NORPAC Foods, Inc., and its affiliated debtors, which were previously the largest processors of vegetables and fruits in the Pacific Northwest, filed a notice indicating that the Debtors’ and the Committee’s Second Amended Joint Plan of Liquidation went into effect on Monday, November 30, 2020. The plan, which was confirmed by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Peter C. McKittrick, District of Oregon, on November 12, 2020, is the product of a Chapter 11 case that saw the successful liquidation of all of NORPAC’s operations, inventory, real estate, and equipment. Confirmation of the plan also required the consensual resolution of complex litigation involving certain of NORPAC’s cooperative members that had supplied produce to the NORPAC as well as litigation involving the purchaser of certain estate assets during the course of the Chapter 11 case. Under the liquidating plan, a plan agent has been appointed to reconcile claims held by and against the Debtors’ estates and to make distributions to holders of allowed claims. Under the Plan, holders of allowed general unsecured claims will receive a distribution in December 2020 equal to approximately 30 percent of their allowed claim and one or more additional distributions next year.
Lowenstein served as counsel to the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the NORPAC case and continues to represent the post-effective date Committee. The Lowenstein team is led by Bruce S. Nathan, Jeffrey D. Prol, Scott Cargill, and John P. Schneider.
