Employees To Benefit From LibertySale

MOUNDS VIEW, Minn. - (04/06/05) -- Employees of Liberty Enterprises,who own as much as 20% of the credit union outsourcer, are expectedto reap millions of dollars from the sale of the company to John H.Harland Co., announced Tuesday. Liberty, which was founded in 1985by David Copham and is still controlled by Copham and his family,has been distributing shares in the company to its 700 or soworkers since 1998 when it became the first Subchapter Scorporation in the country to form an employee stock ownershipplan. Since then, as much as 20% f the company's stock has beendistributed under the ESOP. Harland announced Tuesday it willacquire Liberty for $160 million, meaning employees could receivemore than $30 million from the sale. The deal will merge two of thelargest credit union outsourcers and give Atlanta-based Harland farreach into the credit union market for check printing, coreprocessing, e-commerce, and other services.