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[Art2Gecko]

CRRP - Oregon-based timber company Crown Pacific closes; sold mills to Canadian firm

Tuesday, December 21, 2004
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Crown Pacific Partners, a fast-growing timber company for much of the 1990s, will close its doors at the end of the year.

A liquidation plan approved Monday at a federal bankruptcy court in Phoenix will give about 2,125 square kilometres of Crown Pacific timberland to Cascade Timberlands, a company owned by its lenders, The Oregonian reported.

The action capped a Chapter 11 bankruptcy that started a year and a half ago when Crown defaulted on more than $500 million US in debts.

Crown, which sold three sawmills and five lumber yards earlier this year, enjoyed rapid expansion and large profits for much of the 1990s only to crumble in the timber industry recession that took hold in 2000.

Under the direction of chief executive officer Peter Stott, the company borrowed heavily to buy Northwest timberland. When timber prices declined, the debt became unmanageable.

Crown once employed more than 750 workers. About 14 still work at the company's headquarters in downtown Portland, but those jobs will be phased out, company officials said.

Most employees worked for the mills, which were sold in September to International Forest Products Ltd., one of Canada's largest logging and sawmilling companies.

James Rinehart, an official with Cascade Timberlands, said the new operation's first order of business will be to conduct a thorough inventory of its timber properties, which are in Central and Southern Oregon and Washington.

He said the inventory is needed to determine the condition of Crown's lands. Some observers believe Crown overharvested timber on its lands to maximize revenues.

"There certainly are a lot of folks who think that's accurate," said Rinehart, a timber industry consultant selected to be on the board of directors. "I wouldn't suspect that it's far wrong. Until we do the inventory, we're not going to know."

http://canadaeast.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041221/CPB/31627023

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=%22Crown+Pacific+%22&ie=UTF-8&scoring=d