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Bonnet Shores Voting Rights Activist, Melissa Jenkins, Wins Seat on Fire District Council
August 14, 2025/
by Paula Childs to RINewsToday:
In a follow-up to our story of April 1st, “Drowning in corruption in Bonnet Shores“, here is the result of the election (see link to our full story, below):
“Fire District resident Melissa Jenkins defied the odds and secured a three year term as a new Bonnet Shores Fire District Council member thanks to a strong turnout by Fire District residents in this Narragansett community.
Jenkins defeated opponent James Hill (a bus driver for the private Bonnet Shores Beach Club,) by a narrow margin of just 7 votes following a recount in the August 6 election at the Fire District’s community center. An estimated 400 voters comprised of both Bonnet homeowners and non-resident cabana owners at the Beach Club turned out for the election.
Jenkins won one of two open seats on the seven member Fire District Council along with local resident Kevin O’Brien. It had been a contentious political race as Bonnet residents and the Beach Club’s private owners struggle to control the majority on the council.
Residents complain that the Fire District’s nearly 100 year-old charter has an illegal loophole because in 1932 it granted voting rights to property owners but not to residents who actually lived in Bonnet Shores. Jenkins joined a resident lawsuit against the Fire District six years ago and a Superior Court judge ruled that the Fire District was a quasi-municipality that must follow state and federal voting laws based on residency. The judge also ordered the Fire District Council to create a five member Charter Commission to create a new charter that followed the law.
After that commission held public hearings and drew up a new charter that limited voting rights in the Fire District to residents only, it failed to get passed in the General Assembly due to strong opposition from Council Chair Carol O’Donnell, one of the largest shareholders at the private Beach Club. O’Donnell challenged the legitimacy of the original Charter Commission she had herself appointed and subsequently created a second Charter Commission to develop a new charter.
That second charter commission was criticized as illegal for not having a plaintiff from the voting rights lawsuit on board, which had been a requirement of the Superior Court judge that ruled in residents’ favor. In the end, the second charter commission (which included a Beach Club board member appointed by O’Donnell) failed to come to any consensus on a new charter.) The Bonnet Shores Fire District is currently operating and holding elections without a new charter.
In a non-binding opinion poll on the voting rights issue, voters at the August 6 election voted overwhelmingly in favor of following established law by making residency a requirement for voting, as is done in all but one of Rhode Island’s other Special Districts.
Melissa Jenkins expressed her deep gratitude to the Bonnet residents who came out to support her. Jenkins took up her voting rights fight after she was prevented in voting in previous Fire District elections because her name was not on the deed to the home she shares with her husband.
As a newly elected council member, Melissa Jenkins says she intends to stand up for her community’s residents to ensure that the the neighborhood’s precious natural resources including two small beaches, a harbor and a pond and wildlife sanctuary are properly managed and protected.
Jenkins also hopes to see a new Fire District charter created that will ensure that every qualified Bonnet resident can vote in their local elections and that non-resident property owners will no longer be a part of the Fire District voting pool.”
Here is our April 1st story:
Posted in Politics
Congrats to Melissa for fighting the good fight. Best wishes. Vin
Thank you, my friend! 🙏🏼 Appreciate your kind words!