Brown to pay hometown $31.5 million to help close budget gap

Brown University has agreed to pay Providence, R.I., $31.5-million over the next 11 years, a move that Angel Taveras, the mayor, said would help the cash-strapped city deal with a vast budget deficit. Ruth J. Simmons, Brown's president, joined Mr. Taveras and Gov. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island at the State House on Tuesday morning to announce the deal, which still must be approved by the Providence City Council to take effect. Under the agreement, Brown will pay the city an additional $3.9-million in the current fiscal year, which ends June 30, bringing to $8-million the university's total annual contribution to municipal coffers. Mr. Taveras called the agreement "a renewal of our shared willingness to work together to make both Brown and Providence successful." The arrangement, which took many months to hammer out, reflects the new state of town-gown relations. No longer are the primary fights about underage drinking or other bad behavior by students. Instead, the main friction is pensions—namely, whether, and how much, tax-exempt universities and other nonprofit groups should contribute to cities weighed down by retirement costs for municipal employees and other expenses.

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