e Bonnie Hayward, an end-stacker operator at the Cowichan Lumbermill is one of 220 union
and company employees at the mill who would lose their job if the mill goes down for good.

TimberWest wants to close
a competitive sawmill

If TimberWest succeeds in its plans to shut
down its Cowichan Lumbermill in Youbou it
will take, out of the production, a manufactur-
ing facility that is in the top quartile of B.C.
producers for hemlock and fir lumber.

In the past 5-1/2 years the union membershij
has worked with mill manager Neil Dirom an
other salaried staff to turn the mill around from
an $8 million annual loss to a $1 million profit
last year.

In Sentambes of this year alone it cleared a
hese odowrott. Last month it cleared over
x

During those years the mill has made changes
to adopt for the changing wood basket that
exists in TFL #46. It has found markets for sec-
ond growth fir and hemlock, where few other
mills have.

The mill’s wood basket, which is moving
steadily in the direction of second growth gang-
type logs or small standard logs, has raredible
flexibility that can produce every size from
large 40’ timbers down to 1” lumber.

The mill has long-length capability with those
large timbers and has found niche markets for
them in Australia, Belgium and Eastern Canada.
Some are pressure treated and go into bridge
and mining timbers or are used on docks. Oth-
ers are remanned.

By shutting down a coastal mill that does not
deal exclusively in fractional sizes of dimension
lumber, TimberWest would be exporting those
logs in the United States or Japan, flooding
those markets even more and depessine lum-
ber prices even further. Other millers would be
scrambling to get into TimberWest’s niche mar-
kets.

No major money has been spent to upgrade
the mill since the mid-90’s when TimberWest

e Working the “A” line at the mill is committee
member Mark Vogl.

put over $4 million in the quad infeed, opti-
edger, and replaced its horizontal and pony
edgers. Prior to that, the last major investment,
was in 1984-85 when J-bar sorters were put in.

“You just can’t run a mill on the Coast for
that many years and not put any major capital
into it and expect your profits to come up like
they should,” says Rick Whiteford.

Five and a half years ago, it was primarily a
hemlock mill, with about 15% douglas fir. Most
higher grade fir logs harvested in the valley
went by the mill gates.

As the mill was not competitive as just a hem-
lock mill for Japanese markets, it made a shift
into second growth fir and has made money.

One large problem is the mill’s lack of access
to the U.S. market because of quota restrictions
under the Canada - U.S. Softwood Lumber
Quota Agreement.

“Our manager argues that if we could ship

only 24 million board feet of lumber to the U.S.,
Youbou would make an additional profit of $3
million,” said Whiteford. “It’s Tresaal believe
that TimberWest wants to pull the plug even
before negotiations on softwood lumber start
up.
He says that if the mill had a market sensi-
tive agreement for the chips, that it sells to the
Fletcher Challenge pulp mill in nearby Crofton,
it could make another $1 million.

“Everytime we went to them to make sugges-
tions it didn’t matter,” said Whiteford. “They
just don’t want the mill to run. To TimberWest
the mill represents a fibre allotment that they
can wheel and deal on the open market.”

Whiteford said that about 10-12 weeks a year,
the mill runs small logs down to 4” tops. Even
with that, it retains the ability to make a profit.

The old “A” mill is fed from a 60” ring debarker
and has a head rig on a 4 bunk carriage that
was formerly a gun-shot set-up. It has a 9’ band

saw that runs wood into a 12” bull edger. From
there timbers are kicked-off to timber saws and
lumber is sent to autotrimmers.

Over at “B” mill a 35” ring debarker feeds sec-
ond growth logs (usually to a maximum of 26-
28”). Wood goes into a quad saw with chipping
heads. :

Cants are fed to a 12” arbour while small
side-cuts go to a 10” arbour. All those side-cuts
feed into an optimized edger and both mill’s pro-
duction feed out onto A, B and C lines.

Various belts feed the lumber to vertical and
horizontal resaws and a pony edger. From there
the lumber is dropped into a 50 bin j-bar sys-
tem.

The crew has worked with management to
make the mill turn around. Mr. Dirom has had
an open management style which the crew has
responded well too.

Today the mill operates.on one shift at the “A”
mill and two shifts at the “B” mill, pumping out
some 480,000 board feet of finished lumber.

“We have done everything that they have
asked of us and still they want to get rid of us,”
says Whiteford. “TimberWest is rich in fibre
supply and is the largest private land owner in
B.C. and they want to have their cake and eat it
too.”

Enough timber to
run several mills

With 3.6 million cubic meters of annual allow-
able cut on private and public lands, Timber-
West says it can’t run Youbou. About 2.4 mil-
lion cubic meters of that annual cut is private.
Youbou, on two shifts in the “B” mill and one
shift in the “A” mill, uses up about 462,000
cubic meters a year. It cleared a $300,000 profit
in its last monthly report.

TimberWest has enough timber to run Youbou
and several more mills. According the company
sources, 72% of its current sales are in logs,
22% is in lumber, 4% is wood chips and other
products and 2% is in real estate.

The company’s Honeymoon Bay woodlands
crew logs on both TFL 46 and private lands.
Two more woodlands operations, company’s
Cowichan Woodlands Division and Nanaimo
Lakes Division, log on private lands — wood
that could all be destined for export if Timber-
West gets its way.

The company’s TFL 47 and private lands sup-
ply its Elk Falls Lumbermill with fir and hem-
lock timber to produce mostly high grade lum-
ber for the Japanese market.

In 1991 the northern part of TFL 46 was sold
to Interfor in the Clayoquot Sound area. Then
Minister of Forests Dan Miller connected the
remaining TFL 46 timber supply to the Youbou
sawmill.

“We argued (in 1991) that it was a disaster,”
says Bill Routley. “If you are letting the north-
ern part of the TFL go, what about the security
for our members on southern Vancouver Island?”

For years prior to 1991 the southern portion
of TFL had been overcut to the tune of 1 million
cubic meters a year. Companies were allowed to

“One of the sole
purposes of the TFL’s
is to provide community
stability and to provide
forest employment.”

- Bill Routley,
President Local 1-80

“block up” and concentrate on the southern
Crown lands and use the northern part of the
TFL to up the annual allowable cut.

“We said to the government that they allowed
them to overcut as if that (northern TFL por-
tion) land was included. Now you've got overcut
in the region,” he added.

A “Clause 7” tied into the TFL 46 agreement
has since disappeared.

“Our position is that the government has no
business diluting that clause without going to
the public and to the community and the union,”

continued on page ten

LUMBERWORKER/DECEMBER, 2000/9