Two Northland logging contractors and an individual have been ordered to pay more than $68,000 in fines and reparation after they admitted carrying out earthworks in a wetland without consent.
Woodbank Trading, Sunnex Harvesting and Michael Lance Bartlett appeared in the Environment Court in Whangarei this week for sentencing after earlier pleading guilty to three charges of contravening the Resource Management Act (RMA).
The charges were laid by the Northland Regional Council.
Northland College owns about 123 hectares of forest block in Kaikohe and in May 2013, the school entered into an 18-month harvesting contract with Woodbank Trading.
The company sub-contracted Sunnex Harvesting to undertake logging operations between August and November 2014.
Mr Bartlett was an employee of Woodbank when harvesting was undertaken but has since resigned.
Breaches of the RMA came to light after the Ngawha Geothermal Plant, situated upstream of the Northland College block, notified NRC of an anomaly in water quality it suspected was due to logging operations.
The NRC was not aware until investigations began that part of the area Woodbank Trading and Sunnex Harvesting were working on qualified as significant indigenous wetlands.
The logging operations resulted in discharge of sediment and vegetation directly into unnamed tributaries of the Taikawhena Stream and in the Taikawhena Wetlands.
Between 0.85 hectares and 1.36 hectares of land was estimated to have been damaged as a result of the logging operation.
NRC lawyer Karenza de Silva told the court shortcuts were taken during a commercial operation when both companies and Mr Bartlett should have had a harvesting plan and a pre-harvesting meeting.
Matthew Atkinson, lawyer for Woodbank Trading, said his client's actions were not deliberate and that the company immediately began remedial work on the site that cost about $35,000 when breaches were identified.
Mr Bartlett was represented by Colleen Prendergast and said he was genuinely remorseful and regretted his actions that led to a prosecution.
She sought a conviction and discharge without penalty but Judge Craig Thompson refused, saying deterrence and denunciation were important factors he needed to take into account.
Lawyer Wayne McKean said the actions of Sunnex Harvesting was "careless", not deliberate and asked that any fine imposed did not crush the company.
Woodbank Trading was fined $25,000, Sunnex Harvesting $21,000, and Mr Bartlett $7500.
All were ordered to pay $5000 each in reparation.