North Haven, Connecticut – June 25, 2002
Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and Commissioner of Environmental Protection Arthur J. Rocque, Jr. today announced an historic settlement and administrative agreement with Terminix International Co., LP of Memphis, TN. The settlement brings to a close the State’s court battle with Terminix, one of the nation’s leading pest control companies, for frequent, flagrant violations of state environmental law.
Terminix will pay $1 million to the State — the largest amount recovered from a pesticide company in New England for violations of pesticide laws. Terminix is also required to reform its business practices, and institute an audit program to ensure compliance with Connecticut pesticide laws. It will also temporarily shut down one of its four Connecticut offices and not open any new offices for two years.
“We pursued Terminix relentlessly over many years to hold it accountable for its blatant, repeated violations of Connecticut pesticide laws that exposed people to dangerous toxins. The company’s shoddy work and sloppy, haphazard use of hazardous chemicals put citizens at risk and endangered the environment. Terminix flagrantly flouted and defied basic legal protections,” Blumenthal said. “This settlement sends a signal to pesticide application companies that haphazard use of hazardous chemicals will not be tolerated, no matter how long or hard the fight. I appreciate the efforts of ServiceMaster in reaching this result. The Company has wisely decidedly to settle and hopefully be a wiser corporate citizen.”
“Connecticut’s residents can rest assured that when they call a pesticide applicator to their home or business, all applications will be done with the best management practices possible to protect their homes, health and property,” said DEP Commissioner Arthur J. Rocque, Jr. “This company has paid the highest price ever for failing to meet our standards, and since we took action, this settlement assures that Terminix and others in its field will be held to the highest standards and a failure to comply with these standards will be dealt with aggressively.”
In 1999, Blumenthal sued Terminix on behalf of the DEP for thousands of violations of state environmental laws. The lawsuit was prompted, in part, by Terminix’s handling of a pesticide application at a Deep River home, where the company drilled holes in a basement slab, causing a break in the heating fuel line underneath the slab. The break in the line caused a discharge of heating fuel to the soil and groundwater below the property. After Blumenthal’s intervention, Terminix agreed to purchase the home for more than the homeowners paid and for more than the appraised value of the property.
Under the terms of today’s settlement, Terminix must close its North Haven office for 90 days and cannot accept new business in the office for one year. When the North Haven office reopens, Terminix’s parent, The ServiceMaster Company, will supervise the office’s compliance with state pesticide laws.
Terminix must change its business practices to:
? Require a supervisor to physically inspect any property when a consumer calls more than once within a two year period with a termite problem;
? Adhere to a comprehensive compliance program, including assigning a compliance auditor to each of its Connecticut branches;
? Maintain at least one employee possessing supervisory certification per office for each category of pest control performed in that office;
? Implement and maintain a pesticide inventory control program, to track the pesticides provided to its employees;
? Provide proper oversight of its employees who apply pesticides, by requiring more effective supervision by employees with supervisory licenses;
? Accurately record where, when, and how much pesticide is applied to any given address, so that both the consumer and DEP can address any issues that arise regarding the misapplication of pesticides.
Earlier this year, a DEP hearing officer ruled that Terminix was engaged in:
? Widespread use of unsupervised applicators and the resultant dangerous or ineffective applications of pesticide by these unsupervised applicators;
? Falsification of, and absence in, its records as to whether, when and where pesticides had been applied;
? Practice of denying DEP access to its records; and
? Credible evidence that Terminix employees had been pressured to lie to DEP investigators.
The administrative agreement and stipulated judgment resolve Terminix’s appeal of the hearing officer’s decision, as well as the lawsuits between the State and Terminix pending in state and federal court.
