S TANDARD TERRACE
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VOL. 27 NO. 21
www.terracestandard.com
Wednesday, September 16, 2015
Skeena Sawmills starts up again By JOSH MASSEY SKEENA SAWMILLS has announced it will be reopening after a two month hiatus during an ongoing slowdown in asian timber sales. “We are starting in sequences,” mill official Roger Keery said last week, adding that full production should be kicking in the last week of September. Next week the large log
line will start and the week after the small log line will be moving, he said. At the same time, the mill will start up its planer mill. When the mill is producing at full capacity, it is processing 30 truckloads of logs a day into various forms of lumber, 80 per cent of which goes to Asia. The mill employs 85 people for production and another 15 in backend roles.
Including the number of logging contractor employees the total work force generated by the business is about 140-150. Keery said he is pleased that his workers are coming back after being laid off for the summer. “I was really concerned about that,” he said. “It seems that our employees have stuck with us and I appreciate that.” He says the loyalty
speaks to the workers’ attachment both to Terrace and to Skeena Sawmills as an employer. “I think part of it was timing, everyone in Terrace likes the fishing season over the summer and I think took advantage of that, and I think Terrace is a good place to live and we are a good employer and people believed that we were going to go back to work and stuck
with us,” Keery said. The halt in production saw stacks of lumber waiting in its Terrace yard and at Prince Rupert, waiting to be shipped to Chinese end markets. With such a large proportion of the mill’s customers residing in China, that leaves 20 per cent up for domestic sales. The U.S. is a challenging market for the Terrace-based
mill because of its distance and lack of direct rail access which means wood has to first be moved through Vancouver. “We’re freight-disadvantaged to get to the U.S.,” Keery said. Another reason why U.S. buyers are scarce is because they are looking for treated wood. “We don’t have enough kiln capacity,” said Keery.
Photographer travels Canada By JOSH MASSEY TIM VAN Horn’s RV “Big Maple” stands out from the other vehicles outside the Tim Hortons on Lakelse Ave. It is basically a huge national symbol on wheels, wrapped bumper to bumper in 20,000 photos of Canadians forming a huge Canadian flag with a motorcycle attached to the back plastered in portraits as well. Van Horn was scruffy and had a jumpy energy that seems natural for a road warrior who has crisscrossed Canada eight times to document the human fabric of the landscape. He is in Terrace on his most recent foray to make that number even bigger. The goal for his Canadian Mosaic Project is to have snapped 54,000 portraits by 2017, which will represent 0.150 percent of the population, a number that coincides with that year being the 150th anniversary of Confederation. During that year, Van Horn plans to depart from his hometown of Red Deer, Alberta, on a national tour in a larger bus decked out in the entire collection. “It’s something the country can follow for that birthday year,” he says. “It’s tangible, it’s not on the Internet. It’s not in Ottawa. It’s coming to Terrace. I go back to the communities in which the portraits are taken.” In B.C. alone he’s documented individuals from 80 communities and in this area, approximately 200 people. His vision is to celebrate the growing diversity of opinions and origins making up modern-day Canada, labeling his project a “visual anthropological study.” He doesn’t record information about his subjects, but instead leaves it up to the viewer to create their own story – to find their own identity within the mosaic’s whole. “You write a whole story for that person, and it gives placement for you within that story,” said Van Horn. On the RV door is a sign inviting passersby to knock if they want their photos taken. One Quebecois lady knocks and quickly begins to recount historical instances of discrimination against French language speakers in Englishspeaking parts of the country, telling Van Horn she hopes he is aware of this. And does he speak French?
Cont’d Page A3
JOSH MASSEY PHOTO
JOANNE HAMEL poses for Alberta photographer Tim Van Horn who is on an epic journey to capture the images of thousands of Canadians in time for 2017, the country’s 150th birthday.
Welcome
Airborne search
Shooting big
New Salvation Army captains looking to fill the community’s needs \COMMUNITY A9
Non-profit group looks to ignite mining interest east of Terrace \NEWS A16
Growing biathlon interest spurs competition and big dreams \SPORTS A21