With news of the Crofton mill closure, we see the mayors and other spokespersons of the Alliance of Resource Communities busily blaming the provincial government’s old-growth policy, environmentalists, First Nations and others.

But all of us are to blame. We didn’t heed the warnings back in the 1980s that this day would surely come.

Treating the land like a monoculture woodlot (similar to the Atlantic cod fishery), we overcut beyond the merchantable tree replacement rates, because everyone was in on the easy, quick money.

The tax income, the big salaries, the community spinoffs. It seemed like it could go on forever.

And for those who keep saying there’s plenty of merchantable wood fibre for the mills on the island, and we now need access to the remaining scraps of old growth, load up your Google Earth app and zoom beyond the highway beauty strips and look at what’s left of this island’s once glorious, primeval forest.

Ken Gurr

Gabriola

It’s odd how, in the aftermath of the recent report of the Crofton pulp mill’s demise, there’s been precious little comment on the related issue of raw log exports.

The mill and local sawmills complain about a lack of affordable logs/fibre for their operations, yet the exports continue unabated.

No peep on this from either the B.C. government or the Green Party.

What will it take to curtail this ridiculous policy? Why continue to export our jobs to Asia?

Dr. Robert Hay

Cassidy

Domtar did not close the pulp mill in Crofton due to North Cowichan taxation; it closed the mill because there just isn’t enough affordable fibre to continue operations with no immediate or long-term relief in sight.

In September 2009, the Pulp and Paper Canada trade magazine published an article, “Million Dollar Tax Battle: Catalyst”.

The article referred to North Cowichan, “where the tax assessment on Catalyst’s Crofton mill topped $6 million.”

News reports have said that North Cowichan will lose $5 million in taxes from the closure of the Crofton mill.

It doesn’t appear to me that North Cowichan imposed hefty tax increases on Domtar.

From May 2009 to July 2011, pulp prices went from $584 per tonne to $1,014 per tonne. Crofton produced some 350,000 tonnes in 2011.

The mill’s total income in 2011 would have been in the region of $3 billion. A $5 million or even $6 million tax bill........

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