¢ In the union hall at Local 1-85 headquarters, laid-off crew members from J.A. McKay Trucking take an introductory

course on Forest Renewal work.

Port Alberni Local 1-85 kick starts
Forest Renewal for laid-off workers

Forest Renewal Program jobs for
actual I.W.A. CANADA members are
not coming as fast as we thought and
they are hard to find. Being a rarity,
the Lumberworker recently checked
out what is happening over in Port Al-
berni.

Local 1-85, through persistent ac-
tion, has managed to get the program
working for a group of loggers and
shake mill workers that have been
laid off due to decision affecting the
Clayoquot Sound. Remembering the
Harcourt government’s promise that
land-use decisions would not result in
job loss to forest workers, the local
union has pressed hard to get these
laid off workers active in‘forest re-
newal.

So far only one worker from J.A.
McKay Trucking Ltd. has actually
been put back to work driving a truck
while MacMillan Bloedel is repairing
some roads. The rest of the crew is
taking some courses which are being
taught in the basement of Local 1-85’s
headquarters in Port Alberni.

The local union
wants along term
employment
strategy put
into place

Dave Haggard, President of Local 1-
85, has helped spearhead the effort to
get the workers picked up. The wait
was too long but nevertheless the
workers are now getting a pay check
and are learning about Forest Renew-

al.
Brother Haggard says that the B.C.
Government's decision to fully accept

a scientfic panels recommendations
on harvesting timber in the Clayoquot
Sound region on the west coast of
Vancouver Island is going to be hard
on workers. ‘

“We are looking at losing perhaps
90% of the crews that were working in

Clayoquot Sound,” says Haggard. “The
Forest Minister (Andrew Petter) has
made the comittment that nobody is
going to lose jobs because of the sci-
entific panel report.”

The local union has worked hard to
see that the government’s promise
will not be violated. Working with
FRBC officials, it has managed to get
the J.A. McKay crew back to work, al-
though not doing their regualar jobs.

J.A. McKay, which is a contract log-
ger for MacMillan Bloedel in the
Cyper River area of Clayoquot Sound,
has basically been out of work since
June of this year. Some of the workers
haven't turned a wheel since last year.

In the short term the crew is taking
a 6 week training course that teaches
them the basic theory of Forest Re-
newal work.When they are finished
that they will take some field work
and more courses will be developed
for them.

They are being taught about such
areas as stream and road assessment
and silivicultural work (thinning,
pruning, spacing, etc.). In addition
they are learning about the Forest
Practices Code in detail and how it
will be applied.

In the long-term, and before the end
of November the local union wants a
strategy put into place to take care of
a number of workers who have been
Jaid off since 1993.

“I believe that we can open up some
watersheds and put people back to
work and increase employment lev-
els,” says Brother Haggard. He men-
tions second growth harvesting pro-
grams and commercial thinning as
part of a new silvicultural regime that
can and must be put into place.

“The will has to be there by indus-
try and by the Ministry of Forests to
not be restrictive to commercial thin-
ning practices,” he says. “There has to
be a long-term strategy or we're going
to come back and say we can’t do it.”

The local union president says that
workers are getting some help from
FRBC and the MacMillan Bloedel
“don’t seem to be enthusiastic about
helping us.”

Maybe that’s one of the reasons
why the Lumberworker could only
find a couple of jobs on a recent visit
to Vancouver Island.

Gary Sawyer, camp chairman at
McKay says May was the last time that
most workers had a job and that a
small shingle at the Cyper River log
dump site closed down in August.

MacMillan Bloedel has been work-
ing in the area, but only with contract
helicopter crews on private land. The
crew is concerned about its future.

“Nobody has even come to us to tell
us if there is going to be some log-
ging,” say Brother Sawyer. “To me, it
sound like they want us out of the in-
dustry.”

Sawyer says that the crew just
wants their old jobs back and is con-
cerned over what kind of jobs there
will be in the future.

In the meantime Forest Renewal is

paying the workers $21.31/hr. plus all
regular benefits to study up and pre-
pare for jobs that they are not sure
they'll get anyway.

The crew has a fear a splitting up

- and going in different directions. It

would rather stay together as a cohe-
sive unit.

Some of the workers are coming to
a realization that a traditional work in
the woods is going to change.

Forest companies
need to play
a greater role
in FRBC

projects

“We're getting that message now,”
says Brother Sawyer. “We're all will-
ing to learn - that’s why we’re here.”

Normally the’J.A. McKay crew runs
two grapple yarders, one skyline tow-
er, four logging trucks, loaders and a
falling crew.

Over in Sproat Lake one of those
workers, Jack Christian, is driving
truck on a two man road rehab crew
for MacBlo, who has contracted J.A.
McKay's gravel truck. Brother Christ-
ian, who used to commute to Cyper
River on a 5-2 basis, was taking the
Forest Renewal course and was then
called to work.

He says that he can see a lot of
work opportunities, putting roads to
bed and rehabilitating roads.

“There are a lot of opportunities,”
he says. “Especially in this neck of the
woods.”

Brother Christian says that most
loggers are adaptable and already ca-
pable of doing a number of jobs. He
himself drives logging truck, grader,
bulldozer and front end loader.

“You have go to be versatile to stay
in the ball game,” says Christian.”"Most
of us (workers) cover 4-5 jobs.”

Christian says that the government
must live us to it promises.

“They promised that it (the Clay-
oquot Sound decision) wouldn’t effect
us,” he says. “But that is not the case.”

Mr. Jas Toor, a forestry foreman
and engineer at MacBlo says that
“there is a tremendous amount of
work to do.”

But he says it is hard to figure out
some times which government agency
or department will analyze or approve
proposals.

Jack Christian, a worker a J.A. McKay is back to work driving a truck at a
road rehabilitation site in MB's Somass Division.

LUMBERWORKER/NOVEMBER, 1995/7