11 | MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE September 19, 2016 | VOL. 52, No. 38
17 | SPECIAL REPORT westfaironline.com
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Nature made ASARASI TURNS MAPLE SYRUP WASTEWATER INTO BOTTLED H2O BUSINESS BY KEVIN ZIMMERMAN kzimmerman@westfairinc.com “WATER, WATER, EVERYWHERE/NOR ANY DROP TO DRINK,” Samuel Taylor Coleridge famously lamented in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” But Coleridge probably wasn’t thinking of sugar maple trees — or the potable water that can be derived from their sap during the maple syrup-making process. Certainly Adam Lazar wasn’t. But on a 2008 visit to a Vermont maple farm he learned that after the sugar was removed from the sap, the remaining 97 percent of material — “naturally pure treedrawn water” — was being thrown away.
“I was told, ‘Who would want it? It’s just water,’” Lazar recalled. “That’s when the idea hit me, that here was a renewable resource that could be pretty easily converted from being a waste byproduct to a consumer-priced product. We’re now offering an eco-friendly bottle of organic water from a source that consumers can trust.” The “we” is Asarasi (after the Latin word for the maple family, “aceraceae”), the Greenwichbased company that Lazar formed as CEO. Though not particularly ecology-minded at the time, Lazar had spent some 15 years working in the consumer goods field as a product developer. “I’m also a for» WATER, page 6
Adam Lazar is looking to quench consumers’ thirsts with his “naturally pure tree-drawn water.” Photo by Bob Rozycki.
Greenwich contractor hit with $12.3M judgment for home repairs scam BY BILL HELTZEL bheltzel@westfairinc.com
W
hen fires devastated luxury homes in Fairfield and We stc he ster counties, a Chubb Corp. insurance adjuster was there to assess damages and start the restoration process. But Chubb did not know that its own adjuster was calluding with a contractor he hired to estimate repair costs. The contractor inflated the estimates and the adjuster steered the
repair work back to the contractor. A federal jury in White Plains recently ruled unanimously, in a 40-day trial, that the adjuster, Dennis Sorge, and the contractor, Paul H. Mertz Jr. and the Mertz Co., are liable for fraud and breach of fiduciary duty. U.S. District Court Judge Nelson S. Roman entered a judgment of nearly $12.3 million against Mertz and his company on Aug. 23. He suspended judgment against Sorge while a bankruptcy court sorts through his finances and did not specify
the amount of damages against Sorge. The Mertz Co., based in Greenwich, has been operating in Fairfield and Westchester counties since 1972. For many years it built homes. In the late 1970s, according to its website, Mertz began specializing as a damage restoration consultant. From 2004 to 2010, Chubb paid Mertz nearly $1.1 million in consulting fees. Sorge, formerly of Crotonon-Hudson, was a Chubb employee for 30 years and worked out of the White Plains
office. From 2004 to 2010, Chubb paid him more than $1 million. He has since moved to Wake Forest, N.C. Sorge’s job was to investigate the extent of losses when an insured home was damaged. He hired experts to provide repair estimates and he determined how much Chubb would pay to settle homeowners’ losses. Chubb expected consultants such as Mertz to act independently. A contractor could not consult for Chubb and also work at the same time as a contractor on the insured property.
Consultants may not seek or even discuss the possibility of a contract until their work for Chubb is done, and even then the contract must be disclosed to Chubb. Mertz assessed hundreds of property claims for Chubb. The lawsuit, filed in 2012, singles out eight claims on homes damaged by fires — in Darien and Lakeville in Connecticut and in Armonk, Mount Vernon, New Rochelle, North Salem and South Salem in Westchester County. Sorge hired Mertz to provide » GREENWICH, page 6