50 



shareholders. That is why L-P wants a new deal, and that is why 

 it is holding Ketchikan hostage. 



You said the Ketchikan region is economically dependent on KPC 

 and timber, but this isn't the 1950's. Today K^PC directly provides 

 just three percent of the region's jobs and less than eight percent 

 of Ketchikan's jobs. Ketchikan is far less dependent on this pulp 

 mill than Sitka was on the APC mill before it closed. Yet today, 

 Sitka is doing fine. 



Southeast Alaska needs a new deal and a new direction, not L- 

 P. Our region needs a modern, high-value added timber industry 

 that cuts less but produces more jobs for Southeast Alaska. Steve 

 Seley's newly proposed remanufacturing plant and dry kiln on 

 Prince of Wales Island is one of the kinds of businesses that we 

 would like to see thrive. 



Finally, your bill is a misguided and heavy-handed government 

 subsidized program. It deprives us of one of this country's greatest 

 strengths, the free enterprise system. Instead of proposing policies 

 that would bring the Tongass into the 21st century, you want to 

 take us back to the 1950's. We urge you to stop this bill right here 

 and right now. 



I have finished my statement. 



[Statement of Robert Lindekugel may be found at end of hear- 

 ing.] 



The Chairman. Wayne, you are up. 



STATEMENT OF WAYNE WEIHING, TONGASS CONSERVATION 

 SOCIETY, KETCHIKAN, ALASKA 



Mr. Weihing. Thank you. My name is Wayne Weihing. I am 

 President of the Tongass Conservation Society of Ketchikan. I am 

 a 28-year resident of Alaska and a former 21-year employee of 

 Ketchikan Pulp Company. During my employment at Ketchikan 

 Pulp Company, I was union representative — union president rep- 

 resenting approximately 300 members. 



On Monday, July 1, Ketchikan Gateway Borough Assembly 

 passed a motion to earmark $1 million from its Southeast Alaska 

 Economic Disaster Fund to be used for efforts to extend Ketchikan 

 Pulp Company's timber contract for 15 years and to influence the 

 TLMP process and to send people to testify at hearings here in 

 D.C. to support Ketchikan Pulp Company and to allow the radical 

 so-called wise use movement in Ketchikan a free hand to use what- 

 ever tactics necessary to obtain those goals. 



It is amazing to me to see those tax dollars from this economic 

 fund now ricocheting back to Congress to be used to support a cor- 

 poration, Ketchikan Pulp Company. Ketchikan Pulp Company 

 wants a contract extension. Meanwhile, the pulp workers at the 

 pulp mill have not had a labor agreement with a contract since 

 1984, that is 12 years ago, and are currently working for less 

 wages than they made in the spring of 1984. 



Once again, Ketchikan Pulp Company is threatening to shut 

 down their mill if they don't get their way. There have been a se- 

 ries of threats — of shutting down and leaving Ketchikan high and 

 dry from KPC over the last 20 years. I really feel bad for the cur- 

 rent employees to have that same threat held over their heads now 

 as in years past. I will give you some examples. 



