The Fort Fights Back

After a disappointing start where no out of town reporters, politicians, and not too many protestors gathered here at Cottonwood Park, the voice of the community got to roar in Vanderhoof. The Roundtable on Forestry got to encounter it's first rally and paid for its snubbing of Fort St. James.


Photo and quotations from Opinion250.com

“We want to be part of the solution “ says rally organizer Winson Cheung a former employee of Pope and Talbot “We don’t think the meetings should be held behind closed doors.”
This session was supposed to have been held in Fort St. James, another of the B.C. communities hit hard by the downturn in the forest industry.

Pope and Talbot Dies Quietly

The tortuous death is finally over. Assets were put into receivership over the weekend and P&T's mills will be sold off to whoever, for whatever purpose by the bankruptcy trustees.
-----the SUN

Fort St. James and Mackenzie will each get $2 million from Victoria for retraining. For what and where is the big question. There aren't jobs for 250 welders here.....
----PG Citizen

Result of yesterday's court proceedings

At the end of yesterday's Pope & Talbot court proceedings, the decision was made to continue with the orderly shut down of the pulp mills while a new search is started for a buyer(s).

--foresttalk.com
The fate of Takla sawmill was not discussed. That was touched on in court May 5, where the proceedings of the sale were described as a "Monkey's Wedding". P&T is still hoping for a buyer, and there are persistent rumours they would like to sell the FSJ mill and the Mackenzie pulp mill as a package.
---this story also at foresttalk.com

Take out Dead Wood and Replant?

-image from opinion250.com shows disparity between replanting, the harvesting of beetlewood and the amount of beetlewood over the years.

Idea for Keeping Forestry Workers Working
John Betts, Executive Director of the Western Silvicultural Contractors Association has an idea. It boils down to using gov't money to remove the pine beetle killed wood, maximize replanting, and stockpile the wood so that it can be utilized later, for whatever purpose or buyer.
That would keep loggers and planters working, and could utilize out of work mill workers and keep them in the industry they're familiar with, in the area they live. It waould also greatly reduce the risk of fire and give a headstart on new growth as replanting is atrone of it's lowest levels in years.
--- more at opinion250.com
It would require the BC Liberals to loosen their policy of no intervention or direct public funding, but it appears to be the most common sense idea to come up yet.

The Price of Inaction

A Tale of Two Cities? The Lion and the Ghost?
What title can describe the completely different approaches taken by two small towns separated by a couple mountains, and the results of those approaches?
Mackenzie, a town that made sure to scream whenever it was pinched and is represented by a mainstay of the BC Liberal party, and Fort St. James which approached things with a "we're tough, we can handle this" stiff upper lip and represented by a Liberal newbie in a riding with a history of representatives who shot their mouths off before engaging their brain and paid the price, so has chosen to exist like a ghost on the backbench.
As some of us pointed out a few months back when Global TV ran a special on our town, the "we're coping; we're allright, Jack" portrayal ran the risk of viewers getting the idea that we don't need their help, we're just fine. And that's exactly what panned out!
Have a read here about the suffering of communities, workers and suppliers as Harmac and Mackenzie Pulp wind down their operations and note how P&Ts Fort St. James operation is not even mentioned.
We know all about the spin-off effects. Suppliers, truckers, retailers have already issued their own layoffs in answer to the reduced demand. Restaurants and pubs have become Dead Zones. Admit it, you yourself must have gone for dinner or a glass of draught and wondered "How can this place even stay open?" lately. Every small business remaining is bleeding openly, a drain on the owners pocketbook.
I wish there was a solution to offer. It's ten years too late to think a "shop local" campaign is going to be much help, because every closed shop from Burns Lake to here and Vanderhoof proves that even with $1.25 a litre gas, people won't.
The same $1.25 gas that's going to make it very hard to see tourism as any sort of salvation, or any form of secondary manufacturing because of delivery and supply costs. Add to the mix that the sale of BC Rail has come back to bite us in the arse, you can ask around and discover it's not worth CN's time to send trains here anymore, so how do we ship out anything while any possible new interim industry fires up?
We are entering very hard times, and as the locals have been bled out the only hope is to somehow attract outside investment into our community. As mentioned in the first paragraphs, screaming Blue Bloody Murder is how to get noticed in the first place. The squeaky wheel gets the grease, Mackenzie knows that!

As a community, we need to pull together and clean up this disgrace so after we scream and the investors arrive, they don't immediately leave in total disgust.
A free semi filled with paint and brooms from Victoria for the shopkeepers and homeowners.
A grant of money and immediate designation of somewhere outside of town as an alcohol and drug treatment facility.
A visit from the 1990s version of Gordon Campbell to stand in on a soapbox and say "We're allowing mining because we need the jobs, so STFU and bring your concerns to me and they'll be dealt with."
A zero tolerance by police and citizens towards drunkenness and drug induced behaviours. Scribble on one of the nicely painted walls? You spend 2 weeks sweeping the street and washing windows and your name goes in the paper so the whole town makes sure you do your punishment. Pass out in the middle of the street at noon? No more Christian "Oh you poor person", you're in the bunwagon dropped off at the treatment center, free to choose to sign yourself in or walk back home. Name in the paper: citizens have the right to know that not only were they put at risk, but that this particular person was so stupid they admitted to the cops they were high on crack and at the wheel.
That might be a start to turning things around....

Pope and Talbot Deal Crashes and Burns

Asia Pulp & Paper terminated a deal Friday to buy three pulp mills and a sawmill from insolvent Pope & Talbot, sending shockwaves through mills in British Columbia where the future of over 1,000 workers is now in jeopardy.
Pope & Talbot, a Portland-based company with most of its operations in B.C., has financing in place only until Monday to run its pulp mills at Harmac, Mackenzie and Halsey Oregon. A sawmill at Fort St. James is also affected but it is currently not operating.
Now the future of the mills depends on what happens Monday when Pope & Talbot returns to B.C. Supreme Court, said investment analyst Kevin Mason of Equity Research Associates.

-- story big enough to make Vancouver Sun!

Two things led to the collapse of the deal, US banks have finally figured out it os not a good risk to lend money to someone who's defaulted on $14 billion (as speculated here), and the gov't of Indonesia has allowed APP to strip mine the forests at home.
We're hooped.
Perhaps that local consortium should offer $5 million, if they feel it's even worth that in the shape the current market is in. There's a very small window of hope when P&T returns to BC Supreme Court, but don't expect any help to come from Victoria. Liberal policy was set once they opposed using public funds to keep Skeena in Terrace alive. They won't send a penny to help out.
Book your moving van now. The only people staying here will be those of us who live here by choice and those who live here with no choice.

Wait and Wait and Wait Some More

Pope & Talbot's sale of its pulp mills to PT Pindo Deli, including its mill in Mackenzie and its sawmill in Fort St. James, have failed to meet an April 30 deadline.
However, Pope & Talbot spokesman Mark Rossolo said Thursday the transactions are still planned to go ahead.
Rossolo noted that company's bankruptcy financing has been extended to May 5.
The Fort St. James sawmill has been closed since mid-October. It has put about 280 sawmill workers off the job in Fort St. James,

---- PG Citizen
If you're one of those 280 with a family, with as little as three or four EI cheques remaining what do you do? Wait for the kids to finish school and wait some more?
Risk spending the summer on Welfare, still waiting?
Make the arrangements to leave now and give yourself a minimum hedge with that remaining EI while you seek work elsewhere?
Or wait, wait and wait some more, and hope for the best? How long will it take to recoup from 9 months without work?
How will the mill itself cope with many of it's skilled staff who have already made the choice and left, and many more poised to?

What of the lackadaisical response of our town and its people to this crisis? Subdued, resigned, 'stiff upper lippers' who proved once again that inaction is worth 1,000 words of shame? We've proven ourselves forever to be a place that rises to the occasion when a family or person needs help. What have we done when the entire town does?
Where are the letters to the Editor, the ringing of the phones in our MLA and MP's offices? The street marches and the marches on Victoria and Ottawa who could have aided a solution? Too late, we hear the voices of S.T.R.O.N.G. on what we should have done six months ago.