02/27/2008
By KEITH EDWARDS
Staff Writer
Local union representatives say even though workers fought to stop the sale of Verizon's telephone land-line business in Maine to Fairpoint Communications, they'll do their best to help the company thrive now that the deal has cleared a final hurdle.
Peter McLaughlin, business manager for Augusta-based International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2327, said union objections to the sale helped force concessions in the deal which made it better, financially, for Fairpoint.
Those changes, made to win approval by utilities regulators in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, included a reduced purchase price for Fairpoint, leaving it with more funds to operate the business and, presumably, pay employees.
"We didn't achieve our goal of stopping the sale," McLaughlin said. "But we certainly threw significant light on it, so a lot of the shortcomings came out. And so under the deal now, the three states significantly changed it. Even though we lost, you know, it's a win. Fairpoint is in significantly better shape, financially. And if the company is good, financially, the employees have work."
Jeff Nevins, a spokesman for Fairpoint in Maine, said Fairpoint has about 200 workers in Maine, about 170 of whom work in central Maine, with many at a call center in South China.
Those workers will join about 2,700 Verizon workers in the three states in the new company, which will provide land-based telephone and Internet service when the $2.35 billion deal closes March 31.
Some Verizon workers approaching retirement age have decided to get out now rather than face uncertainty about what sort of retirement benefits and plans the merged company will have.
McLaughlin said between 150 and 160 of the union's previously 1,000-plus members working for Verizon have decided to retire. He said another 50 or so could decide to retire before the deal closes. A key concern for workers approaching retirement age has been keeping Verizon's retiree health-care package, rather than face possible unknowns if they wait and retire after Verizon's operations are absorbed by Fairpoint.
"We've had a significant loss of head count; a lot of them want to retire under the Verizon umbrella," McLaughlin said. "I know Fairpoint has committed to replace the people and get the head count back up. But of the ones we've lost, some of them were our most experienced employees."
Nevins, the Fairpoint spokesman, said Fairpoint anticipates hiring 675 new workers in the three states, including 280 in Maine. Another 60 jobs will be saved in Maine because, Nevins said, Fairpoint will operate a call center in Bangor, where the Verizon contract was expiring.
He said the company has a variety of openings in Maine.
Both company and union representatives said they don't anticipate Verizon and Fairpoint customers seeing a major change in service right away.
"Going forward, we're going to insure workers, especially in the state of Maine, help make sure it's a smooth process for our customers," McLaughlin said. "We'll do it in the same manner we've been doing. We've all got to move forward."
Nevins said customers would see the Fairpoint logo on their bills after the closing at the end of March but it would likely be until the end of the summer before Fairpoint takes over every aspect of Verizon's existing land-line services.
McLaughlin anticipates employees at the two companies could be integrated as a single unit in two or three years. At first, workers from Fairpoint, which is generally not unionized in the three states, and Verizon, which is, would be regulated separately.
"No one will quite be ready to do that from day one but it makes sense to, long term, bring them all together," McLaughlin said. Nevins said Fairpoint workers have been looking forward to the challenge of taking on Verizon's business in the three states.
"It has been a long time, over 13 months, since the deal was announced. It's been reviewed and re-reviewed," Nevins said. "We're happy to finally get the last stone in place. I think it's a combination of happiness and relief."
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