BANGOR, Maine — A federal judge Tuesday encouraged representatives from shuttered Bucksport paper mill owner Verso, buyer American Iron & Metal, the workers, potential buyers and the governor’s office “to sit down in a room together” and “work something out.”
U.S. District Court Judge John Woodcock said that either U.S. Magistrate Judge John Nivison or U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Louis Kornreich could act as mediators for such a meeting.
Lawyers for Verso and AIM did not reject the idea in court but said they wanted the judge to issue a ruling so the sale could go forward. Representatives for AIM have said the firm would consider selling the mill to an operator if it makes a profit on its $58 million purchase price.
Woodcock is considering whether Verso violated any federal or state antitrust laws in selling its mill to Canadian scrap metal dealer AIM. The International Association of Machinists filed suit against Verso and AIM last month, alleging that Verso ignored inquiries from other paper companies so it could reduce competition in the North American coated paper market.
Woodcock has been asked by lawyers for the union to issue a temporary restraining order to block the sale and allow plaintiffs to have access to communications among Verso, AIM and other potential buyers under federal rules of discovery.
Woodcock said Tuesday after a 30-minute status conference that the letters he received over the weekend and on the Martin Luther King holiday were not properly submitted as evidence in the form of affidavits or declarations.
The judge said he would rule on the union’s motion for a temporary restraining order but did not say when he would issue a decision.
Late Monday, representatives from Pennsylvania-based Fibre Technologies LLC and New York-based Minimill Technologies filed letters stating they potentially could find a way to repurpose the mill to operate in new markets.
The two letters were filed in court after Rahul Kejriwal, of a New York-based affiliate of Kejriwal Singapore International, wrote of his company’s interest in the mill Sunday.
The letters may have been sent in reaction to what Woodcock said Jan. 13 at a hearing on the motion for the temporary restraining order. The judge told attorneys that it was going to be difficult for him to decide whether the sale violated antitrust laws when he had no evidence a competitor existed — just “a suggestion there were people who were interested” in the property.
None of the letters stated that the companies made formal offers to Verso after it announced in October it would shut down the mill, which made the type of paper used in magazines and catalogs.
Town officials in Bucksport have said they would prefer that the mill be restarted as a papermaking facility so that the hundreds of Verso employees who were laid off last month could be rehired and get back to work.
“I think that would be the best outcome, to have a mediated settlement where all parties were assured that they could have what they wanted and we could put people back to work making paper in the town of Bucksport,” Town Manager Derik Goodine said Tuesday morning outside the courthouse.
Bucksport officials said that despite their desire to see the facility remain a paper mill, they have been in communication with AIM, providing the Canadian firm with information about the 250-acre waterfront site, in an effort to help maximize the economic benefit to the area of whatever redevelopment plans AIM may come up with. And, they added, AIM has told them it would consider reselling the mill to a paper manufacturing firm.
Goodine said that, short of mediation, the legal wrangling over the mill’s future is likely to continue beyond Woodcock’s ruling.
“I think this is going to be appealed to a higher court no matter which way it goes,” Goodine said.
Kejriwal and Fibre Technologies penned letters to Woodcock on Friday but Fibre’s letter was not made public in the court record until Monday afternoon. The Minimill letter was dated Monday.
Herbert Black, head of AIM, told Maine Public Radio on Monday that he had met with Kejriwal recently but he did not have his financing in place.
Attorneys for Verso and AIM denied last week that there was a buyer other than the scrap dealer.
Clifford Ruprecht, who represents AIM, told Woodcock the company is “ready, willing and able to sell the mill to someone willing to pay more than the sale price, but we’ve seen no evidence that such a buyer exists.”
Ruprecht and David E. Barry, who represents Verso, declined Sunday in an email to comment on the pending case.
Both attorneys said after the hearing last week that they would not comment on the case until Woodcock issues his ruling.
In the same lawsuit, the union also accused the company of trying to “evade its legal obligation” under state law to make timely payments for severance, final wages and accrued 2015 vacation time. Woodcock on Jan. 6 dismissed that portion of the lawsuit in an 86-page ruling.
Attorneys for Verso and AIM told Woodcock last week that the sale closing was on hold because of the lawsuit and because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission had not yet agreed to transfer permits to operate the power plant at the Bucksport Mill to AIM.
FERC approved the permit transfer Thursday, according to a previously published report. The closing is expected to be scheduled once Woodcock issues his decision.