Cascades Restart NY Mill

Cascades Inc. restarted its tissue mill this week, after the Canadian papermaker renegotiated its utility rates.

The company cited rising natural gas and electricity costs when it temporarily shuttered the mill last month.

On May 12^th, , Suzanne Blanchet, president and chief executive of Cascades' tissue group, said the company had negotiated a new contract with New York State Electric & Gas Corp. She said a confidentiality agreement bars her from disclosing details.

In the meantime, Cascades, Saratoga County and the state still are working out a change in the county's Empire Zone to include the Mechanicville mill, which would make it eligible for discounted utility rates and tax credits for any new jobs added.

"It's following its process. It's going in the right direction," Blanchet said of those talks. "It was going to be in mid-May. Now, I think it's going to be mid-June."

Quebec-based Cascades bought that mill and one in Waterford last year as part of a $33 million deal in the bankruptcy case of American Tissue Inc. of Hauppauge, Suffolk County.

The Waterford plant has remained open.

Jon A. Kelley, senior vice president of the Saratoga Economic Development Corp., which administers the county Empire Zone, said he expects the border revisions to be done this summer, and to include the Mechanicville and Waterford mills. Times Union