Editor:
Re: Interfor response Feb. 16 issue of the Grand Forks Gazette
I feel compelled to reply to Interfor’s comments regarding my letter to the editor in the Feb. 9 issue of the Gazette. Mr. Horahan stated that I made a number of untrue statements in my letter.
Perhaps it is my limited command of the English language but after reviewing both my letter and the reply, I fail to see what was untrue.
At no time have I ever stated that the fibre for the Midway mill was not in competition with Interfor. Creating a competitive log market was one of my objectives in helping with the Midway proposal. In fact, when I first read Interfor’s comments, my initial reaction was, “That’s the stuff, Interfor.”
If Mr. Horahan wants to compare battle scars, I too worked for Pope &Talbot for 27 years and retired a short time before the final bankruptcy. However, with this in mind, I do take an exception to the comments that what I said was untrue.
Perhaps we should look at some truths and let the public decide where the truth really lies. From 1996 to 2006 an average of 722,289.6 cubic metres was harvested each year in the Boundary Timber Supply Area (TSA).
Of this volume, 554,641.7 cubic metres stayed in the Boundary TSA while 167,647.9 cubic meters was trucked out of this area.
For those not conversant with cubic metres, the amount of timber leaving our areas was approximately 4,400 logging truckloads based on the average load size of 38 cubic metres/load, each and every year before Pope & Talbot’s financial trouble.
It should go without saying that it was not the Midway sawmill that failed our communities, but rather the poor management decisions made by top executives at Pope & Talbot to expand by purchasing questionable sawmills and pulp mills in other parts of the province.
In my opinion, instead of buying these other mills, had they invested a small portion of what they spent and put it into buying the Castlegar pulp mill, we would in all probability still have the P&T logo operating in our area today.
George Delisle, Westbridge, B.C.