr said. “I’ve had landlords put them in and say they’re not that hard to do.”

Cagnetta has also developed a lead-safe system by creating a groove in the window, inserting a T-shaped piece of metal and shaving down the sides.

It “enables it to function on non-lead surfaces,” removing friction points on the painted wood, Cagnetta explained.

Cagnetta expressed concern that enforcement of the lead compliance may inadvertently be implemented unevenly depending on the landlord. “Only those that can afford to will replace the window, but those units are usually not the problem,” he said.

But the costs of not getting into compliance can be high as well, particularly if a child contracts lead poisoning due to unaddressed hazards.

Building codes in the state also dictate that windows must be fully operational, meaning that homeowners cannot permanently shut the upper sash of a double-hung window to eliminate friction.

If codes allowed a fixed upper sash, only half the window would need to be replaced or altered.

“I would prefer that myself,” Barr said. “It wouldn’t cost the landlord so much to fix the windows either… They’d only have to fix the insides and then the restoration companies can design something to just get it all.”

BouRamia emphasized that wooden windows’ quality eclipses vinyl windows. There will be a “loss of a lot of historic material” as enforcement ramps up if no cost-efficient and accessible solutions are found, she said.

“These things can last forever if they are repaired,” BouRamia said. Vinyl windows “are not repairable, only replaceable.”

This piece is part of ongoing coverage of lead safety in historic homes. Please direct tips to kpickens@ppsri.org. 

By Katy Pickens / Planning and Preservation Writer

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