2A
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WEDNESDAY, JUNE 22, 2022
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APPEAL TRIBUNE
Lumber
Continued from Page 1A
He said wholesale prices of plywood
– 1,000 square feet – have been on a roll-
er coaster in the same span, from $400
before the pandemic to a high of $2,100
in the summer of 2021 and now down to
$700.
To the average consumer, that means
a 4-by-8 sheet of plywood went from
about $13 to high of about $48 down to
about $24.
“We’re really quite concerned at $700
because we’re losing money at that lev-
el,” Freres said. “To be 40% higher than
your previous all-time high and to lose
money is kind of the situation we’re in.
It’s just, it’s absolutely mind numbing
how we are dealing with the wild swings
in the marketplace and dealing with the
challenges of finding a work force. I
don’t know that it’s ever been so un-
pleasant, all the various challenges
we’ve had the last couple of years.”
Highway’s like 99 and 126 maintain
steady streams of log trucks taking
scorched logs out of the fire zone. State
and county officials and private land-
owners have felled thousands of danger-
ous and burnt black trees and are send-
ing as many as they can to the sawmill.
It was rare when burned logs were
processed by a mill before the wildfires.
“We have a tremendous amount of
black logs coming at us. We’d never run
a black log through our mill prior to re-
cently,” said Seneca Sawmill Co. Senior
Vice President of Marketing and Com-
munications Casey Roscoe. “Every tim-
berland owner that had salvageable
timber wanted to get value from it be-
cause they’re up against a timeline.”
But lumber prices have been on the
rise, and a number of conditions related
to the pandemic are expected to keep
lumber — and new homes — expensive.
Marion County community develop-
ment manager Chris Eppley said
Wednesday that 451 homes that were
destroyed in Marion and Linn counties
have applied for septic permits. That
about 75% of those that were destroyed.
“Our building official is aware of a
handful of projects that have recently
been canceled or delayed by applicants
who cite rising lumber prices as the rea-
son for the withdrawal of their building
permit applications,” Lane County
spokeswoman Devon Ashbridge said.
Lumber markets
The average price of a new single-
family home increased by more than
$24,000 between April 2020 and
A H
AR
Freshly cut lumber heads through a sorting station in April at the Eugene sawmill formerly owned by Seneca Sawmill Co.
California-based Sierra Pacific Industries bought the Eugene-based Seneca companies and plans “to continue investing in
these mills and providing jobs at these mills.” CHRIS PIETSCH/THE REGISTER-GUARD
March, according the National Associa-
tion of Home Builders. On Thursday,
lumber closed at $1,260 per 1,000 board
feet, a record high price and up nearly
280% from the same time last year.
Freres said finding enough workers
has been a challenge, especially since
the wildfires. There are fewer workers to
draw from in logging and manufacturing
in wood products in the Santiam Canyon
with over 2,800 people displaced.
He said the company that produces
wood products like plywood and mass
ply paneling has about 410 workers. Pre-
viously it would have close to 500.
“Last year, for example, we could only
make 55% of the plywood we would nor-
mally make and 75% of the veneer prod-
ucts,” Freres said. “And this was in an ex-
traordinarily high market. It was com-
pletely labor driven, lack of labor driven.
“We need 100 people to get back to
our normal levels and we are not unique
in our industry and the entire manufac-
turing sector across America.”
Prices are expected to rise further in
coming months.
See LUMBER, Page 3A
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June 9. BRIAN HAYES / STATESMAN JOURNAL, BRIAN HAYES
Permit
Continued from Page 1A
In the petition, they say the facility
poses a serious risk to ground and sur-
face waters, endangering fish habitats
and the Willamette River basin ecosys-
tem.
The facility is a quarter-mile from the
North Santiam River.
“ODA and DEQ cannot ignore this
mega-chicken operation’s likely pollu-
tion of the North Santiam River, a feder-
ally protected waterway,” said Amy van
Saun, senior attorney at Center for Food
Safety.
The facility’s permit only addresses
discharges to groundwater. But oppo-
nents say there also is the potential for
discharges to surface water.
“This includes aerial deposition of
ammonia from chicken barn fans into
the river, and runoff of contaminated
stormwater,” they wrote in the petition.
The petition also argues that four
inches of compacted soil in the barns,
required by DEQ, is not enough to pro-
tect groundwater. Other states require
12 inches, it says.
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And the groundwater monitoring re-
quired by DEQ is inadequate, it says.
Other petitioners include Willamette
Riverkeeper, Friends of Family Farmers,
Humane Voters Oregon, Food & Water
Watch, Animal Legal Defense Fund and
Center for Biological Diversity.
Tracy Loew is a reporter at the States-
man Journal. She can be reached at
tloew@statesmanjournal.com,
503-
399-6779 or on Twitter at @Tracy_Loew.
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16. BRIAN HAYES/SALEM STATESMAN JOURNAL
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