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Task force recommends help for struggling timber industry
More wood at lower prices is key to getting Minnesota's struggling timber industry through its current downturn, a task force concluded in a report released Thursday. The Governor's Task Force on the Competitiveness of Minnesota's Primary Forest Products Industry recommended a package of proposals -- everything from urging counties to sell more wood to allowing logging trucks to travel on more roads. The report includes more than $8 million in funding requests for the Legislature, including $3 million to educate the private owners of forest lands on their management and $2 million to thin tree growth on state lands. Minnesota's timber industry is caught up in a series of problems, including a slumping national housing market, intense foreign competition and government policies that have restricted the availability of timber and driven prices to unsustainable levels. Ainsworth Lumber Co. closed a Bemidji mill in August and laid off workers at oriented strand board plants in Grand Rapids and Cook in September. That prompted Gov. Tim Pawlenty to reconvene the task force, which he first formed in 2003. The current recommendations are just short-term fixes; Pawlenty asked the group to outline a long-term strategy for the industry's recovery by June 15. Pawlenty said he would be mindful of the report's recommendations as he prepares his two-year budget proposal. Also Thursday, the Iron Range Resources Board dedicated $2 million in grant money to give loggers an outlet for their product. The money will reimburse the Laurentian Energy Authority $32.50 per cord of roundwood product it buys from loggers whose business or residence is in the Taconite Tax Relief Area. Reimbursements will be limited to 1,000 cords for each eligible logger. The program will be in place for the first six months of 2007. "This is not about the loggers making a profit. It's about allowing them to bring some wood to market," said state Rep. David Dill, DFL-Crane Lake. (Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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