Nearly two-and-a-half years into a contract to install new alarms at Rhode Island state beaches and parks, the NBC 10 I-Team discovered the project has been marked by dispute from the start.
The work is still far from done, and the state is now trying for the second time to fire its contractor.
The project has included a bid protest, court action, missed deadlines, some extra state money, and one arm of state government recently finding another department had hired a company that did not have all the necessary licenses at the time it was awarded the job.
Of the 38 Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management state properties included in the alarm contract, nine sites, less than a quarter of the properties involved, are currently complete.
“It’s a headache, but also, I’d rather have my parks staff doing parks work and not really spending all their time trying to sort through or oversee a contractor. This has gone on way too long,” Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management Director Terry Gray told NBC 10.
Documents obtained by the I-Team through a public records request show DEM has filed two breach of contract complaints against the company, North Providence-based Security Solutions, and moved to fire it from the job.
Security Solutions is run by former Rhode Island State Police trooper Kenneth Marandola, Jr.
“I feel at this point that it’s biased, in a sense,” Marandola says of DEM’s attempts to fire his company. “I believe it’s just unfair. I don’t thinks there’s really any substance to the complaints.”
Not long after Security Solution was awarded the five-year, $115,000 state contract in 2022, the company that lost out on the deal filed a complaint claiming the bid process wasn’t fair.
“It should have never been awarded to this company,” Christopher Morra, owner of National Security in East Providence told NBC 10.
National Security had the DEM alarm contract for years beforehand.
Morra claims Security Solutions didn’t have the proper credentials for the job.
Morra lost his protest in court, but isn’t letting it go.
He claims it’s not just sour grapes.
“No. Not at all. If they were lowest responsive bidder, all is fair. We haven’t won every bid. We don’t complain about it when it’s done fairly,” Morra told NBC10.
A week after National lost its challenge, Security Solutions filed its own court complaint against National and DEM, to stop National from removing wires from the DEM buildings.
Security Solutions believes the wires should stay.
Morra argued the wires belong to his company.
The state agreed to pay Security Solutions an extra $28,500 to resolve the dispute and put in its own wires.
But in December 2023, and again in March 2024, DEM filed breach of contract complaints against Security Solutions.
DEM claimed only two buildings had been alarmed at that point and that the work did not meet contract requirements.
Firing back, Security Solutions wrote it was the “victim of deceit” and “unwarranted bias” from DEM.
It argued the agency’s complaint was “wholly without merit” and that DEM’s bid language had been “ambiguous.”
“I thought we were pretty clear,” DEM Director Gray countered in an interview with NBC 10.
In March, work at one building failed an initial inspection.
The state Purchasing Department wrote the company’s “conduct in the past many months has provided the State with little assurance that it is capable of performing the scope of work.”
Purchasing set a June 1 deadline to finish the project.
Two months later, state inspectors found only one of four Security Solutions workers on the job at a DEM property were properly licensed.
In June, DEM filed to terminate the company’s contract.
But this time, state Purchasing was critical of DEM and National, writing DEM was being too deferential to National, and that National had wrongly removed electrical conduits.
Security Solutions was given two more extensions to finish the job.
As an October 2024 deadline passed, though, work at eight of the 38 sites was finished.
In December, DEM moved a second time to fire Security Solutions.
“We continue to have performance problems. And we continue to have schedule problems,” Gray told NBC 10.
Marandola blames National, arguing it’s taking too long to get their systems and wires out before Marandola’s crews can go in.
“Our hands are tied. We have to wait on them,” Marandola said.
In its latest attempt to fire Security Solutions, DEM also cites a violation issued to the company by state electrical inspectors.
In October, based on a complaint from Morra, the state’s electrical inspector issued a violation and $1500 fine to Security Solutions.
The inspector found the company did not have one of the licenses necessary to bid on the project in the first place two years earlier.
“The bid should be terminated. The award should be terminated, reversed,” Morra argues.
Security Solutions says it used a subcontractor that does have the right license.
Whether that’s allowed is another point of dispute.
When asked by NBC 10 if he thinks he’s done anything wrong throughout the process, Marandola replied, “Not at this time.”
Marandola met with NBC 10 accompanied by attorney Richard Nicholson.
“My client from day one has been ready, willing, and able to install these systems. And we have been dealing with National dragging its feet, we believe, and DEM complicit in this process,” Nicholson said. “National has made it difficult. And DEM, for some reason in its administration over this process has made it unnecessarily complex.”
Asked by NBC 10 if he’d dragging his feet, Morra responded, “Not at all.”
Morra’s National Security is still getting paid by the state because its alarms are still in most of the buildings.
“This benefits National. Cannot explain why DEM is allowing this to happen, but they are. And National’s getting away with it,” Nicholson claimed.
DEM did not have a comment on that assertion from Nicholson.
Morra contended, “I wouldn’t think it benefits us because we spent tens of thousands protesting the bid.”
Morra argues he initially offered to remove all his wires within 30 days, but was told not to, and is beholden to DEM’s schedule.
In its latest filing with state purchasing, DEM states it wants to put the project back out to bid and for Security Solutions to remove all its alarm systems.
“We want to get a fresh start,” Gray told NBC 10.
DEM told NBC 10 it is paying each contractor for only the buildings each of their respective systems are in, so taxpayers aren’t paying twice.
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