© Local 1-80 president Bill Routley inspects MB clearcut on public land. Meanwhile company is poised to flip private
forests for profit, taking them out of the productive land base.

MacBlo and Weldwood gear up
for private land development

MacMillan Bloedel has nearly
240,000 hectares of private land in
Management Forest Land status on
Vancouver Island, the Cariboo, the
Queen Charlotte Islands and New
Westminster in the lower mainland.
As such they also appear to be one of
the early entrants into the forest
industry gone real estate developer
sweepstakes.

Charles Smith, Director of Timber-
land and Properties at MacMillan
Bloedel told the Lumberworker that
MB is into real estate developing more
than other companies and not just
with forest lands - it’s with any assets.

“Managed forest units are a contin-
ually changing animal because of defi-
nition in the Assessment Act which is
that you can only have lands in man-
aged forest units if (their) highest and
best use is growing and harvesting
trees,” he said.

“Situations can change both ways,”
said Mr. Smith. “Lands can revert
from industrial use to a forest growing
use or from a gravel pit to a forest
poring use. Land can similarly go

m forest lands to industrial (use) or
(a) gravel pit or highways and devel-
opments just because towns come out
and sort of swallow you up.”

Near Youbou in the Cowichan Val-
ley, MB has taken out 100 acres of
Jand from Managed Forst Land status
which is, in part lake shore property.

“The chance for long-term sustain-

forestry on that land was near
jough zero,” said Smith.

_ With the leave strips that would
have to be left along Lake Cowichan,
potential resistance to logging near

the community of Youbou, MB decid-
ed to develop the lands instead,
to Mr. Smith.

He also said the “forest wasn’t very

% me anyway, there’s a lot of trees

that have no value at all.”

MacBlo already has taken out the

sher quality marketable timber.

said the company took out the
st values “so all we were giving up

. from a forestry point of view was

the next crop . . . 80 years out . . . 80
years from now who knows what will
be happening...”

Apart from that comment the
MacBlo representative said that the
corporation’s long-term plan is to
manage all long-term forest lands as
forest lands but when things around
us change . . . we have to accept that.”

People are moving to Vancouver
Island where MB has a lot of forest
Jands. Will that create a real estate
bonanza for MB?

“I guess the values are going to go
up, ... what we’re struggling with is
to find a... line on the map that we
can draw and hold. Ultimately
whether we like it or not, the line is

”

going to be drawn somewhere.

MacBlo is drawing one itself near
the city of Parksville, has taken 895
acres out of forest production and has
applied for amalgamation into the
city.

Mr. Smith told the Lwmberworker
that “if we don’t get amalgamated the
lands highest and best use still is
forestry. But its a very low use... it
isn’t good forest land.”

That land is along the side of the
Englishman River which feeds fresh
water to the Straight of Georgia.

“We've done a preliminary planning
study on the land which mandates
that there are not specific things that
should stop it from being a successful
development if that’s what we want to
do,” said Smith.

Parksville will decide if it wants
MB, if it doesn’t then Smith said MB
won't develop.

He said over 10 years there could
be population growth rates of 50% in
the Parksville area.

“That puts unbelievable pressure on
the surrounding lands. There’s just no
way of drawing a line and holding it, if
people keep moving in and an area
like Parksville won’t got to high rise
apartments to take the population in
the area.”

Does MB refute that it will become
more of a real estate developer as
time goes on?

“In a sense I do (refute that)
because our prime emphasis is our
investment in our converting mills
and (to) keep a fibre flow to these
mills. We won’t knowingly do any-
thing to damage that.”

“We've got lands all over the place,
that perhaps . . . if we wanted to get
really aggressive, would have develop-
ment potential and we would create
great islands of resorts, etc., out in the
middle of nowhere which can do very
well, but we wouldn’t put our working
forest under that kind of pressure.”

Mr. Smith said that MB has not sold
off prime timber growing islands and
said that it is trying to defend prime
forest land on the west coast of Van-
couver Island and the east coast as
well.

“We've never taken anything out (of
production) to my knowledge where
we've been leading the change.”

“We react to the pressure put on us
and to that extent, yes, as and when
the opportunity arises that is forced
on us, we'll take advantage of it.”

Private land

Continued from previous page

the Regional District for rezoning. The
company has also taken out lands on
Gabriola Island in the Gulf Islands
between Vancouver Island and main-
land B.C.

Tom Sitar, Treasurer of Weldwood
Canada, said the Union Bay develop-
ment is adjacent to other company
land that has long been taken out of
the managed forest area.

According to Mr. Sitar the removal
of forest land is not an indication that
Weldwood will take more land out of
Managed Forest Land status in the
future.

But he did say: “One has to recog-
nize that in certain areas the land has
now a higher value for purposes other
than forestry.”

So then will Weldwood really take
more forest land out of production?

“It’s conceivable,” said Mr. Sitar, “I
would never say never. Sure there are
certain (private land) areas right
around the town of Cumberland . . .
that were in (the managed forest) cat-
egory . ..some still are.”

The Union Bay land being taken out
of production is about 2% of the com-
pany’s private lands on the Island. Mr.
Sitar says the loss in timber produc-
tion is about 2000 cubic meters and he
said based on industry wide statistics,
it amounts to the loss of 8 direct and
indirect jobsayear. -

-So will Weldwood try to find other
jobs for the laid off workers effected
by the land withdrawal?

“You cannot take a correlation like
that,” said Sitar. “The fact that you
take it out does not mean that 8 peo-
ple have lost their jobs.”

“In reality the move at Union Bay
will not result (in the loss) of any-
body’s job,” said Sitar. But he admit-
ted the drop in annual allowable cut
will provide a lesser area to be includ-
ed in the managed forest.

One opponent to Weldwood’s plans
for Union Bay is Harold Macy, forest
technician, electoral area director of
the Comox-Strathcona Regional Dis-
trict, and President of the North
Island Wood Lot Association.

He said in an interview with the
Lumberworker that the issues of
keeping private forest lands in pro-
duction is crucial for local economies.

“Everyone talks about these buzz
words like ‘value-added manufactur-
ing’ but we often fail to realize that we
need basic raw materials - and that is
trees,” said Mr. Macy. “You can have
all the millwork and violin and door
jams factories milking that last dollar
of added value, but if you don’t have
trees you don’t have anything.”

Macy agrees there should be no
more loss of working forest lands and
said if large areas are taken out local-
ly they shouldn’t be compensated for
in areas that are a long distance away
from communities. He believes if
there are productive forest land sites
locally, then they should be managed
for timber so workers don’t have to
leave their families to work in distant
areas.

Macy also said Weldwood’s forest.
land removal is going to put a lot of
pressure on the overall planning sys-

tem at Union Bay. He said that such a
large development area will put a lot
of pressure on the infrastructure (i.e.
water, sewage, power). Such entre-
preneurial zeal, said Macy, doesn’t fit
into the community’s overall structure
and put excess stresses on the plan-
ning process.

Tom Sitar said Weldwood is not
putting pressure on the planning
process in Union Bay.

“We are being very pro-active and
up front with the community in terms
of showing proposed rezoning and
development concepts.”

Weldwood held an open house in
September of 1992 and March of this
year.

Does Weldwood value that land for
real estate over timber?

“The value is not just established by
us. It is a value that is established by
society in general in the value that it
places on recreation, recreational, and
commercial uses.”

How does Weldwood know what
the social values are?

Mr. Sitar said the company polls
people at open houses who fill out
response cards. The polling is done to
those who show up, and not in any
random scientific way.

Does Weldwood believe that the
IWA should continue to support it in
keeping their forest lands intact?

“I see nothing on conflict with that
(support) based on what is happening
in a couple of areas such as Union
Bay,” he said. “We can’t simply make
blanket blind statements that are
(applied) in all situations without
regards for the specifics.”

LUMBERWORKER/JUNE, 1993/15