RI Recycled Metals ordered to stop operation for not having a license. What to know.

PROVIDENCE – The city has issued Rhode Island Recycled Metals a cease-and-desist order after the waterfront scrap metal operation that has been at the center of a long-running legal dispute with the state withdrew an application for a junk license.

Josh Estrella, a spokesman for Mayor Brett Smiley, said the Allens Avenue business must have the license to remain in operation. According to digital records going back to 2014, the company has never had the license, said Estrella.

He said that around 2022 the previous mayoral administration discovered that Recycled Metals did not have the license, and ordered the company to submit an application. The company did so, but the application was adjudged to be incomplete.

“They had applied for and then recently withdrew an application for a license that is required to own and operate this type of facility in Providence,” Estrella said. “The Providence Board of Licenses had requested that the applicant and all interested parties appear to hear what the status was of the ongoing legal conversations. Once the applicant withdrew their applications, the city served the ... cease and desist as they are now operating without the proper license.”

Richard Nicholson, a lawyer for Recycled Metals, said the company was asked to submit the application and did so as a courtesy to the city. But he said his position is that his client is not required to have the license and that the relevant city ordinance does not apply. He plans to file a motion in Superior Court to block the cease and desist order.

Recycled Metals does have licenses from the state to handle regulated and precious metals, Nicholson said.

Asked why Recycled Metals withdrew its application to the city, Nicholson said it was because the company heard before the Board of Licenses met that the application would be denied.

"They're trying at all costs to shut my client's operation down," he said

What we know about Recycled Metals

Recycled Metals went into business in 2009, when it got the job of salvaging the Russian submarine Juliett 484, which had once served as the set of a Harrison Ford movie and, until it sank in a nor’easter, a floating museum in Providence's Collier Point Park. 

Recycled Metals set up shop on a former brownfields site stretching from Allens Avenue to the Providence River that was home to an electronics-recycling operation in the 1980s. The company had the submarine towed to the waters off the 12-acre property and soon brought in other deteriorating vessels. 

But problems quickly ensued. In 2010, DEM inspectors said that the company was discharging stormwater into the river without a permit. Later inspections found that it was dismantling cars without a permit. Recycled Metals even failed to get a permit for ship-breaking, the original purpose of the business, according to the DEM.

The agency issued violation notices in 2012 and eventually reached a settlement with the company, requiring it to install a stormwater system to control runoff possibly tainted by heavy metals and oils, remove the vessels and restore the site by the end of 2014. When the deadline passed without action, the DEM joined with the Attorney General’s office and filed a lawsuit against the company in Superior Court.

Jared Sevinor, who co-owns the business with his father, Ralph, say they’ve been unfairly blamed for pollution around the site and that they’ve worked to clean up their operation. All but one of the derelict vessels have been removed from the waters off the site, and planning is underway to address the land portion.

When the most recent troubles began

The DEM issued a notice of violation to the company Dec. 20 after it submitted a site investigation report after a required deadline and failed to submit a public involvement plan. The company submitted the plan Dec. 29 and it has been submitted to abutters for comment.

The DEM ordered further testing of the site, which was submitted March 11, and the site investigation report is still awaiting final approval.

On March 1, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved the removal of the tugboat Akron, the last remaining vessel off the Recycled Metals property.

Michael Healey, a spokesman for the DEM, said the agency is still assessing how the Providence order affects the state's case.

"If RIRM stopped operating, the site remediation would continue and RIRM would remain responsible for it," he said.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: RI Recycled Metals served cease and desist, city says it has no license