PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- The cost of getting married in Rhode Island may go up, if the House and Senate go along with a surprise move by a legislative committee on Thursday.
The Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill to tack a $46 surcharge on the $24 current cost of obtaining a marriage license.
The first $2 (an estimated $9,000 a year) would go to the city or town clerk and the other $44 (an estimated $200,000 a year) to the Rhode Island Coalition Against Domestic Violence to fund prevention programs.
No one was more surprised than the sponsor, Senate Majority Whip Maryellen Goodwin, that the bill won the committee's approval on the day of its first public hearing.
The lawmakers were swayed by the half-dozen people who signed up to vote, and the 12 letters of support presented to them, by the coalition, from the mayors of Warwick, Pawtucket and Johnston, among others.
"The $46 increase -- less than a night out to dinner and a movie for a couple -- is not unreasonably burdensome for a one-time fee around a carefully considered life event,'' Deborah DeBare, executive director of the RI Coalition against Domestic Violence told the lawmakers.