The man in charge of reopening Orrington’s shuttered trash incinerator created a “web of corporate entities,” to transfer electric bills, potentially creating “substantial losses,” for a power company, according to state regulators.
The allegations come from a dispute between Evan Coleman and Central Maine Power over unpaid electric bills totalling more than $100,000, which the utility accused Coleman of dodging by “name swapping” accounts.
When CMP tried to consolidate the debt, Coleman in March 2024 appealed to the Public Utilities Commission, which is charged with ensuring utilities are reliable and provided at just rates. He alleged Central Maine Power Company and the PUC could not transfer roughly $105,000 of unpaid bills to another company he was associated with.
This month the commission ruled the account balances can be transferred.
The case and subsequent order provide new insight into the finances and business practices of the man in charge of reopening the trash incinerator in Orrington. The town owns 25 percent of the facility that will take at least $25 million to reopen.
Companies where Coleman is either an owner or member ran up more than $105,000 in unpaid electricity bills to Central Maine Power Company, according to undisputed facts from CMP and Coleman included in the ruling. The businesses operate on U.S. Route 1 in Northport.
“Here, the facts reveal that Mr. Coleman’s web of corporate entities receiving electric service at the same location posed a clear danger of substantial losses to CMP if left unchecked,” the Aug. 8, order from PUC Administrative Director Amy Dumeny said.
Coleman said he had no comment.
Electric bills for Northpoint Holdings II, LLC, were more than $42,000 between July and November 2021, according to CMP and Coleman. With an unpaid balance of more than $22,000, CMP issued a disconnection notice. Coleman scheduled a payment but it was returned for insufficient funds, the statement of facts said.
While that payment was pending, Coleman switched the power bill into the name of Northern Venture Fund, LLC, and electric service continued. The company then used more than $136,000 of electricity in six months and failed to pay $83,000, the statement of facts said.
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CMP issued another disconnection notice, this time to Northern Venture. Coleman then switched the account to the name of Clear Energy, LLC. However, Northern Venture is still benefitting from the electricity, the statement of facts said.
Coleman conceded during a PUC conference that Clear Energy paying the electricity bills for Northern Venture did not serve a corporate purpose. He had an investment as a personal owner and it needed “some type of financial capacity to meet what seemed to be a fluid environment for electricity costs. And so Clear Energy stepped in to do that,” he told regulators.
Clear Energy has failed to pay its last four CMP bills as of November, the order said. The debt was paid, Coleman said in a July filing. The order from Dumeny said the balance from Northern Venture will transfer to Clear Energy.
The PUC has the power to transfer account balances to another corporate entity in situations similar to what happened in this case, the order said.
“If left unchecked, there is reason to believe that Mr. Coleman may continue this cycle of accruing substantial unpaid balances and then switching the service to the name of the other entity while either shuttering the entity with a past due balance or, worse, continuing to operate the entity with a new corporate name,” the order said.
The order also addressed what Coleman argued was a legally enforceable settlement and what CMP called a mistake attributable to “human error.”
When a third-party collection agency made an offer to accept $67,000 for an $83,000 balance, Coleman countered with an offer of $30,000 which the collection agent said she was not authorized to accept but would pass along to CMP.
After the call, the collections agency generated a letter to document the call including the $30,000 figure, which Coleman took as acceptance of the counter offer, the order said. CMP said the letter was generated by mistake and the $30,000 counter offer was not authorized.
The mistake was found within an hour and the collections agency contacted Coleman to explain, the order said. Coleman had already authorized a $30,000 payment to CMP during that hour, but canceled it after he was told about the mistake, the order said.
A contract can be rescinded if there is a unilateral mistake, which the letter appeared to be, the order said. Even if the contract was proper, Coleman canceled the payment after he learned about the mistake.
Dumeny’s order doesn’t require Coleman’s entities to pay CMP. It simply affirms that CMP was allowed to consolidate bills from his multiple accounts for purposes of collection and there was no enforceable settlement agreement. The decision can be appealed.