PORT TOWNSEND — The Port Townsend Paper Corp. mill, which is Jefferson County’s largest private employer, has temporarily laid off 28 workers, the president of the steelworkers union said.
Jim Little, president of U.S. Steelworkers Local 175, said four hourly employees were laid off for one week and 24 were laid off for two weeks.
“These are all hourly jobs,” Little said. “They are jobs throughout the production and maintenance operations.”
Little said the union was informed of the decision two weeks ago, and was told nothing of future decisions.
“A few weeks ago we heard about this, and we knew it was coming,” he said. “We talked about these two weeks and that’s it.”
Management of the mill, which employs about 300 workers, has declined to comment.
At the end of December, the mill issued a “no comment” policy, stopped making public announcements and has not responded to inquiries from the news media.
Mill management also proposed freezing wages, Little said, but the union voted that down.
“You don’t want to give wages up because you might not get it back,” he said.
“But people see both sides of the situation. They want to keep their jobs. It’s not a happy time down here at the mill right now.”
The mill closed for 10 days on Dec. 19.
At that time, mill Manager Roger Loney said that if sales didn’t improve, he expected another hiatus in production could happen in the first quarter of 2009.
The mill produces pulp for Asian markets, where it is used in the packaging of exported goods, and container board for cardboard boxes in North America.
Demand reaching low
Loney said that demand for both products had reached a low point.
“The recent worldwide economic downturn is negatively affecting the demand for our products,” Loney said in December.
“The downturn we are seeing is unprecedented, and we need to make sure we are doing everything we can to be cost-competitive.”
The mill, which usually operates 24 hours daily and seven days a week, generally shuts down only once a year for maintenance.
Spokesman Chuck Madison said in October that the company spent nearly $3 million on maintenance, improvements and upkeep during the annual shutdown in October 2008.
No employees were laid off during that time.
Among the improvements were changes designed to reduce oil consumption.
The mill, which emerged from bankruptcy protection in August 2007 under new management, has taken several steps to increase efficiency and decrease costs of operation.
“We have made tremendous progress in the past year to reduce costs and improve the reliability and productivity of our operation,” Loney said in December.
“We have reduced our oil consumption by approximately 40 percent and have completely reorganized our safety and maintenance systems.
“We are making steady improvement to our environmental performance and have significantly increased the recycle content of our products.”
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Reporter Erik Hidle can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at erik.hidle@peninsuladailynews.com.
