Bay Area group, Cipponeri family tangled over Turlock farmers markets

An ongoing quarrel over control of the Turlock farmers market does not represent would-be operator Peter Cipponeri’s first time going up against nonprofit management.

His family appears to be concluding a legal battle stretching more than two years with the nonprofit California Farmers Market Association, which runs 14 Bay Area street markets attracting some 22,000 patrons each week, according to lawsuit documents in Contra Costa Superior Court.

Cipponeri, 24, is not named in either of two lawsuits in which his parents and the nonprofit sued each other. But his alleged behavior at two Bay Area markets is cited in court papers submitted by the nonprofit’s Foster City attorney.

Without describing a Mountain View incident in detail, lawyer Jack Schwartz wrote that Cipponeri’s “outrageous conduct” resulted in his June 2012 suspension for two weeks from all CFMA markets. He also was placed on 90 days of probation, and Cipponeri Family Farms was fined $150; the punishment came “in lieu of a more serious penalty,” the paper says.

Schwartz also wrote that Cipponeri attempted to personally deliver payments for other fines to a Diablo Valley market manager in October 2013. The manager refused because the family business had been directed to mail documents by a deadline, which was that day.

“Peter Cipponeri began videotaping the market manager, making accusatory remarks and disrupting the middle of the market,” Schwartz wrote in an April 2014 account to the California Department of Food and Agriculture. “The market manager asked him to stop taping her, but the disruptive conduct continued.”

In a brief telephone conversation, Schwartz refused to discuss the matter and referred questions to an Oakland attorney who had succeeded him in representing the nonprofit. The Oakland attorney said she was not authorized to speak about the case, which may have been resolved, according to a settlement notice filed in Martinez on Feb. 19.

The Cipponeris’ Sacramento attorney was not reached for comment.

In recent interviews, Cipponeri said he has spent most of his life at farmers markets and wants to improve the one in Turlock, just down the road from his 9-acre farm. He recently established the Golden State Farmers Market Association, has obtained contracts for farmers markets in Hughson and Carmel, and envisions running others in Northern and Central California.

The Cipponeri family has sold produce at various farmers markets for six decades and has been a vendor at Turlock’s, managed for six years by the nonprofit Turlock Certified Farmers Market, as well as those previously managed over the years by other operators. Sebastian and Dena Cipponeri farm about 800 acres and are not involved in their son’s market management venture, Peter Cipponeri has said.

His parents sued CFMA in 2013, saying managers tried to manipulate produce prices and slammed the family “with unwarranted and procedurally improper violations, fines and suspensions,” and impugned the Cipponeris’ reputation.

“The Cipponeris are the first farmers to stand up to CFMA,” a court briefing says.

The nonprofit then retaliated by lodging multiple complaints with state inspectors and finally brought its own lawsuit against the family in 2014, the Cipponeris contend.

The markets’ lawsuit says the Cipponeris breached a contract by selling products they didn’t grow and by refusing to follow CFMA rules. They engaged in unfair competition by slashing prices near closing times of farmers markets and refused to comply when confronted, the nonprofit’s lawsuit says.

The nonprofit, citing 13 reasons including Peter Cipponeri’s conduct, refused to grant the family a 2014 permit to sell at its markets, court papers say.

This story was originally published February 27, 2016 at 2:46 PM with the headline "Bay Area group, Cipponeri family tangled over Turlock farmers markets."