| A number of sugar beet growers and landlords from Goshen
County have received a letter from a liquidation company
offering to pay anywhere from 30 cents to 50 cents on the
dollar to vendors, growers or landlords who have money owed
from Imperial Sugar Company.
Our company is in no way affiliated with the company
that has sent this letter out, said Rick Griffith, ag
manager for Holly Sugar Corp. Through the course of our
negotiations with the growers association, we guaranteed
payments to our growers and our landlords, so there would be
no reason for them to concede half their money to this
company. The growers payments are guaranteed by contracting
their sugar beets with us.
The company that sent the letter is Liquidity Solutions,
Inc. of New Jersey. The letter came to Griffiths attention
within the past two days.
We received a number of phone calls from our beet
growers and landlords, so it sounds like the majority of them
received the letter, he said. The message we want to get
out is this did not come from Imperial or Holly Sugar.
This is a completely independent company, he added.
They make their money by offering people who are owed money
through Chapter 11, cents on the dollar. (The liquidation
company) in return collects the full amount from the company
(that has filed Chapter 11). And thats how they make their
money.
Griffith believes the liquidation company most likely got
the growers names and addresses from Imperials Chapter
11 bankruptcy documents.
In a Chapter 11 situation, all that information is
public information, he said.
Imperial Sugar Company, parent company to Holly Sugar
Corporation, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January and is
in the process of restructuring.
The proceedings are going well, Griffith said, and
it appears everything is on schedule to complete our
reorganization sometime late this summer.
Griffith said that Holly would be sending out their first
additional beet payment for the 2000 crop on April 6.
Its going to amount to $3 per ton based on a 15.5
percent sugar content, he said. Our ag staff continues
to contract sugar beets and anyone interested in growing,
please contact us. |