CHESTER – Scott Gardner hopes that the fire that did as much as $5 million worth of damage to his sawmill last week will spawn a better business.

Workers at Chester Forest Products were clearing fire wreckage from the site Tuesday in preparation for foundation-digging early next week that eventually will put the sprawling, multibuilding operation under one roof.

That realignment of the business’s wood cutting, planing and chipping operations will increase its weekly output of 400,000 to 450,000 feet of wood by 10 to 20 percent, Gardner, the company’s vice president and part-owner, said.

“A bad thing has happened to us, but we’re going to take it and make it better,” Gardner said Tuesday. “It’s going to be a much more efficient business.”

The fire apparently started on Oct. 6 near a maintenance building. It destroyed the building and damaged the cutting mill before firefighters doused the flames.

The blaze did $3 million to $5 million in damage and forced the layoff of four workers, Gardner said.

The fire’s cause is listed as undetermined, said Scott Richardson, a senior investigator with the State Fire Marshal’s Office in Augusta.

“There was so much fire damage that we haven’t been able to determine anything,” Richardson said during a telephone interview. “It’s still an open investigation, but until we find something else, it’s highly likely it will remain [classified as] undetermined.”

The new building will be finished in eight to 10 weeks, Gardner said. Until then, Levesque Lumber of Ashland will provide cut planking that will keep Chester Forest’s planing operations going.

Levesque and Chester Forest signed that agreement Tuesday.

“It’s a big help that Levesque is doing this for us,” Gardner said. “It’s nice that in the forest industry world people can step up and help you out at a bad time like this.”

Chester Forest Products, which employs 38 workers, produces bulk bark mulch, landscaping timbers and ties, pallet stock, pulp chips and two types of wood boards, according to the state of Maine’s Web site on mills in Maine.

Chester’s chipping operations were unaffected by the fire.