JAY – Some people here are remaining optimistic about the town’s future, while others are considering selling their homes after learning that International Paper, the town’s largest taxpayer and employer, is planning to sell the Jay paper mill.
On Tuesday, IP corporate officials announced a massive restructuring of its worldwide business, which includes selling billions of dollars in businesses and millions of acres of forestland and cutting jobs. The company said it wants to focus on its uncoated paper and packaging businesses.
Androscoggin Mill in Jay is part of IP’s coated paper and super-calendar business, which makes glossy paper for magazines, catalogs and inserts. IP corporate officials said they plan to take the next several months to evaluate options for their coated paper business, among other businesses, and make decisions by early 2006.
On Tuesday, U.S. Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, both Maine Republicans, said IP plans to sell its Maine paper mills. The other one is in Bucksport. The senators said they had talked to company officials Monday.
Jay officials are trying to determine what IP’s announcement means to the town and the contracts it has with the mill, Selectmen Chairman Bill Harlow said Wednesday.
$10.5M paid in taxes
IP has two tax increment financing agreements with the town. The most recent one was approved in 2003 for $112 million, which IP invested in a coated-paper machine, wood operations, a bleaching plant and transformer system. That agreement is for 20 years.
The company also has environmental licenses with Jay, which include air and water quality monitoring. The license fees from the Jay industries that fall under the town’s Environmental Control and Improvement Ordinance fund the town’s environmental code enforcement department.
IP’s Androscoggin Mill pays more than $10.5 million in taxes to the town, or about 70 percent of the town’s tax commitment for its $17 million budget.
Harlow said town officials are trying to be ready for whatever IP decides to do with the mill.
“It’s a good solid mill and it’s relatively new,” said Harlow, who is also an IP employee. “I hope they would be able to find a buyer for it.”
“My first reaction is to sell my house,” Jay resident Patty Richards said Wednesday. “It’s not worth anything if anything happened to that mill. That’s our main industry. If someone else buys it, we would wait. Our biggest concern is someone would buy the mill and they would just shut it down.”
Roland Poirier, president of Otis Federal Credit Union, which was organized by IP employees 50 years ago, said the fact that IP continues to invest and upgrade technology at the Androscoggin Mill tells him that it’s a viable mill.
“Our position is we’re hoping that whoever buys the mill will see the viability of the mill and continue to operate the mill,” Poirier said.
Like the shoe shops?
Budget Committee member Al Landry said Wednesday he wasn’t surprised by the company’s announcement. He said he knew the company was planning to restructure from what he had read on the Internet prior to IP’s announcement, and he expects there will be a buyer.
If the company doesn’t find a buyer and shuts down the machines or the mill, Landry said, there would be a big impact on the town, which would mean cutting back some programs.
“I think the mills are on their way out, just like the shoe shops and textile industry. … There is going to be nothing left; goodbye, Jay,” Jay resident Will Adams said Wednesday.
“It is the same thing that happened with the shoe shops. They kept saying they’d be here forever. … It’s going to be just like another tourist town, if it keeps it up,” his wife, Bernice Adams said Wednesday. “Taxes are going to go up.”
“This kind of news is always shocking, but I think we will be able to work through it,” Alison Hagerstrom, executive director of the Greater Franklin Development Corp. said Wednesday. “I think there will be some opportunities here that are yet to be discovered.”
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