Page 28 - Flathead Beacon // 9.3.14

28 | SEPTEMBER 3, 2014
NEWS
FLATHEADBEACON.COM
STOLTZE
Continued from page 5
material. This is not a decision that has been made lightly, however we feel it is in the best interest of our employees and company to be proactive in response to the continue constrained log supply in our region.”
The announcement underscored a bitter battle over public land manage- ment. As the economy rebounds, the market for wood products is the best since the recession five years ago. State- wide lumber production and worker wages increased in the first six months of 2014, according to a new study released recently. But Roady and others in the logging industry have raised concerns over persistent litigation that has tied up timber sales in the courts.
The state’s timber industry is 60 million board-feet short of capacity due to lawsuits against projects on federal land, according to the Montana Wood Products Association.
“Timber supply is an issue,” said
“TIMBER SUPPLY IS AN ISSUE. IT WAS AN ISSUE THROUGHOUT THE ’90S AS WELL, BUT WE HAVE LESS CAPACITY THROUGHOUT THE INDUSTRY THAN WE DID THEN.”
Todd Morgan
Todd Morgan, director of the For- est Industry Research at the Bureau of Business and Economic Research at the University of Montana. “It was an issue throughout the ’90s as well, but we have less capacity throughout the industry than we did then.”
Roady called out three environmen- tal groups — Friends of the Wild Swan, Montana Environmental Information Center and Natural Resources Defense Council — for constraining timber har- vests in a recent sale in the Stillwater State Forest, a 93,000-acre swatch of public land near Olney with six sepa- rate sales. The sale boundary contains designated areas considered critical habitat for grizzly bears and other spe- cies, including bull trout. Both grizzlies and bull trout are protected under the Endangered Species Act.
The groups sued over the proposed timber project, arguing that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to com- ply with the ESA by allowing the state of Montana to selectively log in the forest. State officials had planned to log smaller portions of the forest to avoid negative impacts to grizzlies but still improve forest health and fire safety, according to the Associated Press.
Last week U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy ruled in favor of the envi- ronmental groups, saying the federal and state agencies’ plans were “arbitrary and capricious” and not based on good science.
Following the court decision, the Montana Department of Natural
Resources and Conservation suspended portions of its timber sale contracts for the forest indefinitely.
Stoltze had two of those sales, with an estimated 6 million board feet in each, Roady said. A third sale was owned through a contractor who planned to utilize Stoltze’s facility.
“We were faced with this anyway. But the (Molloy decision) was the final jab in the gut,” Roady said.
Arlene Montgomery, program direc- tor of the Bigfork-based Friends of the Wild Swam, hailed Molloy’s decision and questioned claims of sparse log supply.
“It’s the same thing Stoltze has been saying for the last 25 years,” Montgom- ery said. “There are timber sales that have been advertised and are being logged in the Flathead forests.”
Montgomery said the recent court decision reflected the need for better sci- ence when it comes to making land man- agement decisions.
“We’re a habitat-based group and we want to make sure habitat is there for all the reasons people like to come here: grizzly bear, clean water and bull trout and west slope cutthroat and lynx,” she said. “When we see projects that are directly impacting these species and that we don’t feel are warranted or that the analysis is sufficient to the decision, then we do challenge them.”
Montgomery refuted claims that Friends of the Wild Swan sues every timber sale simply because it involves logging.
“We read through every environ- mental analysis and we consult with sci- entists, legal experts and economists,” she said. “We do our homework.”
The timber industry has seen improvements in the years since the housing market collapsed and the reces- sion hit. The latest prices for logs and plywood are the strongest in nearly a decade, according to the latest market data, and nationwide housing starts are approaching one million this year, com- pared to nearly 400,000 in 2009.
Sawmills have struggled to stay open across the state in recent decades. Dur- ing the harvest peak of the 1980s, there were 29 mills producing over 10 million board feet per year. In 2009, there were 11mills.
Established in 1912, Stoltze is the oldest family-owned sawmill in Mon- tana. It employs roughly 125 people.
Roady said company managers decided to reduce production by 25 per- cent each week to save larger layoffs. The layoffs will likely be permanent, he said.
“For many years we have talked about the urgency in needing to address active management of our forests,” stated Paul McKenzie, resource man- ager at Stoltze. “Unfortunately, we have arrived at the point where hard deci- sions need to be made that will affect Stoltze, our employees and contractors. As a forester, it is disheartening to be surrounded by highly productive for- ests that could benefit from active man- agement, yet still not have access to suf- ficient log supply to meet the production needs of our sawmill.”
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