Guts, Closures For Oregon Mills

Tough market conditions continue to affect operations at mills across Oregon.

Just before Christmas, Weyerhaeuser announced it would permanently close a plywood mill in Springfield and a veneer plant in Coburg. Both were built in the 1960s and acquired in 2002 as part of Willamette Industries.

Springfield was Weyerhaeuser's last plywood mill on the West Coast and had been operating on a reduced shift schedule since last January. "There's a shrinking demand for plywood panels because of the decline in housing starts and the increased availability of alternative products," said Cathy Slate, v.p.-veneer technologies.

The Coburg plant had been curtailed since late October. Equipment from both of the mills will be sent to veneer plants the company owns in Albany, Eugene, Junction City, Stayton, and Sweet Home.

Roseburg Forest Products, Dillard, Or., laid off 12 workers at its plywood plant in Coquille in early January and will lay off another 25 by April.

"It's tough when you have to do something like this," said Dan Schaefer, the personnel manager at Roseburg. "It affects a lot of things and a lot of people. It's not something you enjoy doing."

Last May, 17 full-time workers at the Coquille plant were laid off after new and updated machinery went on line. After the current layoffs are complete, there will be about 280 workers, a number that is expected to drop to 240 over the next two to three years. Ten years ago, about 400 were employed at the plant.

Southport Forest Products reportedly let go of 15 to 20 workers in midDecember at its small log sawmill in Sumner, Or. A nearby whole log chipping facility in Coos Bay was unaffected. Owner Jason Smith reportedly was very upset as he distributed final checks.

Said one employee. "These people have been working with him for years. He realized with the holidays coming up it was very unfortunate."

Butch Bernhardt, a spokesman for the Western Wood Products

Association, blamed the layoffs on a weak housing construction market. "With housing down, there is less demand for lumber in the marketplace, which has led to an oversupply situation and a downward pressure on prices," he said. The average price for all wood products, he noted, has dropped $96 in the last year.

Bernhardt predicts that a surplus of lumber in the marketplace and continuing weakening of the home construction market will drive wood prices even lower in 2007 "That will require less lumber being made and in some cases curtailing and reducing production-or in fact closing mills," he said.

At Roseburg Forest Products, Schaefer said the problem is threepronged: competition from South American companies importing less expensive wood, technological advances allowing for less human labor, and general market conditions. "The market has been kind of stagnant to say the least," he noted. "In our case, we make plywood here and we have all types of competition from OSB, which is taking a big bite out of