Port Townsend Paper Corporation Bankruptcy Details
Showing posts with label Port Townsend Mill Bankruptcy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Port Townsend Mill Bankruptcy. Show all posts
Monday, May 6, 2013
Port Townsend Paper Corp. Bankruptcy EXIT
"PORT TOWNSEND - Port Townsend Paper Corp. officially exited Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday as a private company under the control of its bondholders.
The paper mill, which employs about 310 people and is the largest private employer in Jefferson County, will follow a reorganization plan that calls for it to pay its unsecured creditors within five business days.
As a group, the 729 unsecured creditors will receive about 37 percent of the money they were owed - between $21 million and $22 million - when the company filed for bankruptcy protection in January.
But some of those creditors will receive as little as 5 percent of their claim.
The plan will pay 100 percent to those with claims amounting to $2,000 or less and give those with higher claims the option of accepting $2,000 or receiving 5 percent to 10 percent of their claim.
The unsecured creditors include individuals, businesses, government agencies and nonprofit organizations in Port Townsend, Port Angeles, Port Hadlock, Quilcene, Sequim, Carlsborg, Forks and Neah Bay.
'Significant event' "Obviously, this is a significant event for the company," John Begley, president and CEO, said in a prepared statement on Monday.
"We are excited about the future because of the new debt structure and the opportunities it presents us."
Judge Samuel J. Steiner of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Seattle signed off on the papermaker's reorganization plan on Aug. 14.
The Chapter 11 plan cuts $50 million in debt from the company's balance sheet in return for transferring control of Port Townsend Paper to its bondholders.
The company's Chapter 11 exit will be funded by $60 million loan, which is backstopped by hedge funds GoldenTree Asset Management and Thales Holding Ltd.
Proceeds from the exit loan are earmarked for bondholders that provided the company a $50 million loan for its Chapter 11 case.
An additional $7.6 million will go to vendors and unsecured creditors.
Port Townsend Paper has also said in court papers that it planned to obtain an additional $20 million loan.
The company and its owner, PT Holdings Co. Inc., filed for Chapter 11 protection on Jan. 29 after reaching a deal with holders of most of a $125 million bond debt.
Under that deal, Port Townsend bondholders forgave $50 million in debt in exchange for control of the company.
In October, Port Townsend missed an interest payment to bondholders, causing it to default on its bonds.
The missed payment also caused the papermaker to default on about $20 million in loans owed to lender CIT Group.
New chairman Begley will remain on the five-member board of PT Holdings.
The board has a new chairman, Michael Ranson, portfolio manager of New York-based GoldenTree.
Ranson will take the place of Don Tisdel of Northwest Capital Appreciation as chairman.
A variety of unbleached pulp and paper products are produced at the Port Townsend mill, including market pulp, converting paper and containerboard.
The company was founded in 1927.
Also part of the Port Townsend Paper Corp.'s family of companies are three Crown packaging plants, two BoxMaster plants and the Crown Creative Group, located in British Columbia and Alberta.
The Canadian units weren't part of the bankruptcy case."
Source
http://www.loggers.com/news.asp?546
The paper mill, which employs about 310 people and is the largest private employer in Jefferson County, will follow a reorganization plan that calls for it to pay its unsecured creditors within five business days.
As a group, the 729 unsecured creditors will receive about 37 percent of the money they were owed - between $21 million and $22 million - when the company filed for bankruptcy protection in January.
But some of those creditors will receive as little as 5 percent of their claim.
The plan will pay 100 percent to those with claims amounting to $2,000 or less and give those with higher claims the option of accepting $2,000 or receiving 5 percent to 10 percent of their claim.
The unsecured creditors include individuals, businesses, government agencies and nonprofit organizations in Port Townsend, Port Angeles, Port Hadlock, Quilcene, Sequim, Carlsborg, Forks and Neah Bay.
'Significant event' "Obviously, this is a significant event for the company," John Begley, president and CEO, said in a prepared statement on Monday.
"We are excited about the future because of the new debt structure and the opportunities it presents us."
Judge Samuel J. Steiner of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Seattle signed off on the papermaker's reorganization plan on Aug. 14.
The Chapter 11 plan cuts $50 million in debt from the company's balance sheet in return for transferring control of Port Townsend Paper to its bondholders.
The company's Chapter 11 exit will be funded by $60 million loan, which is backstopped by hedge funds GoldenTree Asset Management and Thales Holding Ltd.
Proceeds from the exit loan are earmarked for bondholders that provided the company a $50 million loan for its Chapter 11 case.
An additional $7.6 million will go to vendors and unsecured creditors.
Port Townsend Paper has also said in court papers that it planned to obtain an additional $20 million loan.
The company and its owner, PT Holdings Co. Inc., filed for Chapter 11 protection on Jan. 29 after reaching a deal with holders of most of a $125 million bond debt.
Under that deal, Port Townsend bondholders forgave $50 million in debt in exchange for control of the company.
In October, Port Townsend missed an interest payment to bondholders, causing it to default on its bonds.
The missed payment also caused the papermaker to default on about $20 million in loans owed to lender CIT Group.
New chairman Begley will remain on the five-member board of PT Holdings.
The board has a new chairman, Michael Ranson, portfolio manager of New York-based GoldenTree.
Ranson will take the place of Don Tisdel of Northwest Capital Appreciation as chairman.
A variety of unbleached pulp and paper products are produced at the Port Townsend mill, including market pulp, converting paper and containerboard.
The company was founded in 1927.
Also part of the Port Townsend Paper Corp.'s family of companies are three Crown packaging plants, two BoxMaster plants and the Crown Creative Group, located in British Columbia and Alberta.
The Canadian units weren't part of the bankruptcy case."
Source
http://www.loggers.com/news.asp?546
Port Townsend Paper Mill Bankruptcy Details and Research
07-10342-SJS
Port Townsend Paper Corporation
Chapter: 11 Asset:
Judge: Samuel J. Steiner
Date filed: 01/29/2007
Date of last filing: 02/09/2009
Date terminated: 02/09/2009
United States Trustee Seattle Washington
Email: USTPRegion18.SE.ECF@usdoj.gov
Tax ID / EIN: 91-1226624
Atty: Gayle E Bush Represents party 1: Debtor
Atty: Katriana L Samiljan Represents party 1: Debtor
Port Townsend Paper Corporation Bankruptcy. Amcol. Dale Stahl. Roger Hagen
Want to know a Secret. A company can go BANKRUPT, and yet their Retirement Plan is Safe. So lot's of places to hide money and file bankrupt.
So they can travel, invest, save for the future, use retirement funds to buy real estate and all manner of fun stuff. THEN go bankrupt. Yee Haw.
Got a Tip on the Port Townsend Bankruptcy Case?
Crystal@CrystalCox.com
Now Remember anything you eMail me, I can and will Post. So try and be nice best ya can.
"Port Townsend Paper Corporation Reaches Agreement in Principle With Holders of More Than 70% of Senior Secured Notes to Restructure Debt Through Chapter 11 Proceeding"
" PORT TOWNSEND, Wash., Jan. 29 /PRNewswire/ -- PT Holdings Company, Inc. (the "Company"), the parent company of Port Townsend Paper Corporation ("PTPC"), announced today that the Company and its U.S. affiliates have filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Washington (the "Bankruptcy Court"). The Company's Canadian subsidiaries are not part of
the filing.
Through the Chapter 11 cases, the Company will seek to implement an agreement in principle it has reached with members of an ad hoc committee holding more than 70% in principal amount of the Company's 11% Senior Secured Notes due 2011 (the "Senior Secured Notes") on the terms of a consensual chapter 11 plan of reorganization. The agreement in principle is reflected in a term sheet filed with the Bankruptcy Court in connection with the Chapter 11 cases (the "Term Sheet").
The Term Sheet provides that holders of the Senior Secured Notes would receive, on a pro rata basis, in exchange for their allowed secured claims against the Company (inclusive of
principal and interest accrued through the petition date of the Chapter 11 cases): (i) newly issued notes in a principal amount not to exceed $75 million and (ii) 100% of the newly issued shares of common stock of reorganized PTPC, subject to dilution on account of the Management Equity Plan (as defined in the Term Sheet) and warrants provided to existing
holders of common equity to purchase 5.25% of the new common stock with a strike price equivalent to a $170 million total enterprise value.
Upon emergence from Chapter 11, in accordance with the Term Sheet, the
Company anticipates that it will have less than $100 million of funded
indebtedness, representing a reduction of at least $50 million from 2006
year end. Additional terms and conditions of the reorganization will be
outlined in a disclosure statement which will be sent to holders entitled
to vote on the plan of reorganization after it is approved by the
Bankruptcy Court.
Port Townsend Paper Corporation President and Chief Executive Officer
John Begley stated, "The balance sheet restructuring will significantly
enhance our financial strength and operational flexibility, which will
benefit all of our stakeholders. We expect to improve our short- and
long-term liquidity, allowing us to better serve our customers, to meet our
debt service and working capital requirements and to fund capital
expenditures for new programs."
Copies of court documents filed in connection with the Chapter 11 cases
are available via the Bankruptcy Court's website at www.wawb.uscourts.gov.
Please note that a PACER password is required to access the documents via
the court's website.
The Port Townsend Paper family of companies employs approximately 800 people and annually produces more than 320,000 tons of unbleached Kraft pulp, paper and linerboard at its mill in Port Townsend, Washington. The Company also operates three Crown Packaging Plants, two BoxMaster Plants, and the Crown Creative Group, located in British Columbia and Alberta.
Some of the statements in this press release are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include statements about our future financial condition, our industry and our business strategy. Statements that contain words such as " will," "should," "anticipate," "believe," "expect," "intend," "estimate," "hope" or similar expressions, are forward-looking statements.
These forward-looking statements are based on the current expectations of Port Townsend Paper Corporation, its parent, PT Holdings Company, Inc. and all of its subsidiaries. Because forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, the plans, actions and
actual results Port Townsend Paper Corporation, PT Holdings Company, Inc. and its subsidiaries, could differ materially.
Among the factors that could cause plans, actions and results to differ materially from current
expectations include the following: uncertainty related to the approval of the plan of reorganization by our creditors and the bankruptcy court, the impact of general economic conditions; container board and corrugated products general industry conditions, including competition, product demand and product pricing; fluctuation in wood fiber and recycled fiber costs; fluctuations in purchased energy costs; and legislative or regulatory requirements, particularly concerning environmental matters."
Source
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases-test/port-townsend-paper-corporation-reaches-agreement-in-principle-with-holders-of-more-than-70-of-senior-secured-notes-to-restructure-debt-through-chapter-11-proceeding-53808447.html
More information at
http://www.porttownsendpapermill.com/
the filing.
Through the Chapter 11 cases, the Company will seek to implement an agreement in principle it has reached with members of an ad hoc committee holding more than 70% in principal amount of the Company's 11% Senior Secured Notes due 2011 (the "Senior Secured Notes") on the terms of a consensual chapter 11 plan of reorganization. The agreement in principle is reflected in a term sheet filed with the Bankruptcy Court in connection with the Chapter 11 cases (the "Term Sheet").
The Term Sheet provides that holders of the Senior Secured Notes would receive, on a pro rata basis, in exchange for their allowed secured claims against the Company (inclusive of
principal and interest accrued through the petition date of the Chapter 11 cases): (i) newly issued notes in a principal amount not to exceed $75 million and (ii) 100% of the newly issued shares of common stock of reorganized PTPC, subject to dilution on account of the Management Equity Plan (as defined in the Term Sheet) and warrants provided to existing
holders of common equity to purchase 5.25% of the new common stock with a strike price equivalent to a $170 million total enterprise value.
Upon emergence from Chapter 11, in accordance with the Term Sheet, the
Company anticipates that it will have less than $100 million of funded
indebtedness, representing a reduction of at least $50 million from 2006
year end. Additional terms and conditions of the reorganization will be
outlined in a disclosure statement which will be sent to holders entitled
to vote on the plan of reorganization after it is approved by the
Bankruptcy Court.
Port Townsend Paper Corporation President and Chief Executive Officer
John Begley stated, "The balance sheet restructuring will significantly
enhance our financial strength and operational flexibility, which will
benefit all of our stakeholders. We expect to improve our short- and
long-term liquidity, allowing us to better serve our customers, to meet our
debt service and working capital requirements and to fund capital
expenditures for new programs."
Copies of court documents filed in connection with the Chapter 11 cases
are available via the Bankruptcy Court's website at www.wawb.uscourts.gov.
Please note that a PACER password is required to access the documents via
the court's website.
The Port Townsend Paper family of companies employs approximately 800 people and annually produces more than 320,000 tons of unbleached Kraft pulp, paper and linerboard at its mill in Port Townsend, Washington. The Company also operates three Crown Packaging Plants, two BoxMaster Plants, and the Crown Creative Group, located in British Columbia and Alberta.
Some of the statements in this press release are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include statements about our future financial condition, our industry and our business strategy. Statements that contain words such as " will," "should," "anticipate," "believe," "expect," "intend," "estimate," "hope" or similar expressions, are forward-looking statements.
These forward-looking statements are based on the current expectations of Port Townsend Paper Corporation, its parent, PT Holdings Company, Inc. and all of its subsidiaries. Because forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties, the plans, actions and
actual results Port Townsend Paper Corporation, PT Holdings Company, Inc. and its subsidiaries, could differ materially.
Among the factors that could cause plans, actions and results to differ materially from current
expectations include the following: uncertainty related to the approval of the plan of reorganization by our creditors and the bankruptcy court, the impact of general economic conditions; container board and corrugated products general industry conditions, including competition, product demand and product pricing; fluctuation in wood fiber and recycled fiber costs; fluctuations in purchased energy costs; and legislative or regulatory requirements, particularly concerning environmental matters."
Source
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases-test/port-townsend-paper-corporation-reaches-agreement-in-principle-with-holders-of-more-than-70-of-senior-secured-notes-to-restructure-debt-through-chapter-11-proceeding-53808447.html
More information at
http://www.porttownsendpapermill.com/
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Them Thar is FIGHTIN' WORDS. Oh Well, I have had Death Threats Before. If the Good Ol' Boys GOONS off me, then Job Well Done Right?
a Little Diddy about what The Washington State Department of Ecology allegedly say is non-toxic odor. The TRUTH comes at a high price. Time to Make a Stand.
Investigative Blogger Crystal Cox says time to SUE those who will not be TRUTHFUL about what is really in the air, in the water, in the sludge, in the soil and therefore in the BODIES of the Port Townsend Washington Residents.
"Trouble in the air at Port Townsend
Cindy Buxton woke up one night to the rancid smell of rotting eggs and the unnerving sound of her 10-year-old son violently vomiting. By the next day...
PORT TOWNSEND — Cindy Buxton woke up one night to the rancid smell of rotting eggs and the unnerving sound of her 10-year-old son violently vomiting.
By the next day, the smell that had permeated her house — the telltale odor of the local paper mill — was gone and her son was better. But then she started feeling sick.
Sixteen months later, Buxton's headaches and respiratory problems are still so bad she and her family have had to move to Alaska.
Her conclusion: The mill made them sick.
Port Townsend Paper, Jefferson County's largest private employer, has put food on people's tables for 81 years, sustaining the town even through lean years when the historic downtown and elegant Victorian homes were boarded up.
Since then, the town has transformed into a tourist and retirement oasis, and the mill is under attack as never before. The odor that was once tolerated as the cost of living-wage jobs is now being dissected for its toxic content.
An organized and noisy environmental group, with Buxton as the lead case study, has campaigned for more aggressive air-quality monitoring. A recent editorial cartoon in the local newspaper portrayed the mill as a "sacred cow," dropping steaming piles of pollution, with state regulators asleep on its back.
Earlier this month, the state pollution-control board sided with the mill critics. The board ordered the Department of Ecology to rewrite the mill's air permit, after federal regulators had accused the state of going too easy on the mill's air-quality monitoring.
That likely means at least another public meeting, giving mill critics — an environmental group called Port Townsend Airwatchers, led by a flock of recent arrivals — an opportunity to vent at the microphone.
Whether the mill's emissions are making people sick is unclear. No health study has found a link, in part because there is also no ambient air monitoring to measure the density of toxins drifting from the mill's stacks.
But the mere fact that the mill's environmental cost is being debated — in local coffee shops and in the local newspaper — reflects a new day for an old mill town.
Smell of opportunity
In the late 1920s, amid the closure of local canneries and the looming failure of the municipal water system, paper company Crown Zellerbach spent $7 million to build a new pulp and paper mill on Glen Cove at the edge of town, according to the Jefferson County Historical Society.
The mill quickly rebuilt the water system and spurred a home-building boom. It remains the county's economic mainstay, employing about 300 people at an average yearly wage of about $57,000. It produces about 1,000 tons a day of virgin and recycled pulp, most of it made into cardboard boxes.
It also churns out about 58 tons of carcinogens each year, including nitrogen oxides — known to aggravate asthma — as well as ammonia and sulfur compounds that cause the mill's rotten-egg smell, according to the mill's Toxic Release Inventory, which catalogs some bulk emissions from its stacks.
Port Townsend City Councilman Mark Welch, who worked at the mill in high school and college, said opinions of the smell usually depend on how long someone has lived in town. His family has lived in Port Townsend since the 1850s, and he links the smell to "economic opportunity."
"I don't want to be critical of the people complaining about it, but they did move to a mill town," said Welch. "I'm one of those odd individuals who like the odor, because I grew up with it."
Mill monitoring itself?
Opposition to the mill blossomed in 2006, when a local environmental group, led by resident Elaine Bailey, realized the state Department of Ecology had issued the mill a new air permit good until 2009.
After some digging, the group, which now numbers about 150, found the permit relied heavily on the mill to test and monitor itself, and to respond to citizen complaints.
Some complaints are directed to the mill, while others are recorded by a hotline in Ecology's Olympia office. Those complaints show that Port Townsend Paper ranks second — with 38 complaints since 2001 — among the 11 pulp and paper mills regulated by the state. The complaints are vivid, with people describing smells that made them vomit, turn to inhalers and pull their children indoors.
Late last year, the federal Environmental Protection Agency weighed in, e-mailing state regulators to say they wrongly waived some federal air-monitoring requirements at the mill. The state had written the permit in a way that "you couldn't really tell what was required," said Nancy Helms, the EPA official who sent the e-mail.
Although the objections were technical, the tone was one of a rebuke. For only the second time in 12 years, the EPA asked the state to redo an air permit. Merley McCall, manager of the Ecology division that regulates industrial plants, said the state would rewrite the permit to appease the EPA but disputed that Port Townsend Paper got a break.
"As we've made major reductions in emissions from the mill, rather than smelling like a pulp mill all the time, you get intermittent bursts, and it's more irritating when you aren't used to it," said McCall.
Speculation filling void
Eveleen Muehlethaler moved to Port Townsend in 1982, hired by the mill's owners with a tough job: Either close or sell the mill. She helped with the sale, and saw it sold three more times, including last year, after the mill emerged from bankruptcy.
Now the assistant mill manager, she said the mill was "not getting a fair shake" from critics, noting that the mill recently spent $8 million to upgrade equipment monitoring in the mill's towering stacks.
"We do everything we're asked to do, and we work to be a good neighbor," she said. "What I want to know is, why don't they trust us? Why don't they trust their public servants [at Ecology]?"
Richard Stedman, head of the Olympic Region Clean Air Authority, said the issue isn't one of trust, but data. The state only requires testing of the stacks, not the air quality in town, leaving a void to be filled by speculation.
"They probably have a handle on 50 to 80 percent of what's coming out of the mill," said Stedman. "It's the other 50 to 20 percent that you want to know for sure. You need to know where the hot spots are."
Buxton, 44, said she developed a permanent chemical sensitivity after noxious blasts from the mill. She and her husband, both geologists, had moved to Port Townsend in 2002 to live in a cohousing community near the mill, seeking the town's progressive and placid lifestyle.
After her splitting headaches came on, she tried to stay, buying a $1,200 air filter for their house. A few days later, she and her family left for good, moving to their cabin near Glacier Bay, Alaska, and filed an appeal of the mill's air permit.
Through the legal process, she learned that Ecology never investigated the complaint she filed just after getting sick.
"The people of Port Townsend deserve to know what's in their air," Buxton said. "The way it is now, you can't even get a complete list of chemicals."
Source
http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2004189039_mill19m.html
Investigative Blogger Crystal Cox says time to SUE those who will not be TRUTHFUL about what is really in the air, in the water, in the sludge, in the soil and therefore in the BODIES of the Port Townsend Washington Residents.
"Trouble in the air at Port Townsend
Cindy Buxton woke up one night to the rancid smell of rotting eggs and the unnerving sound of her 10-year-old son violently vomiting. By the next day...
PORT TOWNSEND — Cindy Buxton woke up one night to the rancid smell of rotting eggs and the unnerving sound of her 10-year-old son violently vomiting.
By the next day, the smell that had permeated her house — the telltale odor of the local paper mill — was gone and her son was better. But then she started feeling sick.
Sixteen months later, Buxton's headaches and respiratory problems are still so bad she and her family have had to move to Alaska.
Her conclusion: The mill made them sick.
Those can be fighting words in this old mill town.
Port Townsend Paper, Jefferson County's largest private employer, has put food on people's tables for 81 years, sustaining the town even through lean years when the historic downtown and elegant Victorian homes were boarded up.
Since then, the town has transformed into a tourist and retirement oasis, and the mill is under attack as never before. The odor that was once tolerated as the cost of living-wage jobs is now being dissected for its toxic content.
An organized and noisy environmental group, with Buxton as the lead case study, has campaigned for more aggressive air-quality monitoring. A recent editorial cartoon in the local newspaper portrayed the mill as a "sacred cow," dropping steaming piles of pollution, with state regulators asleep on its back.
Earlier this month, the state pollution-control board sided with the mill critics. The board ordered the Department of Ecology to rewrite the mill's air permit, after federal regulators had accused the state of going too easy on the mill's air-quality monitoring.
That likely means at least another public meeting, giving mill critics — an environmental group called Port Townsend Airwatchers, led by a flock of recent arrivals — an opportunity to vent at the microphone.
Whether the mill's emissions are making people sick is unclear. No health study has found a link, in part because there is also no ambient air monitoring to measure the density of toxins drifting from the mill's stacks.
But the mere fact that the mill's environmental cost is being debated — in local coffee shops and in the local newspaper — reflects a new day for an old mill town.
Smell of opportunity
In the late 1920s, amid the closure of local canneries and the looming failure of the municipal water system, paper company Crown Zellerbach spent $7 million to build a new pulp and paper mill on Glen Cove at the edge of town, according to the Jefferson County Historical Society.
The mill quickly rebuilt the water system and spurred a home-building boom. It remains the county's economic mainstay, employing about 300 people at an average yearly wage of about $57,000. It produces about 1,000 tons a day of virgin and recycled pulp, most of it made into cardboard boxes.
It also churns out about 58 tons of carcinogens each year, including nitrogen oxides — known to aggravate asthma — as well as ammonia and sulfur compounds that cause the mill's rotten-egg smell, according to the mill's Toxic Release Inventory, which catalogs some bulk emissions from its stacks.
Port Townsend City Councilman Mark Welch, who worked at the mill in high school and college, said opinions of the smell usually depend on how long someone has lived in town. His family has lived in Port Townsend since the 1850s, and he links the smell to "economic opportunity."
"I don't want to be critical of the people complaining about it, but they did move to a mill town," said Welch. "I'm one of those odd individuals who like the odor, because I grew up with it."
Mill monitoring itself?
Opposition to the mill blossomed in 2006, when a local environmental group, led by resident Elaine Bailey, realized the state Department of Ecology had issued the mill a new air permit good until 2009.
After some digging, the group, which now numbers about 150, found the permit relied heavily on the mill to test and monitor itself, and to respond to citizen complaints.
Even complaining about the mill is complicated.
Some complaints are directed to the mill, while others are recorded by a hotline in Ecology's Olympia office. Those complaints show that Port Townsend Paper ranks second — with 38 complaints since 2001 — among the 11 pulp and paper mills regulated by the state. The complaints are vivid, with people describing smells that made them vomit, turn to inhalers and pull their children indoors.
"Someone other than the mill needs to be monitoring the mill," said Bailey.
Late last year, the federal Environmental Protection Agency weighed in, e-mailing state regulators to say they wrongly waived some federal air-monitoring requirements at the mill. The state had written the permit in a way that "you couldn't really tell what was required," said Nancy Helms, the EPA official who sent the e-mail.
Although the objections were technical, the tone was one of a rebuke. For only the second time in 12 years, the EPA asked the state to redo an air permit. Merley McCall, manager of the Ecology division that regulates industrial plants, said the state would rewrite the permit to appease the EPA but disputed that Port Townsend Paper got a break.
"As we've made major reductions in emissions from the mill, rather than smelling like a pulp mill all the time, you get intermittent bursts, and it's more irritating when you aren't used to it," said McCall.
Speculation filling void
Eveleen Muehlethaler moved to Port Townsend in 1982, hired by the mill's owners with a tough job: Either close or sell the mill. She helped with the sale, and saw it sold three more times, including last year, after the mill emerged from bankruptcy.
Now the assistant mill manager, she said the mill was "not getting a fair shake" from critics, noting that the mill recently spent $8 million to upgrade equipment monitoring in the mill's towering stacks.
"We do everything we're asked to do, and we work to be a good neighbor," she said. "What I want to know is, why don't they trust us? Why don't they trust their public servants [at Ecology]?"
Richard Stedman, head of the Olympic Region Clean Air Authority, said the issue isn't one of trust, but data. The state only requires testing of the stacks, not the air quality in town, leaving a void to be filled by speculation.
"They probably have a handle on 50 to 80 percent of what's coming out of the mill," said Stedman. "It's the other 50 to 20 percent that you want to know for sure. You need to know where the hot spots are."
Buxton, 44, said she developed a permanent chemical sensitivity after noxious blasts from the mill. She and her husband, both geologists, had moved to Port Townsend in 2002 to live in a cohousing community near the mill, seeking the town's progressive and placid lifestyle.
After her splitting headaches came on, she tried to stay, buying a $1,200 air filter for their house. A few days later, she and her family left for good, moving to their cabin near Glacier Bay, Alaska, and filed an appeal of the mill's air permit.
Through the legal process, she learned that Ecology never investigated the complaint she filed just after getting sick.
"The people of Port Townsend deserve to know what's in their air," Buxton said. "The way it is now, you can't even get a complete list of chemicals."
Source
http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2004189039_mill19m.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)