During a Great Northern Paper Inc. bankruptcy court hearing Friday, Judge Louis H. Kornreich expressed frustration with the lack of timely and complete information from the company – in this case, whether GNP had paid court-ordered bills for wages and electricity – and the difficulty that adds to the decisions he must make. “If you feel in the dark,” he told an attorney for one creditor, “think how I feel.”

Better still, think how the workers feel. The Inexcon era of GNP ownership (1999-?) will be remembered for, in addition to the economic devastation of a region of this state, a lack of straightforwardness by management. Businesses fail; rarely do they fail with such callous disregard for those who will be hurt.

The labor unions at the Millinocket and East Millinocket mills have had enough. During the weekend, 11 locals representing various trades wrote a letter to GNP CEO Lambert Bedard asking that future communications from company headquarters contain something previously missing: the truth.

They make many good points. Union members have been asked repeatedly during Inexcon’s ownership to make wage-and-benefit concessions and to accept the sell-off of valuable assets – forest lands and the hydro-electric system – as vital parts of putting the company on sound financial footing. Union leaders have been asked to help quell the many rumors that are inevitable when an employer seeks concessions and sells assets.

In return for their cooperation, workers and labor officials got blindsided. The GNP board of directors voted to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Dec. 23, yet union officials were not told of this decision until the papers were filed in court two weeks later. Further, the company told the news media a few days after the Dec. 23 board meeting that it had no plans to file for bankruptcy.

This, wrote the union officials, “was the last straw… We are sick of being bombarded with calls from members and others in the community, as well as other locals, giving what little information was passed on to us only to find it is incorrect. We are not going to be the ones who look like we are lying and covering for the company.”

In a perfect world, no one would be lying. In this world, judges, along with federal and state financial regulators, have considerable powers to expose lies. Given the stakes here – 1,100 direct jobs, 7,000 associated jobs, the future of an entire region – a new owner for the GNP mills must be found. Gov. Baldacci and the state’s congressional delegation are working closely with workers and creditors to develop an incentive package to attract one. Such an incentive package cannot be developed unless there is a clear picture of GNP’s actual condition.

A new owner will be found; the stakes preclude failure. That new owner will be the beneficiary of considerable federal and state assistance, the good will of an entire region and the hard work of 1,100 grateful men and women. That new owner would do well to heed this advice offered by the unions in their letter to the current owner: “We all want GNP to succeed, but you have to treat us more like a partner than another number. Be truthful with us and maybe we can all survive the hard times before us.”