St. Tammany News

St. Tammany's forestry industry fends off the ax

Walking past the blaring hydraulic wheeze of a 10-ton buzz saw machine splitting massive pines like hot butter in the Jenkins Lumber Co. saw mill in Folsom, third- generation owner Huey Jenkins Jr. points to a stack of freshly cut pines. "This," said Jenkins, yelling over the noise, "this is mostly all from outside the parish. It used to be a lot more from St. Tammany Parish."

It's an all too familiar site for Jenkins, whose grandfather built the factory in 1948 when the area's timber farmers farmed the lion's share of one of the region's largest agricultural gems.

But now with a quadruple ax of permits, fees, industry regulations and booming development encroaching on rural farms, St. Tammany has become the most taxed and regulated timber parish in the state. The once deep economic roots of the local forestry are now threatened.

Compounding the challenge is Hurricane Katrina's destruction, where a 65-percent loss of pine and hardwood trees spawned up to $350 million in damages. In other words, almost 300 years worth of mangled timber blankets the area's underbrush, unfit for use and too big to move.

"Over the years, (St. Tammany) has become very timber unfriendly," said Buck Vandersteen, executive director the Louisiana Forestry Association, who is calling for a change. "It's still a $50 million to $100 million business, but it's declining."

More than a decade ago, St. Tammany Parish adopted ordinance 523 which required timber businesses and other heavy-load industries such as utility companies to post a $10,000 road bond or a similar road bond to move their products on locally governed roadways because, officials feared, mammoth trucks would damage roads.

At that time the local industry was booming, reaching a pinnacle of sawtimber and pulpwood harvest since 1970. After the gavel was dropped and the ordinance adopted, that number plummeted immediately, and by 2004 reached the lowest amount in the 24 years, according to the study's results from Louisiana State University's Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.

In addition, St. Tammany Parish required tree farmers who clear their land to build a 25-foot buffer zone at their own expense, as well as foot a $150 harvest fee outlined in a land-clearing ordinance.

The road bonds "protects the taxpayers for the cost or any potential repair costs to damage roads," said St. Tammany Parish Spokesman Suzanne Parsons. "This is not unusual. But the industry has not said anything to us. I have no comment."

Does the forestry industry feel singled out?

"If that is the case, they need to come in and talk to the Parish Council and planning and zoning," Parsons said. "We will be happy to sit down and talk with them."

But while the fee was designed to preserve natural streams and wetlands and conserve property values, the timber industry felt the ax.

"What other crop do you need a permit to harvest," said tree farmer Jeannine Meeds, who owns 150 acres of trees outside Mandeville and has been in the business for 20 years. "For many of us, our trees are like children. For some city dwellers, it's hard to understand."

When Meeds surveyed the twisted branches and cracked pines left behind from Katrina, her eyes welled up. She began to cry.

Before the storm, Meeds planned to harvest trees on one of her five-acre plots, but was confused by the parish's land-clearing ordinance. After learning three languages and earning three educational degrees, she admits she's not a genius, but smart enough to figure out complicated texts. The ordinance took time to sort through. She waited. Meanwhile, Katrina rumbled ashore. She lost 70 percent of her crop on the parcel.

"I'm not upset at the idea behind the regulations. Taking care of the environment is a good thing. I know many loggers who when they are finished, leave nothing left ... But we need to encourage forestry as an industry."

The proof is in statistics. In 2006, the largest year in St. Tammany Parish history largely due to loggers quickly chopping down damaged trees, the economic impact reached $60 million, or 42 percent of the plant agricultural commodities in the parish, including nursery crops, vegetables, hay and many others. The harvested trees themselves earned loggers $24.5 million last year.

"Forests are, in fact, our single most important agricultural product," said Mike Dunn of the LSU AgCenter's Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.

And in "St. Tammany, the industry still exists ... southeast Louisiana has the most productive soils for growing forests in Louisiana. But I'm not confident that growing forests will continue to be a significant enterprise in St. Tammany."

The biggest issue, however, is not the regulations or ordinances themselves. It is population changes and the boom of white picket fences and two-car garages that follow.

"Ultimately, the people that move from the cities to the rural areas for its rustic scenery and privacy may actually be the ones most responsible for its demise," Dunn said. "In the long run, it will just not pay."

St. Tammany Parish Chief Deputy Assessor George Klumpp estimates the average acre of land costs $11,000 when a homestead is attached.

Now, the younger generation is looking at their grandparents 100 acres and figuring they can sell, walking away with $1.2 million, and destroying parts of the forestry industry.

"Most land is more valuable as residential than forestry," said Brian Chandler at the LSU AgCenter's office in St. Tammany. "I hate to say that but its true."

If loggers in neighboring parishes and counties in Mississippi continue to grow forests without the same regulatory burdens as in St. Tammany, "they are naturally going to turn away from St. Tammany and look to other parishes," he said.

Meanwhile, Jenkins, donning a blue hard hat, steel-tipped boots and jeans, yelled over the growl of the buzz saw. He said he's seeing more timber come from Washington and Tangipahoa parishes than St. Tammany.

It's Jenkins understanding that the "the concrete trucks don't have to pay, the gravel trucks don't have to pay, the dirt trucks don't do it, so why are the log trucks paying it," Jenkins said. "It seems like they are singling out the industry."

Next Sunday: the horse industry.