Maine Beverage Co. makes plea to keep liquor pact
Gov. Paul LePage has turned down a plea from Maine Beverage Co. CEO Dean Williams to renegotiate and extend the company's current 10-year contract to manage the state's wholesale liquor business.
The Bangor Daily News reported that Williams offered in a letter to help the state pay back $186 million it owes Maine hospitals and to guarantee the state $32 million annually and a $4 million to $6 million share of its profits if Maine Beverage Co. could keep the business it first took on in 2004.
In his response, the paper reported, the governor wrote he feels the contract is more valuable than Maine Beverage's latest offer and that his administration intends to continue a competitive bidding process outlined in September 2012 for the contract that expires next year.
LePage and Gerry Reid, director of the Maine's Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages and Lottery, have said previously that the state hopes to make nearly $30 million annually through renewed bidding on the contract and that the expected revenue would support state bonds to pay the $186 million portion of outstanding MaineCare payments the state owes hospitals.
The market value of that contract was estimated to be $378 million in a 2009 study by consulting firm Deloitte & Touche.
Ford Reiche, who founded the company Dirigo Spirit to compete for the liquor wholesale contract, challenged Maine Beverage Co. to a bidding process in a prepared statement about the latest development.
"If Maine Beverage Company has a compelling proposal, they should not be reluctant to submit it in an open and competitive bidding process, and let the State of Maine make a choice by comparison," Reiche said.
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