Connecticut board mill to close

Fusion Paperboard, Versailles, Connecticut, has informed 145 workers at its recycled-content paperboard mill in nearby Sprague, Connecticut, that it intends to close the mill in September 2014. 

An article on the website of the Norwich (Connecticut) Bulletin,  says regional economic development officials have declared their intentions to explore how to keep the mill open. 

Fusion Paperboard was granted a $2 million economic development loan by the state of Connecticut in September 2013, according to the same article. 

Fusion Paperboard filed a notice with Connecticut’s Department of Labor Thursday, July 24, 2014, of its intention to cut 145 jobs when it closes the mill and the company office in Versailles on Sept. 22, 2014. 

On its website, www.fusionpaperboard.com , Fusion Paperboard says it “buys brown fiber recycled material [and] recycles more than 160,000 short tons of fiber each year.” 

The company says it focuses in particular on procuring material from the surrounding New England region. “Every year we buy back approximately 130,000 tons of used boxes from recycling centers, stores and distribution centers in the New England area and give them new life by converting them into coated recycled boxboard,” the company states on its website.