AUGUSTA – A mediator gave lawyers for Maine’s wild blueberry growers and three processors a 24-hour deadline Wednesday to reach a compromise in their $56 million antitrust court case.

David Bustin, a mediator for the Maine Labor Relations Board, called a news conference to say that he had presented the two sides with his own recommendation for a settlement.

He disclosed few details, but said the proposal involves cash and a new pricing method.

The talks have occurred in the wake of a Knox County Superior Court jury’s verdict in November that concluded the three processors – Allen’s Blueberry Freezer of Ellsworth, Jasper Wyman & Son of Milbridge and Cherryfield Foods Inc. of Cherryfield – conspired to fix prices on what they paid growers in the late 1990s.

The jury in the class-action lawsuit awarded the growers $18.6 million in damages. The amount was tripled to $56 million under Maine’s antitrust statutes.

Since then, the two sides have talked, but with no agreement apparent.

“This is an unusual thing for a mediator to do, but this is an unusual and complex case,” Bustin said in a statement Wednesday afternoon. “An agreement between the parties is far preferable to a decision forced by the courts.”

Bustin and Robert Spear, the commissioner of agriculture, called the news conference to announce that Bustin was giving the growers and processors until the close of business today to agree to the proposed settlement.

As the growing season has rounded into view, processors and growers have found themselves cut off from their traditional financing sources to see them through the harvest. Growers’ lawyers have attached the processors’ assets pending a resolution of the case.

Maine produces 25 percent of the world’s blueberries on some 60,000 acres. Unrest at a time when growers ordinarily would be arranging for bees and chemicals has spread well beyond farmland.

“It’s important for everybody to know that there’s a constituency involved far beyond the individuals battling at the table,” Bustin said Wednesday.

“A great many families in Washington, Hancock, Knox and Waldo counties are directly or indirectly impacted by the blueberry industry. This dispute is viewed with great anxiety in many quarters,” Bustin said.

There are two portions of his proposal, Bustin said.

The first addresses the amount of cash that each processor would pay to the growers. The numbers that suggested by Bustin are collectively much lower than the $56 million imposed by the court, and even less than the original jury judgment of $18.6 million.

The second part of the agreement focuses on a new pricing method for the growers’ berries.

“While I will not reveal details at this time, I can say that my recommendation is designed to avoid bankruptcy by two of the processors, and will involve the abolition of the old ‘field price’ mechanism and substitute fairer methods of pricing,” Bustin said.

Troubled by the distance that remained after the last proposals were exchanged, Bustin declared Wednesday: “I have concluded that they have been unable to cross the gap between them. For this reason and because it is now time for the industry to move forward to make place for next year’s crop, I am today sending the parties a mediator’s recommendation for settlement of their differences.”

If the sides do not agree to Bustin’s recommendations today, then he will step out of the negotiator’s role.

“If they do not support me in this, then my credibility with both sides is gone,” he said. “But if they support this in general, if I can help tighten a bolt here and loosen a bolt there, then I will stay and help.”

Both sides have been looking toward two dates scheduled for hearings before the Maine Supreme Judicial Court in Portland, on Friday and on March 11.

Friday’s arguments, which processors asked to be heard as soon as possible, cover only the issue of attachments that growers put on the processors’ property.

Friday, Feb. 20, marks 90 days since the attachments were filed in the registries of deeds in four counties.

The processors have asked the court to render a decision on the attachments’ validity by that date. If the lower court’s judgment stands, both Wyman and Allen have indicated that some type of bankruptcy is the likely outcome by Feb. 20 in order to escape the liens.

The hearing on March 11 would cover the processors’ bigger appeal of the Rockland court’s decision in general. They are seeking either a reversal of the judgment or else a retrial.

March 11 “is the main show,” said one of the attorneys representing the processors last week.

Bustin hopes the pressure of the public spotlight would force both sides to realize that something needs to be done, short of returning to court.

The Lewiston attorney representing the growers, William Robitzek, welcomed the last-minute move by Bustin. “We are greatly encouraged by his actions,” Robitzek said.

None of the attorneys for the three processors could be reached for comment Wednesday afternoon.