Regulators Check Out Proposed Purchase by Consolidated Communications

Maine utility regulators are ready to delve into details of the $1.5 billion sale of FairPoint Communications to a Mattoon-based broadband and business communications company.

The Maine Public Utilities Commission is holding a technical conference on the merger Tuesday. New Hampshire and Vermont will hold meetings and deliberations in the following weeks.

Consolidated Communications announced in December it was buying FairPoint, assuming that company's debt and offering dividends to stockholders. FairPoint is based in North Carolina and is the country's eighth-largest phone and internet company. Its holdings include the Odin and Shobonier phone exchanges in this area.

Federal regulators and 11 states will have to sign off on the deal.

So far, no organized opposition has surfaced, but plenty of groups have intervened, including the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.