LEVEL 3 'RUMOR' IS JUST THAT
Company exec: newspaper report 'totally untrue'

A report in the June 18 edition of the Potter Leader- Enterprise that claimed Level 3 would leave Couderport in October was untrue, according to company officials, who said there are no plans to leave Coudersport at any time.

A published report from a Potter County official that claimed one of the area's largest employers would close its Coudersport facility in October is "totally untrue," according to a senior official at the company.

The report had sent shockwaves around the two facilities operated by Level 3 Communications in Coudersport, where about 300 people are employed.

"There is no intent to, or inclination to, close operations in Coudersport in October or anytime," said Rich Cochran, vice president for service activation at Level 3.

He was responding to a statement by Wanda Shirk, who chairs the Potter County Planning Commission, that Level 3 would be "leaving in October."

Shirk said her informtion came from the wife of a former Potter County commissioner.

It was published in the June 18 edition of the Potter Leader-Enterprise.

Asked Thursday if he had any information to substantiate the published report, Leader-Enterprise managing editor Donald Gilliland said "all I have is rumor."

"It (the statement) was part of Wanda Shirk's email that ran (verbatim)," Gilliland told Endeavor News. "I left it in."

Gilliland went on to say that a "host of people have come to me over the past eight weeks claiming" that Level 3 will leave Coudersport in October.

"Level 3 is totally committed to Coudersport," Cochran emphasized. "The company has four operations centers and Coudersport is one of them. There is no talk of closing it - period. Any claim like this that doesn't come from the President of Level 3 is nothing more than an unfounded rumor."

One employee at Level 3's center at the Coudersport Industrial Park said there was alarm and some long faces among a workforce that has already seen changes in ownership and elimination of many higher-level jobs in recent years.

Supervisors there were quick to contact corporate officials in Colorado for assurances that Shirk's declaration was in error.

"When you see something like that published and it affects you so directly, you obviously believe it to be fact, particularly when it's coming from the chairman of the county Planning Commission," one Level 3 employee told Endeavor News. "We just assumed that she knew something we didn't."

Level 3 Communications is an international communications company headquartered in Broomfield, Colo. The company operates one of the largest communications and Internet backbones in the world.

Since its founding in 1998, Level 3 has been focused on delivering premier services over advanced, IP-optimized networks.

The company acquired the assets of TelCove in Coudersport, which was a successor company to Adelphia Business Solutions. ABS had previously been formed out of Hyperion Telecommunications, a subsidiary of Adelphia Communications.