SCLS Realty, LLC and Sixty Three Johnston, LLC were formed by Salvatore Compagnone, Jr, a fourth-generation general contractor in Johnston, Rhode Island, whose family has a long history in the building trade dating back to Italy. After Salvatore’s father passed away in early 2024, his family took the helm of development in the town with plans to carry on the building tradition and provide desperately needed, new affordable housing.
A 2023 Rhode Island law aimed at incentivizing private creation of affordable housing (housing that costs less than a third of a moderate- or low-income household’s income) seemed to pave the way. This law allows more living units per acre than local rules usually permit and requires local governments to streamline the approval process with quicker and simpler permitting procedures.
SCLS and Sixty Three Johnston own just over 31 vacant acres of land in the Providence suburb of Johnston. The town of some 30,000 residents is just a few miles from the state capital, yet only 7% of its housing serves low- and moderate-income residents.
SCLS and Sixty Three Johnston’s property was already zoned for dense apartment-style development. Sal Compagnone and his partner, Ralph Santoro, designed a 252-unit, five-building complex, and in October 2024, submitted a preliminary land-use application to the Town planning department, which set a December 3 hearing to review the plans. But Johnston’s mayor, Joseph Polisena, Jr., had other ideas. On the same day as SCLS and Sixty Three Johnston’s planning board hearing, he posted a letter on social media attacking the project. He claimed it would create “a trifecta of chaos” with increased traffic, drainage problems, and an overwhelmed school system. And although Rhode Island law specifically allows—indeed encourages—this type of housing development, the mayor accused the LLCs of trying to “force-feed” an unwanted project on the Town. His letter also fired out a clear threat: “If you insist on moving forward with the currently proposed project, I will use all the power of government that I have to stop it.”
The mayor wasn’t bluffing. On January 27, 2025, Polisena abruptly announced the Town would seize the LLCs’ land by eminent domain. He claimed the Town needed the LLCs’ property for a new municipal complex, despite zero evidence the Town had ever previously considered such an acquisition or that relocation of the Town’s facilities nearly three miles away from their present central location to the edge of the town had ever been mentioned, much less planned. But the Town Council unanimously approved the taking the very next day.
The power of eminent domain is among the government’s most potent powers. It allows the government to force a property owner who may not want to sell to do so, at a price the owner doesn’t agree to. The Constitution recognizes that such overwhelming power is subject to abuse, so it requires that eminent domain be used only for genuine public uses or purposes (like building roads or schools). It cannot be a sham, and the Constitution forbids the weaponization of eminent domain to stop property owners from using their land in legal ways, all the while hiding the real reasons for the taking.
In this case, the mayor—and the Town Council—invoked eminent domain to block housing that’s affordable for low-to-moderate-income families, simply because they don’t want that kind of thing in their town.
When government paints the eminent domain target on a property owner’s back, the Constitution requires genuine public purpose. But the mayor’s own words and actions reveal that the Town’s sudden need to relocate its municipal complex to a new location miles away on the edge of town is nothing more than a smokescreen—a fake justification to take the LLCs’ property for spite, to block new affordable housing openly opposed by the mayor. The Constitution forbids this sleight-of-hand and abuse of eminent domain.
Represented by Pacific Legal Foundation free of charge, SCLS and Sixty Three Johnston are fighting back with a federal lawsuit to protect the rights of all property owners to use their land to serve important public needs—like affordable housing for families in Rhode Island and nationwide.
What’s At Stake?
- The government cannot take property through eminent domain simply because it doesn’t like an owner’s lawful use.
- When the government takes property claiming that it’s for a public use, it must be truthful, and the use must actually be publicand not merely a pretext for some other hidden use or purpose.
