E-Malt.com News article: USA: Pittsburgh Brewing Acquisition's reorganization plan approved

The Pittsburgh Water & Sewer Authority, the last remaining holdout in the reorganization plan for Pittsburgh Brewing, reached a deal Thursday with the prospective buyer of the ailing brewery, Pittsburgh Business Journal published April 26.

Representatives of Pittsburgh Brewing Acquisition LLC said they struck a deal with the PWSA over the authority's claims for more than $2.6 million, mostly stemming from unpaid water bills.

The PWSA agreed to accept $500,000, double what it was offered in Pittsburgh Brewing Acquisition's reorganization plan, but still only a fraction of its claim.

Clifford Levine, attorney for the PWSA, said the authority will maintain a lien of the Pittsburgh Brewing property as the new ownership works to pay off another $575,000 in claims accumulated after the Chapter 11 proceedings began.

"When you're in a bankruptcy situation, it's not as though cash was sitting there that would've been available," he said.

The announcement was made before U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Bruce McCullough.

The deal comes at the same time that Pittsburgh Brewing Acquisition expects to receive a total of $750,000 in state and local grants an low interest loans, Joel Walker, an attorney who represents the buyer, told the court.

The new public funding will go toward replacing an antiquated boiler at the brewery as well as other upgrades.

Robert Lampl, the lawyer representing Pittsburgh Brewing in Chapter 11 proceedings, described the plan as a win-win.

Levine said the deal needed to balance not only the needs of the city's water rate payers but also the prospects of maintaining a brewery that has employed more than 100 people.

"The mayor's office and the county chief executive want to make sure that this was to be an operational brewery and the jobs were going to be saved," he said. "The mayor was quite insistent that if there are any types of concessions or public assistance that the money be put toward operations of the brewery."

The parties involved are still working to assemble the final components of new public assistance package for the 141-year-old brewery.


27 April, 2007