Joe McWilliams

Lakeside Leader

Tolko Industries is asking the M.D. of Lesser Slave River to get on board with the Rural Renewal Stream program. Alan Bell of Tolko made the pitch at council’s June 25 meeting, saying Tolko struggles to find skilled tradespeople to fill its positions, and recruiting overseas talent through the RRS works.

Bell said in spite of ongoing recruiting efforts, on-the-job training opportunities and so on, there are “prolonged vacancies,” at its Mitsue mill, that have an impact on operations.

Meanwhile, Bell continued, Tolko has been able to recruit foreign skilled workers at its High Level and High Prairie mills, thanks to the host municipalities being approved by the province under the RRS program.

“We’ve had good experience with that,” he said, mentioning skilled people – principally from South Africa, but also a few from South American countries – filling positions such as for engineers, millwrights and electricians.

Tolko would like to do the same thing at its mill here, by taking advantage of the Town of Slave Lake’s Rural Renewal Stream program. But because its mill is in the M.D., it can’t. Those are the rules, Bell told council, which is why Tolko is hoping the M.D. will sign up as a member of the program through the town – as Big Lakes and the Town of High Prairie have done.

There’s a cost; a $10,000 sign-up fee, and it has to be the municipality that signs up – not individual companies. A few years ago, M.D. council had decided not to spend that money, after the town proposed it. That was in spite of an employer in Smith asking council to get on board so he could take advantage of the RRS to bring in workers.

Councillor Brad Pearson asked if Tolko was willing to share in the sign-up fee.

Maybe, was Bell’s cautious answer. But we don’t want to be the ones to pay the shot and then have all the other employers lining up to get on board for free. We can talk about it though, he said.

Bell also said there were other ways to recruit foreign workers – federal programs – but they are much more complicated and take a lot longer. The Alberta RRS program works well, is quick and – as he said – is already serving the company well in other northern Alberta locations.

The $10,000 fee to join would be paid to the Town of Slave Lake, which then handles the administration of the program, Bell said.

Bringing foreign skilled workers in by this method isn’t cheap, Bell told council. There are plenty of other expenses involved, which the company wouldn’t spend if it didn’t feel it had to.

Council made no promises, other than that it would be discussing it further.

Tolko operates an oriented strandboard and what it calls ‘engineered wood products’ (a type of lumber) mill about 15 kilometres east of Slave Lake, in the M.D. of Lesser Slave River.