EAST MILLINOCKET, Maine — The court-appointed trustee of bankrupt Great Northern Paper Co. will ask a bankruptcy judge Thursday to approve a deal that will continue operation of a wastewater treatment plant formerly run by the company that serves the town, officials said Wednesday.
Attorneys for the two GNP bankruptcy estates have agreed to loan the town and state as much as $250,000 to pay the treatment plant’s four full-time and two part-time workers and operate the plant for six months, according to documents filed with U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Bangor. Town and state officials have until Aug. 5 to reimburse the two estates for operating the paper mill’s secondary treatment plant, which treats wastewater from town homes and businesses.
The operation of the plant over that time will cost less than $250,000, but how much less won’t be known until the estates bill the town. The state Department of Economic and Community Development also will share the operational costs, town administrative assistant Angela Cote said.
“We received our tax payment from the mill, so obviously we have some money in the coffers. But we are going to have to do something after the six months — organize what type of entity we need to form to operate the secondary plant,” Cote said Wednesday. “We are in the process of getting a study done. Once we have all the options available to us, the citizens will have to choose one in a public hearing.”
The Board of Selectmen and town administrators have worked to protect several town interests since the Great Northern Paper mill shut down in late January, eventually laying off all but half a dozen maintenance workers from its 256-member payroll. The Katahdin region’s largest single employer and taxpayer, the mill began filing for bankruptcy in September and Hackman Capital Partners of Los Angeles successfully bid to buy the paper mill for $5.4 million on Dec. 2.
Administrators received on Dec. 8 from the sale $712,435 of the $767,392 in pro-rated property and real estate taxes the facility’s former owner owed the town for the present and 2013-14 fiscal years. Board members have encouraged Hackman Capital to revitalize the site, which the buyer has said it is willing to do instead of than raze it, though Hackman has not yet announced its ultimate plans for the mill site.
The board voted 4-0 during a brief special meeting Wednesday to accept a contract addressing the town’s portion of the six-month operation. Selectman Gary MacLeod was absent, officials said. Board Chairman Mark Scally did not immediately return telephone messages seeking comment.
Hackman officials have said they have no interest in operating the water treatment plant, so to figure out how to keep operating the plant, town officials have the six months granted them by the $250,000 deal with the estate, trustee’s attorney Randy Creswell said.
“We basically said we have the money to help you get through this time period. We are trying to be cooperative and not make a bad situation worse,” Creswell said of this firm and his client, trustee Pasquale “Pat” Perrino.
The bankruptcy hearing with Judge Louis Kornreich will start in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Margaret Chase Smith Federal Building at 10 a.m.