BUCKSPORT, Maine (From The Bangor Daily News) -- Millworkers who expected to be laid off as soon as Dec. 1 will get a monthlong reprieve, as Verso Mill officials announced this week they will not let workers go until the end of the month.

Bill Cohen, spokesman for Verso, said Wednesday that the company will stop making paper in Bucksport on Thursday, Dec. 4. But workers will stay on the employment rolls until Dec. 31 in order to clean up, winterize and "mothball the machines," he said.

"We said in the beginning, 60 days ago, that until we had all our plans in place, we weren't sure of our exact schedule," Cohen said.

At the beginning of October, the company made the surprise announcement that it would cease papermaking operations in Bucksport in December, putting around 500 employees out of work. Verso has said all along that it will continue to operate the power plant at the mill site, but officials initially did not say how many workers would be needed to keep that going.

This week, Cohen said that Verso estimates 50 to 60 people will be needed to run the power island.

"But we're not sure yet," he said.

The delay in laying off the workers will be a help to workers trying to figure out how to pay for Christmas gifts and heating oil, according to Roger Doyon of Winterport, the vice president of Local 261 and a longtime papermaker at the mill. But the shifting timeline and changing information also has posed challenges for workers.

To read the entire story, click here.