Garden Homes Will Pay $225,000 Penalty and Preserve 108
Acres of Land in New Jersey’s Highlands Preservation Area
Contact: John Martin, (212) 637-3662, martin.johnj@epa.gov
(New York, N.Y. – May 29, 2015) The Environmental
Protection Agency and the Department of Justice today announced that they have
reached an agreement with Garden Homes and its affiliated companies to settle
their alleged failure to control stormwater discharges. These failures
potentially resulted in pollutant discharges to the Passaic, Hackensack,
Rahway, Raritan, Saddle and Delaware River watersheds. The agreement requires
Garden Homes to pay a $225,000 penalty and implement measures to improve the
company’s stormwater practices. In addition, the company has agreed to provide
108 acres of land for preservation within the Highlands Preservation Area in
Morris County, New Jersey, protecting it from possible future development. This
land contains approximately 23 acres of wetlands adjacent to the Berkshire
Valley Wildlife Management Area and in the Highlands Preservation Area— a
critical drinking water protection area for the state of New Jersey.
“Stormwater often carries pollution and sediment into
local waterways that can damage water quality,” said EPA Regional Administrator
Judith A. Enck. “Large quantities of stormwater can run off of construction
sites and it is critically important that stormwater be controlled. The EPA
takes these violations seriously, and this legal settlement not only holds the
company accountable, but also includes measures to preserve 108 acres of land
that contains vital wetlands near a wildlife area.”
“Today’s settlement will help protect New Jersey
waterways from the harmful pollutants contained in stormwater runoff from
Garden Homes’ construction sites, and also preserve valuable wetlands and
wildlife habitat,” said Assistant Attorney General John C. Cruden for the
Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. One of the
important parts of the settlement is the requirement that Garden Homes develop
a corporate-wide stormwater management program which may stimulate better
management practices throughout the construction business.”
Under the federal Clean Water Act, developers and
contractors responsible for operations at
construction sites one acre or larger are required to implement
stormwater pollution prevention plans to keep soil and contaminants from
running off into nearby waterways. These plans can include measures such as the
establishment of sediment barriers, the implementation of controls to hinder
stormwater flowing onto the construction site and the protection of slopes.
Water carries soil and contaminants off of construction sites at a rate
typically 10 to 20 times greater than that from agricultural lands and 1,000 to
2,000 times greater than that from forested lands.
Under the settlement, Garden Homes will undertake a
corporate-wide evaluation of its existing stormwater practices and develop a
corporate-wide stormwater management program.
In addition, Garden Homes will designate one of its employees as its
company stormwater manager, who will be responsible for preparing all
stormwater pollution prevention plans, developing and overseeing stormwater
compliance training and conducting unannounced site inspections, among other
responsibilities. The company will also designate individual site stormwater
managers for its various sites. EPA estimates the value of these measures to be
$539,000 for the first year and approximately $380,057 annually thereafter.
The complaint alleged that Garden Homes violated numerous
stormwater requirements at ten of the company’s sites in New Jersey by failing
to conduct and document weekly inspections; failing to install perimeter silt
fencing along the perimeter of construction sites; failing to maintain a spill
kit on-site; and allowing fuel to spill on the ground uphill from an unprotected
catch basin, among other allegations.
The violations at issue in this case were found at multiple construction
sites owned and/or operated by Garden Homes through their affiliates. These
repetitive violations continued to persist despite two administrative penalty
actions taken by the EPA against affiliates of Garden Homes.
Under the terms of the proposed settlement, Garden Homes
will donate land within the Highlands Preservation Area as a supplemental
environmental project. This donation of land will further aid in the recovery
of threatened and endangered species, particularly the Indiana Bat and bog
turtle, which have a known presence in the vicinity.
The proposed consent decree has been lodged in the U.S.
District Court for the state of New Jersey and is subject to a 30-day public
comment period and final court approval.
A copy is available on the Department of Justice website at: http://justice.gov/enrd/Consent_Decrees.html
For more information about requirements of the Clean
Water Act and how EPA protects the nation’s water, visit http://water.epa.gov/