Warm Springs Forest Products to Cut Jobs

Warm Springs Forest Products is a name that most of us are not familiar with at all. So before we take a look at the job cuts to come to the company lets begin by taking a look at how they have chosen to describe themselves, “On August 19th, 1966, voting members of the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation appropriated a $15 million referendum to propel the Tribes into the forest products industry. In 1967, the Jefferson Plywood Corporation was purchased and Warm Springs Forest Products Industries was born. With the establishment of WSFPI, the Tribes were able to position to take advantage of the Reservation’s vast timber resources. In years that followed, WSFPI underwent many changes as the industry and the forest evolved. In the seventies, the mill flourished, and in the eighties experienced major expansion and revision. In the nineties, the challenges proved difficult as the culture of the industry changed dramatically. WSFPI met those challenges and today continues to be a valuable asset to the Tribes.”

Sadly the company is getting ready to cut back on 93 jobs in the very near future. The jobs, which are set to be cut in November, are all coming to full time workers. This level of job cuts is enough to qualify as a mass layoff action under the current federal guidelines. For those of you who are not familiar with the idea of a mass layoff action here is a look at how the federal government defines the term, “The Mass Layoff Statistics (MLS) program collects reports on mass layoff actions that result in workers being separated from their jobs. Monthly mass layoff numbers are from establishments which have at least 50 initial claims for unemployment insurance (UI) filed against them during a 5-week period. Extended mass layoff numbers (issued quarterly) are from a subset of such establishments—where private sector nonfarm employers indicate that 50 or more workers were separated from their jobs for at least 31 days.”

The only good news in this situation is that the positions may be recoverable in the spring when the logging conditions are set to change and the company may be able to increase its production again. For the time being however there should be no expectation that the jobs will be returned and the company is preparing the workers for the worst.

This is not the only company in the lumber production industry that is resorting to layoffs in order to stay profitable. For those of you who missed out on our earlier coverage of cuts to a similar company here is an excerpt, “Canadian-based NorSask Forest Products, a lumber producer, are bracing themselves for layoffs. The company has already sent out twenty-seven layoff notices out of the company’s forty workers.  General manager and President of NorSask Allen Brander is blaming the bad market for the layoffs.. “U.S. housing starts are usually around 1.8 to 2 million housing starts a year. They’re down to less than half a million a year, and that’s what’s driving these whole markets,” Brander said…”