R.I. Gen. Laws § 45-31-4: Finding of obstacles to private redevelopment.

It is further found and declared:

(1) That it is impossible for private enterprise alone to remedy these conditions of blight without the additional aids granted by this chapter;

(2) That these blighted and substandard conditions tend to further obsolescence, deterioration, and disuse because of the lack of incentive to the individual landowner and his or her inability to improve, modernize, or rehabilitate his or her own particular property while the condition of other neighborhood properties remains unchanged;

(3) That, as a consequence, the process of deterioration of a blighted and substandard area frequently cannot be halted or corrected except by redevelopment of the entire area, or portions of the area; and

(4) That in many instances the private assembly of the lands in blighted and substandard areas for the purposes of replanning and redevelopment is so difficult and costly that it is uneconomical and, as a practical matter, impossible for individual owners independently or collectively to undertake to remedy these conditions because of the lack of the legal power necessary for, and the excessive costs involved in, the private assembly and improvement of the real property of the area.