LAWRENCE TWP. – A corporate tomato grower faces huge fines for “misusing pesticides” and jeopardizing the health of both workers and consumers at its Cedarville farm and packing house, according to a state Department of Environmental Protection report.

Ag-Mart Produce Inc., which markets its tomatoes under the brand Santa Sweets, must pay what DEP officials call an “unprecedented penalty” of more than $931,000 in fines.

The report, released Thursday, states officials at Ag-Mart’s New Jersey headquarters in Cedarville committed “hundreds of violations that include denying state environmental inspectors access to facilities, losing track of a highly toxic insecticide, failing to properly ventilate areas during pesticide use, failing to post important pesticide safety information for workers, careless record keeping and using forbidden mixtures of pesticides.”

The corporation’s Cedarville location hosts a number of farms and packing houses.

John O’Riordan, council for Ag-Mart, said the company will request a hearing to contest the allegations within the next 35 days.

“It’s important to point out that $780,000 of that total fine comes from hyper-technical violations, where someone forgot to put a.m. and p.m. after the times they put down insecticides,” said O’Riordan. “No workers have been injured, and our workers are represented by the Teamsters Union, and they had not received any complaints.

“This is fairly new to us, and we are very taken back by this.”

In a statement, N.J. DEP Acting Commissioner Mark Mauriello described the infractions as the most egregious his office has ever witnessed.

“Ag-Mart has repeatedly shown a stunning disregard of laws and regulations intended to protect the workers who harvest their tomatoes, the people who consume them and New Jersey’s environment,” said Mauriello. “Ag-Mart’s pesticide violations are the most serious DEP inspectors have ever uncovered.

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