<b>Parchment Sells Shuttered Mills to American Tissue </b>

Parchment will turn over much of the old Crown Vantage property to American Tissue and in return the city receives the potential of 200 to 250 jobs and new tax revenue.

A proposal that calls for selling most of Mill 1 and Mill 2 for $1 a year and leasing the Mill 2 wastewater treatment plant and power plant for $1 more was unanimously approved Monday by the Parchment City Commission.

"I think these are interesting times to be around Parchment," said Commissioner Robert Heasley, also referring to a recent approval by voters to increase the city's millage cap from 12 to 17 mills.

"I'm not sure when the dice will stop rolling."

The dice will stop if a development agreement stipulating the number of jobs, taxes paid and improvements to the Parchment plants cannot be hammered out between the city, Southwest Michigan First and American Tissue.

Barry Broome, Southwest Michigan First executive director, in a telephone conference call from Cleveland to the Parchment commission Monday night, said the city's effort is commendable, but it will go for naught if American Tissue cannot finalize a pact with Georgia-Pacific over its Kalamazoo Township plant.

The two deals are tied together in what could potentially be the creation of 1,000 paper-making jobs in Kalamazoo County.

"If we don't do the deal with American Tissue we're going to have to find hundreds of thousands of dollars to knock those (paper plant) buildings down," said Broome. "American Tissue is our best and most immediate shot at bringing jobs to southwest Michigan.It's all over" if the Georgia-Pacific talks fall through.

Parchment commissioners said they were encouraged by the American Tissue offer, but included several stipulations in the proposal.Because the city owns the Crown Vantage 90-acres and its buildings, Parchment is in a better position to suggest some terms, Broome said.

The city will lease, not sell, the wastewater treatment and power plants so that it can have some control over those future facilities.

It has excluded turning over the former parchmentizing plant and the administration building, both of which Parchment officials say they believe can be re-developed in other ways.

The city also refused to be responsible for environmental cleanup, and if American Tissue goes out of business or closes, the Parchment plants will revert back to the city.

The three sides will now go to the negotiating table to hammer out the development agreement. Broome said he hopes to have a concrete decision from American Tissue by the end of May.

He said that it appears American Tissue is a solid, reputable, family business, privately held but showing a great growth from $500 million to $1 billion in a few short years.

American Tissue became interested in the Parchment plants after negotiating with Crown Vantage to buy its equipment and machinery there. That deal also is still in the works, with a late-May deadline looming.

If the equipment deal goes through, Parchment stands to gain up to $350,000 under terms of its court-approved bankruptcy agreement with Crown Vantage.

"You're only doing it because Parchment had the courage and foresight to take over that property. I must congratulate you on that.Kalamazoo Gazette.