PROVIDENCE — Lawmakers are poised this year to revive a long-defunct commission that promises to build new housing and conserve the state’s green space at the same time.

Legislation (H5310/S0711) to revive and update the state’s Housing and Conservation Trust Commission is well on its way to passing through both chambers of the General Assembly. The commission, which was first created in the 1980s, is designed to heal what is commonly seen as a fractious divide between the state’s construction industries and environmental groups.

Rhode Island has long held, perhaps unfairly, the view that the two groups are fundamentally at odds. Environmental groups advocating for reviving the commission say both parties work better together.

“There’s an opportunity to understand each other a bit better,” said Kate Sayles, executive director of the Rhode Island Land Trust Council and a big advocate for reviving the commission. “We’ve been separated for so long that it would be good to talk about each other’s work and when we learn about how we can work together, we’re both stronger.”

It’s no secret the state needs a shotgun approach when it comes to housing. The median price of a single-family home in 2023 was $425,000, and HousingWorks RI found no municipality in Rhode Island in which a household with an income under $100,000 could affordably buy a home.

A prime reason? Rhode Island isn’t building enough new homes, and hasn’t been for a long time. According to the latest data from the U.S. Census, Rhode Island hovers near dead last for the pace at which it builds new housing, and has been dead last in residential construction since 2020.

It’s the second year in a row legislation has been introduced to revive the commission. Lawmakers originally created the commission via state law in the late 1980s, with the same goal of identifying and funding projects that provide affordable housing to residents and conserve the state’s rapidly diminishing natural areas.

But despite it being created almost four decades ago, the commission has never had anyone appointed to serve on it, nor have lawmakers allocated any funding to execute its core mission.

It’s not the first time advocates have tried reigniting lawmakers’ interest in the commission. A legislative study commission, chaired by Scott Wolf, executive director of Grow Smart Rhode Island, started in 2004, and spent 18 months studying the issue.

But the commission was split on how to fund the projects identified. Wolf and others on the commission favored raising the real estate transfer tax at the time from $4 per $1,000 to $5.50, with $1 going toward the commission’s trust fund, and the rest toward helping municipalities identify and fund similar projects on their own. The commission estimated it would bring in about $7 million annually.

The tax increase was decried by the Rhode Island Association of Realtors, which issued its own minority report denouncing the increase.

Sayles said this year’s bill to revive the commission doesn’t include any mechanisms for funding, and part of the revived commission’s job will be to work out how future funding will be sourced.

“If we can come together and learn more about our similarities and differences and figure out what makes the most sense for a funding solution, we’re better off,” she said.

Under this year’s legislation, the number of voting members on the commission would be increased from five to 11, with specific representation required from the environmental community, the conservation and land trust community, family farmers, municipal officials, officials from the nonprofit and for-profit housing construction sectors, among others.

While the final legislation is still far from being signed, or even executed into law, the revival legislation is coasting its way through the General Assembly. Earlier this month the Senate voted to pass its version of the bill, and last week the House Municipal Government and Housing Committee sent its version onto the House floor for a vote.

H5310 is expected to receive a full vote in the House sometime this week.