Last week, 17 full-time workers at the Roseburg Forest Products plant in Coquille were laid off after new and updated machinery went on line.

Plant officials expect to lay off another 25 to 35 people within the next year.

“The goal of this whole thing is we have to compete with the best,” said Dave Week, the plant's operations manager. “When all is said and done, there are certainly fewer full-time positions - but we have secured a good future for the plant.”

The reduction in the plant's work force, now at around 290 hourly workers, will save the company an estimated $1.2 million a year in salary and benefit costs and allow it to be more competitive in the global market for engineered-wood products.

Plant officials said the layoffs were the result of further automation, allowing the plant to reduce the number of shifts.

“We are able to make the same amount of volume on three shifts, than four (shifts),” Week said.

Instead of seeing the layoffs as a sign of impending doom, Week said the company's decision to make more than $20 million in capital improvements in recent years signals its intention to stick around for the long term. After more than 15 years of little investment at the Coquille plant, Week said the company committed to adding a newer, more automated plywood hot press that is faster, larger and more efficient.

The company also rebuilt another hot press that had not been updated since the 1960s.

“We are trying to take the physical labor out of our production,” said Roseburg Forest Products Vice President Hank Snow. “It makes the jobs easier, and makes them more efficient.”

He said the company planned to institute similar methods in other plants over the next several years, and hopes the impact on workers' lives would be lessened through attrition - retirements and people moving.

“We are competing with operations overseas,” he said. “We have to get more efficient.”

Officials said the decision also was the result of increasing health care, pension and other benefit costs. In addition, the cost of many of the materials the plant uses have all risen. The price of one of the engineered-wood products chief ingredients, resin, has doubled, keeping pace with its base component - crude oil.

“You know what's happened at the pump,” Week said.

The cost of resin alone has added an additional $1.5 million to the plant's annual expense column, he said.

Rumors that officials are going to lay off up to 165 people at the Coquille plant over the next two years are not true, Snow said, indicating that companywide, that number of people could be laid off in the next few years.

“There are no massive layoffs coming,” Weed said.

Last week's layoffs impacted “newer and younger workers” at the plant, Snow said. “This is a union plant. When you have layoffs, it's done by seniority.”

On average, he said, each of the 17 workers laid off cost the company about $60,000 per year in salaries and benefits.

Over the next 31/2 months, the 17 workers would be able to fill in for sick workers, those going on vacation and those about to go into overtime, Snow said.

“We will make sure that those people get enough time to cover their insurance hours they need for this month in May,” he said. “And then in June we start all of our vacation periods so they will all be working through that period and by end of summer, we believe they will all be back in full time positions because of normal attrition,” Snow said.

Over the last five years, Week said, the Coquille plant has downsized by about 140 workers. Up to 45 workers were laid off last year.

The products shipped from the Coquille plant feed the home, commercial and industrial construction markets in the form of siding, cabinetry sheathing and plywood.

Butch Bernhardt, the executive director of the Western Wood Products Association said the forecast for the wood market this year will be slower than year's past.

“We are coming off a record year in demand in 2005,” Bernhardt said, noting it was the fourth record year in a row.

“Our forecast is that markets will be slower this year,” he said. “We are anticipating the housing market will slow down,” noting that market makes up about 75 percent of the wood products industry.

Compared to last year at this time, he said, preliminary numbers indicate that overall wood production is down by seven percent in Western states.

That trend already is being felt at the plant in Coquille.

“Demand is starting to wane,” Week said.

Despite the outlook for the immediate future, Week said he remains confident.

“We're very definitely working hard to secure a future for this plant,” he said. “We believe we will be here a long time.”