EAST PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Metacomet Golf Club, one of the last large open spaces on the coast of Rhode Island and likely an important Native American historical site, is poised to become the site of a massive mixed-use development.

The historic former golf course covers 138 acres along Veterans Memorial Parkway and is named after the Wampanoag sachem who was killed in 1676 in a war against encroaching English colonists.

There’s almost nowhere else on the coast where you could put a development of this size, according to state archaeologist Charlotte Taylor.

The multimillion-dollar development planned for the property will be developed by Pawtucket-based Marshall Properties Inc., Lianne Marshall, co-owner of Marshall Properties, said in an email. The project will include 845 residential units, with 10% of the homes designated as affordable, inclusionary housing.

The development will also include a “town center,” with retail space, recreational amenities, and pathways connecting the site to the East Bay Bike Path, according to Marshall. Marshall Properties is donating 9.6 acres of the property to the city as public open space.

There is no question Metacomet Green was an important Native American site, according to Taylor.

“That whole chunk of East Providence was a large settlement with both Narragansett and Wampanoag villages, not dense settlement, but concentrated settlement,” she said. “One of the things with settlements like these are very often there are burials where people were living, not in discrete cemeteries, but all over, so there are sites that might be burials that haven’t been investigated.”

Native American burials trigger further reviews when found, but don’t necessarily stop a development from happening, according to Taylor. During her 33 years of work as an archaeologist, she could only think of one project that was stopped by the discovery of burials. She declined to identify the site, wary of treasure hunters.

“[The project] was a large residential subdivision,” Taylor said. “Archaeologists went in and found another village site. This was not truncated by golf course activity. It was totally intact. All the features were still there and it included burials. It was not possible to find places without burials for the subdivision to go.”

In a brief telephone interview, Deborah Cox, president of The Public Archaeology Laboratory Inc. (PAL), the firm performing an archaeological survey for Marshall Properties, said her company’s investigation is ongoing, “but I can say we have found no evidence of burials.”

Jeffrey Emidy, executive director of the Rhode Island Historical Preservation and Heritage Commission — and Taylor’s boss — said it was his understanding that Marshall Properties got started on the archaeology of the Metacomet site very early in the process because they knew there were concerns about archaeological sites.

“There’s clearly a group of people in East Providence who care deeply about this piece of property and don’t want to see it developed,” Emidy said. “Then you have the tribe. The Narragansett are deeply concerned about it as well, for different reasons. I don’t want to put words in their mouth, but it’s clear they don’t want to see it developed.”

They don’t. Mark Andrews, deputy tribal historic preservation officer for the Narragansett Indian Tribe, said the site has all the components of the everyday life of a village.

“The piece de resistance was the post molds they discovered, indicative of a huge longhouse where families gathered in the winter,” he said. “It has to be 50 feet by 30 feet long.”

Taylor added that it’s possible the longhouse is “the very place Roger Williams negotiated with sachems for the colony of Providence.”

“The site is certainly very important,” she said. “It’s one of the last sites of its kind surviving in Rhode Island. If we could excavate the entire site we could learn a lot, but that’s not going to happen.”

Marshall Properties bought Metacomet Golf Club in 2020 from a group of investors that included Rhode Island golfing legend Brad Faxon. Faxon and his fellow investors bought the golf course in April 2019 for $750,000, assuming more than $2 million in debt. They sold the property to Marshall for $7.6 million more than a year later.

Local residents felt betrayed by Faxon and his investors, who had promised to preserve the open space and restore the golf course to its former glory. The course was designed by renowned golf course architect Donald Ross in 1926. In July 2020, ecoRI News reported that neighbors of the golf course weren’t pleased with the likelihood of increased traffic development would bring, as well as “losing a quiet nature refuge that is home to coyotes, deer, and foxes.”

“We’re all extremely frustrated,” local resident Roselette DeWitt said then. “We’re going to try to stop it.”

Six years later, the Facebook group Keep Metacomet Green!, with 3,100 members, continues to oppose development at the site.

“Keep Metacomet Green! started in 2020 to stop the Metacomet Country Club from being sold to begin with, but that didn’t work out,” said Heather Andrade, one of three directors for the organization.

PAL discovered arsenic in the soil on the site, left over from decades of herbicides and pesticides used for the golf course, according to Taylor. She noted PAL investigators working on the site have to wear hazmat suits because of the discovery of arsenic.

“My boss does not want me to go there,” she said.

“The project went through a years-long review and approval process at the city level,” Marshall wrote in her email to ecoRI News. “The project is expected to create 3,640 jobs during construction and approximately 630 permanent jobs, generating over $5 million in annual tax revenue for the City of East Providence.”

Marshall said that while PAL archaeologists are wearing protective suits to avoid direct skin contact with the soil before remediation has taken place, there is no hazard to the public. The remediation plan contemplates blending the soil in specific areas on the site with clean fill, according to Marshall. That plan is currently out for public comment.

PAL resumed the final phase of the archaeological study in the field in April, according to Marshall. The study is expected to be completed sometime in June.

The items located by the archaeologists include shells, fragments and animal bones. To date, there has been no confirmation of human remains on the site. Any messages or comments suggesting otherwise are inaccurate.”
— Lianne Marshall, co-owner of Marshall Properties

If human remains are found, Marshall said there is a “statutory protocol that governs the process by which these findings are to be noticed and subsequently administered. Marshall [Properties] must adhere to those requirements if and when required.”

Andrews noted the Metacomet site is adjacent to another site with known Native American burials, and that “contextually,” it makes sense that there are burials on the Metacomet Golf Club site as well.

“This has the potential to explode,” Andrews said. “That’s the last thing proponents of the project want. They cringe every time a new discovery is found. This site is one of the most significant cultural sites found in New England.”

Emidy said his organization typically gets involved in a development if there is permitting required. In the case of Metacomet Golf Club, the Coastal Resources Management Council, whose purview is to protect the coastal resources of Rhode Island, determined the project lay within its jurisdiction.

“We ultimately have to provide our comments to CRMC, and they will decide whether they want to issue a permit,” Emidy said.

Once the archaeological study is completed, Marshall said her company intends to go before CRMC to provide a comprehensive update on the project.