PROVIDENCE — One of the three bills that Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos hopes will help lower grocery prices recently cleared the House of Representatives.

Lawmakers, on June 4, approved H8106, sponsored by Rep. Stephen Casey, D-Woonsocket, which would bar grocery chains from using restrictive covenants to keep competitors out of former store properties.

“Everyone supported this bill,” Rep. Carol Hagan McEntee, D-South Kingstown, said during the session, adding that “this is a good bill.”

The House passed the measure in a 62-3 vote, with nine lawmakers abstaining and one absent.

The Senate approved a companion version of the bill sponsored by Sens. Melissa Murray, D-Woonsocket, and Brian Thompson, D-Woonsocket, in May. The House Judiciary Committee advanced that measure, but it has yet to be scheduled for a floor vote.

With only a few days left in the session, both versions remain in limbo.

The measure is part of Matos’ Fair Price Grocery Agenda, a three-bill package she first introduced in 2025 and brought back this session to curb grocery costs in Rhode Island.

But only the measure backed by the Woonsocket lawmakers has advanced in either chamber, while the others remain stalled in committee.

Matos found grocery chains’ use of restrictive covenants in deeds and leases contributed to limited access to healthy food in Woonsocket, where nearly 45,000 people have just one full-scale grocery store within city limits.

She moved to address the issue by partnering with state elected officials to introduce legislation modeled on an ordinance that helped bring new grocery stores to Washington, D.C.

In the process, she found seven restrictive covenants across the state, along with cases where grocery chains kept vacant stores tied up by continuing to pay rent under existing leases.

The Woonsocket City Council passed a resolution in support of the Matos’ bill in 2025. Council member Kristina Contreras Fox, who introduced the resolution, told ecoRI News that if the statewide ban fails in the General Assembly, she’s prepared to roll up her sleeves and pursue a city-level prohibition.

“If we wait for the state to take action, the action that we need, we might be waiting way too long,” she said. “I’m prepared to take action to get these restrictive covenants banned here because it hurts the consumer. It hurts households. It hurts our city.”

If enacted, that state legislation would bar new restrictions, but it wouldn’t invalidate existing ones, which would remain in place for 30 years under state law.

In March, Washington became the first state to outlaw the practice.