Sunday, July 15, 2007
enlargeStaff Writer
Bob Barnes is a senior member of a veteran paper-industry workforce.
Barnes, 66, got a job at what is now Madison Paper Industries 32 years ago, and even though he loves the profession, the MPI machine tender plans to retire in the next few years.
Barnes -- and a lot of others. The average age of a Maine paperworker is 54.
The industry, still the largest manufacturing sector in Maine, will have 2,200 workers turn 63 within the next 10 years, according to Mike Barden of the Maine Pulp & Paper Association.
Paper company executives lose sleep contemplating those numbers. They know paper does not get produced without skilled people.
And right now young people with those skills are hard to find.
"If we are going to survive as an industry," said Glenn Saucier of Millinocket's Katahdin Paper, "we better damn well make some good paperworkers very quickly."
Saucier attended a meeting at Kennebec Valley Community College in Fairfield last month just for that reason.
He was joined by seven other executives from the industry who met with college President Barbara Woodlee and members of her staff, as well as Dumont B. "Monty" Henderson, coordinator of the college's Pulp and Paper Technology Program, the only program in the state that teaches the skills needed to become a machine operator or technician.
Also at the table was Dwane Huffo of the Process Development Center at the University of Maine. That center is part of a program aimed at developing engineers for the paper industry.
Together, the two programs are the only Maine source of qualified new workers for an industry whose workforce is rapidly aging, and the number of graduates they are producing is not nearly enough to meet the coming demand, industry executives say.
Barnes understands that concern. He knows the reality of the mill. He sees that many colleagues are, like him, nearing retirement. And he does not see many young people -- at least ones with basic qualifications -- looking to enter the profession.
Is a crisis coming?
Barnes contemplates the question.
"I can only answer that one way," he said slowly. "I think we all wonder. We all wonder a lot."
WHAT HAPPENED?
Maine's paper industry has shrunk over the past few years.
Paper mill employment plummeted from 17,200 in 1990 to 10,200 in 2003, according to a study done for the Maine Future Forest Economy Project.
The number has continued to decline significantly in the past four years, standing now at an estimated 7,000 workers, based on the latest information from the Maine Pulp & Paper Association.
The number of paper mills has dwindled as well, with only 11 active among nine companies.
Among the closures: the Kimberly-Clark mill in Winslow, Statler Tissue in Augusta, Gardiner Paperboard, Georgia-Pacific's Old Town Mill. Sappi closed its pulp operation in Westbrook in 1999.
And even with the fear of a labor shortage ahead, job cuts continue. Fraser Papers in Madawaska recently announced plans to shut down three paper machines and eliminate 135 positions.
At the same time, mills have become more efficient, and the paper industry continues to have a huge economic impact in the state.
Based on 2004 data, the industry accounted for 22 percent of total manufacturing wages in the state, according to the Maine Pulp & Paper Association.
Moreover, the association reports, the paper and allied products sector boasts the highest weekly wages, averaging about $1,100, which outstrips the nearest competitor (those in professional or business services) by about $300.
In fact, the average income of a person in the paper industry in 2004 was $58,136.
Still, are the promises of a good income enough to overcome the trepidation of entering a profession that has endured such a steep decline?
Barden of the Pulp & Paper Association acknowledges that this is the central question the industry faces.
"It is still that public perception (of a dying industry)," he said. "It is trying to overcome that. The reality is I just don't see the industry going away. I think there will always be an industry here."
Bill Cohen of Verso Paper, which has mills in Bucksport and Jay, confirms that the paper industry faces a labor challenge.
"It is harder to recruit, because of the perception that it is a dying industry," he said. "That is one thing we have to overcome. We are not dying; we are continuing to reshape."
Michael Michaud, director of employee and labor relations at Madison Paper Industries, remembers the way it used to be.
He said back in the 1960s and early 1970s, Great Northern Paper in Millinocket used to go to the town high school (Stearns) on graduation day to recruit new workers for their two mills. And many of those graduates accepted the invitation.
Michaud said graduates have a different attitude about paper mills today.
"Because of closures and consolidation in the industry," Michaud said, "many people don't see themselves as having a future if they go into the pulp and paper industry."
Karen Van Orman, a human resources officer at Sappi Fine Paper in Skowhegan, has seen the change firsthand.
"My dad worked at Scott Paper (in Winslow) forever," she said, "and when he came home from work, he talked about the mill, and he loved it. What are the children (of paper workers) hearing now?"
Van Orman answered her own question.
What they often are hearing, she said, are negative comments.
Michaud said young people turned sour on the paper industry for good reason.
"They were knocking on the door," he said. "There just weren't any opportunities for them."
Henderson saw the souring in his Pulp and Paper Technology enrollment numbers.
"I can remember having 28 students on campus, about half who were full-time students," he said. "Within a few years that dropped off dramatically. I remember one year having only four students. We had 10 last year, about four or five who were full-time students."
PLAN OF ACTION
Getting enrollments up again, paper industry executives agree, will be difficult.
Michaud said one of the keys is to form even stronger relationships with Kennebec Valley Community College and University of Maine, the chief sources of qualified recruits in the state.
"We came here ... to talk about the fundamental problem and how the programs here at KVCC can help us bridge the (employee need) gap," Michaud said of the mid-June meeting at the community college.
Some in the paper industry already are planning bold steps to address the feared shortage.
"We are looking at offering for the first time this fall, tuition free to (Pulp and Paper Technology) students at KVCC," said Glenn Dufour of Verso Paper. "And after they graduate we would give them two years of guaranteed employment. Even if it does not work out, they end up with a degree and two years experience."
Michaud said he sees three immediate steps the industry in general should take:
n Create awareness of the need for workers;
n Develop internships, scholarships and other enticements to encourage interest in the industry;
n Provide an accurate profile of today's paper mill.
Michaud said the importance of the last objective cannot be overstated. Workers no longer have to labor on a dirty, noisy mill floor, he said.
"To be an operator in a mill today," Michaud said, "is not what it was to be an operator 30 years ago, or even 15 years ago."
That is the case at Madison Paper Industries, which makes magazine paper used in The New York Times Magazine, among other publications.
Operators sit in enclosed control rooms, monitoring the massive paper machine before them via computer terminals that provide instantaneous information on the machine's every function.
"It is not bad work," said Craig Parker, a controller at Madison Paper. "Shift work is different. It makes for a different lifestyle, but, yeah, it's a good living."
Parker is the son of a paperworker, and his father in turn had a father who worked in the industry.
He is not sure whether his son, 15, will continue the tradition, even though he is mechanically inclined.
For Barnes, the man who loves his job, there is no uncertainty. He has three grown children -- two boys and a girl -- and none chose the paper industry as a career path.
Barnes said his younger son, now 32, worked in the mill one summer but never considered being a paperworker.
He shrugs as he relates this.
For Barnes, no other occupation could have been better.
"I just appreciated being here," he said. "I just loved it. It's been a super career for me."
Colin Hickey -- 861-9205
chickey@centralmaine.com
Reader comments
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The paper industry has been their own worst enemy as far as hiring practices go. There really isn't any shortage of help, it's just that the good old boys don't want young people to come in and threaten their jobs.
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