On Thursday, July 27th, the 12 members of the CANFOR Company board met to discuss the future of a sawmill in Houston, BC. CANFOR is a wood product company that owns pellet and wood mills across North America.

On January 25th, 2023, the CANFOR Corporation announced the temporary closure of the Houston sawmill in April 2023. Pending approval from CANFOR’s board of directors, the plan was to rebuild a modern facility over the next two years or shut down the mill.

That was the purpose of the July 27 meeting which resulted in no decision being made by the board members.

Michelle Ward is a Communications Official for CANFOR. In response to the July 27th meeting result, she said "We [CANFOR] are very excited about the opportunity to build a new facility in Houston, and to be able to do that, we need to be sure that we've got the right fiber supply.

We also want a fiber supply that's going to ensure that we can run the facility consistently, because that's what's best for our employees and for the community, [and] for our contractors, so that we can hopefully work to avoid some of the cyclical ups and downs that we can experience in the industry."

The Houston sawmill employed directly 300 people and indirectly another 400 to 500 people (as contractors, drivers, and maintenance crews). The mill is the largest employer in the town of 3500 people and would be a devastating loss for the town's economy and livelihood.

Even the town's Mayor, Shane Brienen was an employee of the mill. He told CICK News that as Mayor, his office is having to manage a lot of emotions, especially those who worked at the Quesnel Mill which shut down in 2014. "Some people in the community worked at the mill that went down in 2014. So [...] Some people have been through the full experience before. For some people, it's brand new. It is absolutely different for almost every person. Overall the news of the extension (after the July 27th meeting) that will be taken different ways as well. For myself, and I think Council, we do feel it's very positive.

It is a step in the right direction. So it's one major hurdle for the community that there is a willingness to reinvest if fibre can be secured. So it is a big step. It's not the answer we wanted to hear last Thursday, of course, but we are moving in that direction."

Listen to the full interview with Michelle Ward of Canfor and Mayor Shane Brienen in the link below.