Chuck LeBlanc… president of the Public and Private Workers of Canada… says having to field concerns from his junior comrades and see their furrowed faces, which once beamed with ambition, weighs on him. …The layoffs were more than just sad news for the workers — the whole of Prince George underwent a period of mourning. Joel McKay, CEO of Northern Development Initiative Trust, called the news devastating. Eby and MLA Shirley Bond couched their sorrow in the same expression. …“It was not a matter of if but when,” said Brink, the CEO of Brink Forest Products. …Brink ascribes the industry’s woes to the mountain pine beetle infestation in 2001. …Then, in 2017 and 2018, wildfires engulfed forests in the Interiors. To preserve the remaining trees, the government slashed the annual allowable cut. …But Ben Parfitt, at the Centre for Policy Alternatives, says the plight of forestry companies is a reckoning of failed government policies.

Additional coverage in CKPG Today by Jack Clark: Union representing laid-off workers reacts to PG Pulp closure