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$100,000 fine for Bradford Township family
By MARCIE SCHELLHAMMER
Era Reporter
A Bradford Township family has been fined more than $100,000 for violating Department of Environmental Protection regulations on streams and dams.
The DEP’s Environmental Hearing Board issued a notice of adjudication on May 1 against Philip Pecora, along with John, James, Greg, Jay and Elizabeth Pecora and Ann Pecora Greco, assessing a civil penalty of $113,538.97.
The seven own property in Bradford Township on which Philip Pecora occupies and maintains a residence, the notice reads. Minard Run, designated an Exceptional Value wild trout stream, runs through the property.
According to the adjudication memo, Philip Pecora has “pointlessly, deliberately and repeatedly caused severe damage to an Exceptional Value wild trout stream and its tributaries. Pecora’s activities essentially ruined a healthy habitat for a wild trout stream. He dredged out stream channels, made the stream wider and shallower, eliminated riparian zones, created erosional scars, accelerated stream bank erosion and disfigured the stream bottoms.”
The Board explained how the penalties were arrived at, including how much was saved by failing to obtain permits, DEP enforcement costs, 22 days of violations and an adjustment for intentional conduct.
Pecora’s problems with the DEP apparently began 10 years ago when agency officials first inspected the Pecora property and documented “unpermitted, unplanned, uncontrolled earth disturbance activities and stream encroachments.” The DEP issued a notice of violation to Philip Pecora in August of 1998 and enforcement efforts have continued since, the adjudication memo reads.
On June 16, 2004, DEP officials met with Philip Pecora at the site and “observed that the stream channel and floodway of Minard Run had been excavated and graded without a permit” and the work caused soil and sediment to enter the stream and a tributary. Philip Pecora was issued a notice of violation at that time.
In December 2004, the DEP again inspected the site, finding additional excavation and grading of the stream channel and floodway of Minard Run — all without a permit. The continuing lack of erosion and sedimentation controls caused more soil and sediment to enter the stream and tributary. In addition, new activity had begun on two more acres along the stream and tributary, creating the potential for more pollution.
On Feb. 3, 2005, the DEP issued an administrative order, directing the Pecoras to cease the activity and restore the site. The order was not appealed or complied with, reads the memo.
The DEP filed an enforcement petition in Commonwealth Court, and the action was settled in June of 2005 with a consent decree, according the adjudication memo.
The DEP reserved the right in the consent decree to seek civil penalties for non-compliance with the February order and for the violations cited in that order. The DEP filed a complaint for civil penalties with the Environmental Hearing Board in April 2006, citing the Pecoras’ “failure to timely comply with the order.”
The Board issued an adjudication in October, penalizing the Pecoras $18,500 for the delay in compliance. The Commonwealth Court upheld the penalty.
Meanwhile, in June 2006, a DEP employee driving past Philip Pecora’s residence saw more work on the property, leading to an inspection in July, which revealed “numerous and unpermitted activities covering more than five acres.”
Included in that activity was the installation of a steel pipe culvert into the bed of the western tributary of Minard Run. The pipe was covered with “bare earth that was eroding downstream into the western tributary,” the memo reads.
A rock dam was also installed across the western tributary upstream of the culvert, resulting in erosion and scouring downstream. An earthen dam with a metal culvert was installed farther upstream, and several drainage swales had been graded. Grading across the property resulted in sediment deposit into the eastern tributary of the stream.
Ponds had been excavated and discharge routed into Minard Run. Some of the grading had routed water onto a neighbor’s property, the memo reads.
More than five acres total had been excavated and graded without sediment or erosion controls in place and without a permit.
The DEP filed for an injunction to stop the activity. On April 11, 2007, the Commonwealth Court permanently banned Philip Pecora from doing any new “earth disturbance activities” there without first obtaining a permit from the DEP, except for those actions necessary to restore Minard Run as ordered.
On May 11, 2007, the DEP filed a complaint for civil penalties in the matter. The adjudication, issued last week, was the result of the DEP’s request for penalties.
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