Timber Towns in Idaho Scramble as Mills Close
11/26/98
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Title: Timber Towns in Idaho Scramble as Mills Close
Source: The Associated Press
Status: Copyrighted, contact source to reprint
Date: 11/26/98
Byline: Dan Gallagher
BOISE - After the last logging truck sheds its load and the sawmill blades
spin to a stop, thousands of residents in Idaho's struggling timber towns
face uprooting themselves if they want to keep paying the bills.
But those determined to stay on in their picturesque, close-knit
communities have a chance if they are tenacious - and creative.
"It's been a way of life to just go in and work a shift. The timber
company takes care of you, and that's what company towns have always been
about," said Dick Gardner, executive director of Idaho Rural Partnership.
The federal-state-financed program brings together government and private
resources to help small communities.
"But there's options the towns should be looking at. Otherwise, the
default alternatives are accepting more retirees, which is not necessarily
a bad thing, or giving a greater role to tourism," Gardner said.
Towns are now looking for answers in things like straw particle board
production, industrial parks with clean factories and tourism.
"The debate that needs to happen is, 'What kind of town do we want to be
in the future?' " Gardner said.
The dwindling timber base has been disastrous. Mills throughout Idaho have
been razed and saws and planers sold off throughout the 1990s.
From 1989 through 1997, 24 Idaho mills closed, idling 1,300 workers, said
Paul Ehinger, an industry consultant in Oregon.
Here is how some of the affected communities have responded:
The Idapine mill near Grangeville closed in 1994, putting 150 people out
of work. Shearer Lumber Products converted it to a planer mill employing
just 25.
With less timber, rock-bottom wheat prices, a soft market for cattle and
U.S. Forest Service downsizing, Grangeville is losing $22 million a year,
businesswoman Lorraine Roach said. Idaho County had a 10.5 percent jobless
rate in September, twice the state average.
To counter, the Grangeville Economic Management Group is trying to take
advantage of at least some of the 300,000 tons of straw north-central
Idaho wheat farmers generate each year.
Community leaders have a business plan to attract investors for a $9
million plant using the straw to make particle board. It could mean up to
40 new jobs.
Boise Cascade's Council sawmill was closed in March 1995, idling nearly 60
workers. The wood-products corporation turned the mill site over to the
city, which has turned it into a business park.
Clearwater Research, which conducts telephone surveys, and the RJ
Counseling firm from Weiser have located branches there, city planner
Elaine Johnston said.
"We feel we can attract businesses that can commute by computer," Johnston
said. "Our general population has actually increased, and we're doing
fine."
Louisiana-Pacific shut its Priest River plant in 1996 and Crown Pacific
followed suit in 1997. A total of 300 workers were idled.
But wood products companies like Tri-Pro Cedar Products and Idaho Forest
Industries are helping pick up the slack. Priest River boasts an
industrial park and sees tourism as part of its future.
"I wish we had a toll booth for all the people headed to Priest Lake,"
said Kay Small of North Idaho Woodnet, which helps small businesses
develop and market wood products. "We still depend on natural resources,
but we are successfully diversified."
Some timber towns are joining forces to identify common problems. The W.K.
Kellogg Foundation from Battle Creek, Mich., selected Idaho to be part of
a development program called Managing Information with Rural America.
Without some alternative, the loss of a mill can be devastating. Some 20
miles north of Boise, Horseshoe Bend is still reeling after Boise Cascade
closed down its mill this fall, displacing 44 workers.