The Mackenzie Sawmill is taking the hardest hit after Canfor recently announced mill curtailments across the province.
The company announced the temporary cutbacks last week and while most of their mills will be curtailed for two weeks or the equivalent, the Houston and Plateau mills will be seeing extended curtailments of four weeks, while Mackenzie will experience six.
Prince George-Mackenzie MLA Mike Morris said the six-week closure has residents feeling uneasy, and the province’s silence on the issue isn’t helping.
“This is serious stuff. It’s affecting people’s mortgage payments, it’s affecting their total way of life. Mackenzie is still smarting from the downturn in 2008/2009 which saw that basically the whole community shutdown from a forestry perspective.”
Morris is sending a letter to Minister Doug Donaldson on why the government hasn’t spoken to the communities that the Canfor curtailments are affecting.
“The entire community basically relies on the forestry sector. If Conifex is shut down and Canifor shutdown for six weeks, it’s going to affect the chip supply for the Mackenzie pulp mill, so there are people on edge over that as well.”
Morris said he’d like to see the Minister go to Mackenzie for a town hall meeting and explain to people what the province is doing, not only for the short term but the long term as well.
“We just need some reassurance from the government that they still plan on assuring that Mackenzie is going to be a viable community far into the future,” added Morris.
Mike Morris’s letter to Minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations, Doug Donaldson:
MyPGNow has reached out to the Minister, but have not received a reply as of this publication.
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