Columbia Pulp Receivership terminated

DAYTON–Attorneys handling the liquidation of assets of Columbia Pulp I, LLC, recently issued a notice to all concerned parties that the receivership has fulfilled its duties, the receivership is terminated and the actions pertaining to selling Columbia Pulp I, LLC's assets are complete and closed. The filing in King County Superior Court, the Honorable Leroy McCulough presiding, was filed June 6, 2024.

On September 19, 2023, following the sale of all of Columbia Pulp I, LLC's assets, the receiver, Paladin Management Group, sought authority to distribute $4,334,000 in gross distributable cash proceeds, consisting of $3,700,000 in aggregate gross distributable cash proceeds realized from the sales of substantially all of Columbia Pulp I's assets, and approximately $634,000 in unrestricted cash, representing the unspent proceeds of the Receivership Advance.

On October 23, 2023, the court granted the distributions to be made, and on December 18, 2023, Paladin Group filed a motion for Order Approving Final Report and Terminating Receivership, which was approved and ordered on January 23, 2024.

UMB Bank, N.A. was left holding the bag to the tune of $246,378,528.25 after two secured claims were satisfied by the proceeds from the sale of Columbia Pulp's assets, information in court documents pertaining to the Columbia Pulp I, LLC's receivership show. Columbia County held a secured tax claim of $2.228 million, and the Receivership Advance from trustee UMB Bank, N.A. of $11 million (plus interest) received 10% of the $12,841,000 amount, or $1,307,000. Next in line was UMB Bank, N.A. with its $246 million secured claim, which did not receive any funds.

Columbia Pulp was sold in three transactions. For $550,000, Columbia Straw Supply LLC, straw inventory and a truck scale were sold in July, 2022.

The Pomeroy assets were sold for $150,000 in cash plus a 15% equity in the Pomeroy buyer's parent entity. This transaction closed August 30, 2022.

The Lyons Ferry assets of machinery and equipment were sold for $3 million to a consortium of companies from Illinois, Florida and Delaware. The Lyons Ferry property was sold to Palouse Enterprises LLC affiliated with Palouse Fiber, purchaser of the Pomeroy assets. These sales closed August 31, 2023.

Columbia Pulp I was a single-purpose limited liability company organized in Washington for the sole purpose of developing, owning and operating an agricultural waste-to-pulp manufacturing plant, where wheat and see alfalfa straw sourced within a 100-mile radius, would be processed into wet-lap pulp sold to tissue, paper, molded fiber and packaging manufacturers in the Pacific Northwest and United States. The company started in 2015, halted operations in February, 2022, foreclosure action was initiated in March, 2022, and Paladin Management Group was appointed as receiver in August, 2022.