The gun range predates both of the nearby public schools. But the firing range also pre-dates the nation’s school shooting crisis.

A devoted contingent of Cranston residents has been calling for the closure of the Cranston Police Academy Training Complex outdoor firing range, citing the mental health effects of gunfire on pupils in both nearby schools — Cranston West High School and Western Hills Middle School.

Public safety and city officials in Cranston, however, are struggling to strike a balance between neighborhood concerns and the department’s training needs.

The Crusade

Martha DiMeo has led a crusade to relocate the firing range for more than two years. She lives near the facility and she abhors the frequent sound of gunfire echoing throughout the nearby hills of mostly pastoral and quiet western Cranston.

Last week she asked the following question: “Why is there such resistance to protecting children — and the community — from harmful gunfire noise pollution?”

DiMeo attended a Cranston City Council meeting last week with several like-minded individuals. She was shadowed by documentary filmmaker Mae Gammino, who recorded the evening’s attempt to advocate for an end to gunfire in the neighborhood off Phenix Avenue.

They were expecting an update from Mayor Kenneth Hopkins’s office on efforts to re-locate the range. They offered testimony during the public comment portion of the meeting and approached Hopkins’s Chief of Staff Anthony Morretti in the hallway outside council chambers after adjournment.

DiMeo points to statements by Dr. Patricia Ricci, a psychiatrist who testified before the Cranston City Council in October 2022 “about the irreparable harm that is being inflicted on the community and the schoolchildren.” She also cites Dr. Melissa Jenkins-Mangili, a neuropsychologist, who sent an open letter to Hopkins in September 2022, “calling for an immediate shutdown of the range.” The next month, DiMeo read the letter into the record at the same October 2022 council meeting where Ricci spoke.

She has provided volumes of research and several medical opinions, but after last week’s meetings, DiMeo confessed a discouraging lack of progress in her mission.

“Listening to our testimony again—two years later—it infuriates me that absolutely nothing has been done,” DiMeo wrote via email. “The Mayor, the Council, and the CPD, simply do not care. Political expediency trumps the welfare and wellbeing of children and the residents.”

Little Administrator Concern

School administrators, however, say they’re not worried.

John Fontaine has been Principal at Cranston High School West since 2022, and he’s been working at the school for more than a decade.

“Yes you can hear it,” Fontaine said earlier this week. “In my 12 years of working here I have never had a student or a parent or staff member complain to me about it, ever. If a student was having a mental health crisis because of the gun range, I would be concerned about it, but I have never had a student come to me with a mental health concern because of the gun range.”

Western Hills Middle School Principal Tim Vesey offered a similar assessment.

“Yes, you can sometimes hear the sounds of the gun range shooting from inside the school on occasion,” Vesey said. “It depends upon where you are in the building and the noise level of students. No students have approached me or my team with major concerns about it. On very few occasions students have asked about the gun range shooting and I reassured them that it is the Cranston Police, the good guys and girls, practicing. That always seems to have put them at ease.”

The Cranston Public Schools Leadership Team also offered a statement on the range and its proximity to two district schools: “Yes, you can hear gunfire during the school day, but it does not distract or interrupt students’ learning or activities during the school day. Students have not reported any mental health concerns regarding the use of the gun range.”

The school department, however, refused to arrange interviews with students at either school.

Visiting the Range

Cranston Police Lt. Joshua Dygon held an “AR style” semiautomatic rifle tight against his shoulder last week. He wore noise-cancelling headphones to protect his hearing.

“This range has been here since about ’54,” Dygon said.

He and Capt. Carl Ricci gave a tour of the more than 70-year-old facility last week.

“The range pre-dates most of the development in the area,” Ricci said.

Western Hills Middle School, at 400 Phenix Ave., and Cranston West High School, at 80 Metropolitan Ave., are both located less than 600 yards from the facility at 493 Phenix Ave.

“We did some firing with rifles and we brought a decibel reader to the school; to the door,” Ricci recalled. “They did some readings. And then they went inside the school. Once inside the school, the decibel readings did not go up at all inside the school. There’s a couple of decibels higher outside of the school. But once inside the school, the decibel reader didn’t pick up on anything other than the ambient reading.”

Ricci also recalled his experience as a student.

“I went to Cranston West,” Ricci recalled. “It didn’t affect the day-to-day goings on in the school.”

Western Hills was constructed in 1970, and Cranston West was constructed in 1958 (with CACTC constructed in 1976), according to the 2018 District-Wide Facilities Assessment Report.

Dygon, the Cranston Police Department’s Training Division Commander, schedules and supervises firing exercises at the range. Over the past few years, as residents like DiMeo have been sounding the alarm over allegedly excessive gunfire, Dygon has been looking into numerous ways to reduce the noise-level.

Suppressing Noise

The department has drastically reduced the number of outside departments training at the range (which at one time included numerous federal and state law enforcement agencies).

Some weeks at the range are very busy (last week, for example). And some weeks (like this week), the range is mostly silent.

“There is nothing scheduled this week,” Dygon wrote via email Monday morning. “The range will be in use next week beginning Monday with an outside agency (East Providence PD) as well as a demo from a suppressor manufacturer.”

Cranston Police are considering the purchase and use of rifle shot suppressors.

The city has also explored the addition of more noise-reducing features, enclosing the outdoor range, and possibly relocating the facility.

“Over the past several years, the Cranston Police Department has implemented various sound mitigation policies and physical modifications to the department’s gun range to address the complaints from the immediate neighborhood,” explained Cranston Police Chief Col. Michael J. Winquist. “This includes adding noise absorption baffles, planting trees, increasing the height of the berm that serves as a backstop, eliminating rifle fire by all outside agencies, reducing external department usage to three agencies a few days annually, publicly posting the schedule of use through city hall, and communicating with the school department to cease fire during scheduled athletic events.”

The department may switch over to the new technology, if training officers are convinced suppressors won’t affect weapon accuracy.

“Since the passage of the law at the General Assembly that permits police departments to use weapon suppressors, we have done extensive research and testing,” according to Winquist. “We will soon purchase and implement suppressors for all rifle fire at the range. Based on our original testing of suppressors, we believe the decibels from rifle fire will be reduced by more than 50%. We will continue to explore additional sound mitigation technology and be mindful of the impact our required training has on the community.”

According to Dygon, however, suppressors will only help dampen the sound of rifle fire.

“We can’t suppress pistol rounds,” he said. “That’s not going to happen.”

The Politics

Moretti responded to requests for comment from the mayor’s office.

The Cranston Herald asked if Mayor Hopkins shares resident concerns over the firing range’s proximity to two Cranston public schools.

“Are you asking about residents in the neighborhood in general or the extreme few folks that are tied to the progressive left of the Democrat party that are campaigning against the mayor?” Moretti replied. “Other than the few folks from the extreme group noted above, there are rare complaints from area residents. Those residents, however, are generally pleased with having the range where it is located in close proximity to Western Hills and Cranston West for response times along with having officers receiving top-notch training to protect the community.”

Moretti referenced school administrator sentiment on the issue.

“In fact, the administration has never received a single complaint from the school department about the use of the range,” Moretti said. “The mayor, of course, has public safety as his top priority and continues his concern for the well-being of the city’s students.”

Despite Hopkins’s lack of concern, Moretti said many steps have still been taken in an effort to appease gun range opponents.

“Use of the range has been reduced to only three other police agencies that use the range each, once per year, for pistol fire qualification only,” Moretti explained. “In recent months, the mayor has been looking into the feasibility of relocating the range comprehensively in respect of overall public safety.  This assessment is considering alternative possible sites, costs and sound efficiency. This also includes the possibility of keeping the range at its current location with improved sound proofing. In addition, recent legislation has enabled communities to use sound suppressors on rifle fire that is the highest level of noise production at the range. The mayor has asked the Colonel to follow-up on this sound mitigation effort.”

Moretti told city council that a new gun range could cost taxpayers as much as $4-5 million.

Hopkins, a Republican, faces City Councilman Robert Ferri, a Democrat, in the General Election.

“I do not believe residents and children close to the gun range should become accustomed to the sound of gunfire,” Ferri said Tuesday morning. “It causes a persistent and unhealthy level of stress for many who live near the range.”

Ferri echoed the concerns voiced by DiMeo and others in public session over the past few years.

“Unfortunately, the Mayor’s response has been consistent on this issue like so many others of late — no new updates,” Ferri wrote via email. “This issue was first brought to Mayor Hopkins by concerned residents (his constituents) when he took office 3.5 years ago, and at the time he said he would address their concerns with the same potential remedies as he is saying now. He stated to the concerned residents that they needed to trust him to take care of the issue. In three years he has taken no action resolve the issue. Three years in and still no plan.”

According to Ferri, the city still has “some options to be considered.”

“Either enclose, soundproof or move the facility,” Ferri insists. “Action must be taken by the Mayor and his administration to make something happen. I do not think solving this problem is truly a priority for the Mayor. He recently stated during a debate just before the primary that he had a plan. It turns out that there was no plan, just a discussion.”

Voters have a choice between the candidates in November.

“When I am elected Mayor, we will have a plan to address this issue in my first year, and I would aim to have some resolution before the end of my first term,” Ferri said. “There needs to be a reasonable compromise to satisfy everyone’s needs. Doing nothing is not acceptable.”

The gun range and schools are located in Ward 5, and represented by Cranston City Councilman Chris Paplauskas. His kids have also attended the nearby schools.

 “I’m sympathetic to the neighbors living directly next to the police range, which is why I support enclosing it,” Paplauskas explained this week. “Doing so will not only mitigate the noise but also provide our Police Department with a state-of-the-art facility where they can train more frequently.”

Paplauskas, a Republican, requested patience from his constituents (term-limited on city council, Paplauskas is now running for the House District 15 seat, vacated by Hopkins’s Primary opponent, soon to be former Rep. Barbara Ann Fenton-Fung).

“During my time on the City Council, Col. Winquist and the entire command staff have been extremely helpful in notifying neighbors when the range will be in use and they have significantly reduced its use by neighboring departments,” he said. “As a parent of two children attending Cranston West and a resident of Meshanticut, I find it reassuring to have this facility with additional officers close by. My position is that the training facility should not be moved, but rather enclosed to provide our Police Department with a state-of-the-art facility, ensuring our schools continue to benefit from having extra officers nearby and allowing Cranston to maintain one of the best-trained police departments in the country.”

Ward 4 City Councilman Richard Campopiano, a fellow Republican, agreed with Paplauskas.

“We have one of the finest police forces in the state,” Campopiano said Tuesday morning. “We need to give them the tools they need to protect us. With that said, I look forward to being part of the effort of enclosing our gun range in order to keep the neighborhood quiet while also keeping it safe.”

No other Cranston City Council members, besides Ferri, responded to requests for comment on Tuesday morning before the Herald went to the presses.

Past Experience

On May 24, 2023, local officers — primarily from Cranston and Providence Police Departments — fired more than 140 bullets at double murder suspect James Harrison after a car chase and crash on Plainfield Pike (on the border of Cranston and Johnston).

At least 10 of those bullets found their target and no bystanders were injured. Harrison died, but in August of this year (more than a year after the shooting) a multi-agency review headed by the Rhode Island Attorney General’s office determined the use of deadly force was warranted and appropriate.

Many of the officers at the scene that day were trained and certified at the Cranston gun range.

Ricci and Dygon stood on the training course last week, next to an old Cranston Police vehicle, which had been driven onto the range as a prop obstacle for firearms training.

The course has an old, no longer used building façade (think Dirty Harry) and a wooden watch tower (where officers formerly took aim for sniper training).

On the range, Ricci and Dygon connected the training exercises and the very real 2023 police shooting of Harrison.

“I will say, (in) the annual training, we’ve incorporated some elements of that incident into that training, for the officers who were not there, to see what the officers who were there saw … to go through what they might do in that situation, how they might react,” Dygon explained.

For training purposes, the course has attempted to “duplicate the stress of the incident,” according to Ricci.

“What went, if not under-reported, unreported, in that incident, despite the number of rounds fired, no innocent individuals were harmed,” Ricci said. “And I think that goes to their training.”

If the firing range is moved, however, Ricci pledged to maintain the same high level of training standards.

“We will do what we need to do to provide the highest level of training for our officers,” Ricci said. “Wherever that may be.”