The president of a Thunder Bay security company is distancing himself from claims made by one of his local clients at a recent meeting of Sault Ste. Marie city council.
Italo Ferrari, general manager of Leisure Meadows Community Living Inc., told city councillors on Dec. 12 that his company has paid for round-the-clock security at its former General Hospital property since mid-November.
"We have security on that property, seven days a week, 24 hours a day," Ferrari proclaimed.
But Nicolas Rabaa, president of RLP Security Services Ltd., the company retained by Leisure Meadows to protect its Sault assets, says Ferrari's 24/7 claim is simply not true.
"The only thing I'm going to tell you about that security thing is, RLP is not there 24/7," Rabaa said when reached by SooToday on Tuesday.
"I am a mobile patrol. We do various patrols between the hours of 6 p.m. and 4 a.m."
"During holidays they're different and on weekends they're different. But for that particular hospital location, it is 6 p.m. to 4 a.m., seven days a week, mobile patrol," Rabaa said.
"We are not on site 24/7. We are a local patrol. That's it."
RLP Security Services is located in Thunder Bay, but lists its Sault Ste. Marie base as Suite 40 at 955 Queen St. E.
That's the Doctor's Building, little more than a stone's throw away from a side entrance at the old General Hospital site, which a SooToday reader found wide open and visible from the street on Monday.
Rabaa's firm watches a number of properties in the Sault and he resents Ferrari's claim that RLP is at the hospital 24/7.
"To be honest with you, I've never even spoke to that guy. I deal with somebody else," he tells SooToday.
"I don't want this to come back and bite me in the ass."
"I don't like my firm to be labelled as not doing their jobs or anything like that."
Mayor Matthew Shoemaker expressed concern Tuesday that the building was found unsecured this week in spite of Ferrari's assurances of tight security and prompt action to block any access points breached by vandals.
"It's disturbing to me that this is happening when there's allegedly 24-hour security on site," Shoemaker told SooToday.
"It obviously contradicts what we were being told at city council, which is extremely worrisome."
"I don't think this could happen if there was 24-hour security on site," the mayor said.
"Whether or not this leads to any new enforcement measures needs to be determined through discussions with staff."
The SooToday reader who found the old hospital building unsecured on Monday reported hearing people inside.
"We heard voices inside. It's definitely occupied," she said.
But Sault Ste. Marie Police Service has no immediate plans to search for squatters inside the derelict structure.
Police spokesperson Lincoln Louttit told SooToday's Alex Flood yesterday that no calls for service were received about the building.
If it's determined emergency crews are needed at the former hospital, then the fire department would most likely answer the call because it's better trained and equipped to deal with the hazardous conditions of the building, Louttit said.
Italo Ferrari has not responded to two messages from SooToday inviting him to provide his side of this story.