Anchorage Daily News

WASILLA -- The state is taking another shot at selling the historic Matanuska Maid dairy plant in Anchorage.

The now-defunct plant on Northern Lights Boulevard and the 1.42 acres it sits on will be put up for sale in a sealed bid offering starting this month, said Ray Nix, an asset manager for the state Division of Agriculture.

The minimum accepted bid will be $1.5 million and deadline for bids will be Aug. 21, he said.

The Board of Agriculture and Conservation, which has oversight over the dairy's properties, decided Friday to put the property back up for sale.

The state-owned dairy plant has been closed since December.

An attempt last year to sell the plant and a Mat Maid bottle-making facility in Palmer failed to attract any bidders. In that sale, the state had required a minimum bid of $3.35 million, and the price included the land, the facilities and equipment in both buildings, Nix said. The equipment has since been auctioned off. The $1.5 million price set as the minimum for this sale was chosen because that is the appraised value of the land, Nix said.

"One would hope it would bring a significant amount over the minimum bid price," he said.

If no acceptable bids are submitted, the property will be offered in an over-the-counter sale, he said.

The board members have not yet decided what to do with the dairy's Palmer property. They plan to address this at their next meeting Sept. 5.

Matanuska Maid started as a cooperative in Palmer in 1936. The state took it over in the mid-1980s after the dairy went bankrupt. Under state ownership, Mat Maid operated successfully for several years but closed late last year because of losses in recent years.

Also on Friday, the state Board of Agriculture and Conservation introduced three new board members on the seven-member board.

Ruby Hollembaek, a Delta Junction bison rancher; Omar Stratman, a Kodiak cattle rancher; and Al Poindexter, Anchor Point greenhouse operator, will fill out the terms of Ray DePriest, Don McLean and Wayne Brost, all of whom resigned in the past year.

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