Before getting a multimillion-dollar contract from Mayor Adams’ administration to install “panic buttons” in city public schools, a Florida tech company hired the lobbying and consulting firm operated by Frank Carone, the mayor’s longtime confidant and ex-chief of staff, the Daily News has learned.
Sources confirmed that the company, SOS Technologies, hired Carone’s firm, Oaktree Solutions, earlier this year to do “strategic consulting” in connection with its effort to secure the city contract.
There is no record Oaktree employees engaged in direct lobbying of Adams administration officials prior to the award in October. In any event, Carone, Oaktree’s founder and chairman, resigned as Adams’ City Hall chief of staff in late 2022, so he’s no longer covered by the one-year lobbying ban on former city officials.
But the revelation that a company represented by a close Adams ally recently netted a lucrative city contract comes as government watchdogs have raised concerns about influence-peddling and unethical business practices under the mayor’s administration. Adams is leaving office at the end of 2025 after a term rocked by corruption scandals, including his own since-dismissed federal indictment.
The panic button program was announced at an Oct. 27 press conference in Brooklyn. Appearing alongside city Chief Technology Officer Matt Fraser, Adams said Fraser’s Office of Innovation and Technology had entered into a deal to install panic button systems at 25 public school campuses across the city. The systems involve giving teachers portable buttons they can press to alert 911 in the event of an emergency, or their classrooms can be fitted with a similar stationary technology.
At the press conference, neither Adams nor Fraser identified the company producing the buttons or said how much the program would cost taxpayers.
Ray Legendre, a spokesman for Fraser’s office, later confirmed the outside vendor is SOS Technologies and that the city paid the company $200,000 for the first campus installation, meaning the total tab for the 25 campuses could be as much as $5 million.
The 25 campuses have 51 individual schools on them. In total, there are some 1,800 public schools in the city, and Adams characterized the first 25 campus installations as a “pilot,” indicating he’s hoping the program could eventually be expanded.
It’s unclear if Adams’ successor, Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, may want to expand the panic button system.
Frank Carone in December 2022. (Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images)
The sources familiar with the business relationship told The News that Carone’s firm was retained by SOS Technologies at some point before the contract was sealed in October, but the exact timing is unclear. It’s also not clear how much Carone’s firm was paid or what exact type of work it did for SOS Technologies as part of its strategic consulting agreement.
Lobbying is regulated under local laws and subject to extensive disclosure requirements, as it involves direct efforts aimed at influencing government actions. Strategic consulting, by contrast, is not typically subject to disclosure requirements as it is limited to providing advice to clients as opposed to engaging directly with government officials on their behalf.
Some government watchdogs have argued strategic consulting deals amount to a loophole that should be plugged by lawmakers in order to avoid even the appearance of unregistered lobbying.
Carone, who helped run Adams’ reelection campaign before he dumped it amid fallout from his corruption indictment, did not return multiple requests for comment last week on his firm’s dealings with SOS Technologies. His brother, Anthony Carone, Oaktree’s CEO, declined to comment, as did an executive for SOS Technologies when reached via phone last week.
Legendre, the Office of Innovation and Technology spokesman, said his office “has not had any conversations with Oaktree or Frank Carone” about the panic button program. Spokesmen for Adams didn’t comment on whether he spoke to Carone about the matter.
City records show Oaktree never registered to speak with any Adams administration officials on behalf of SOS Technologies, as would have been required under the law if employees of Carone’s firm were engaged in direct lobbying.
In fact, SOS Technologies never registered having any lobbyists working on its behalf to secure the panic button program. The company has no prior record of doing business with New York City government entities, either, records show.
Legendre said his office found SOS Technologies after its “Public Safety and Emergency Management division did significant market research for this project.”
On its website, SOS Technologies has started prominently featuring its involvement in the New York City school program.
“SOS Technologies is proud to be part of a historic milestone in NYC, implementing the first-of-its-kind Direct-to-First Responder Emergency Alert System for schools,” a banner says on the site’s homepage next to a picture of Adams holding one of the company’s panic buttons during the October press conference.
The Adams administration’s “panic button” push has been shrouded in controversy before.
Florida-based SaferWatch, which Adams’ administration contracted to install panic buttons in city schools as part of a pilot program last year, was ensnared in a federal corruption investigation scrutinizing the company’s hiring of Terence Banks, a lobbyist and brother of two of the mayor’s top aides, Schools Chancellor David Banks and Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Phil Banks.
Neither the Banks brothers nor SaferWatch have been accused of wrongdoing by the feds. The Banks brothers left Adams’ administration in fall 2024 after the mayor’s indictment as part of a wave of resignations from top city officials entangled in corruption probes.
With Cayla Bamberger