Meadow Creek Cedar has partly restarted operations at its Lardeau Valley sawmill, following a series of safety inspections over the last few weeks.
“Some areas are now in compliance [with safety orders] and are operational,” says WorkSafeBC spokeswoman Megan Johnston. “Some areas are not operational yet because they’re still trying to meet the requirements of the regulations.”
The mill closed in March after an industrial accident in which an employee, reportedly young and inexperienced, caught his hand between a live chain and drive sprocket of a belt conveyor and lost parts of three fingers.
WorkSafe ordered the company to stop using all machinery that required safeguarding, which effectively shut the operation down.
Since then, WorkSafe officer Ted Williams has met with employer representatives Roland McCulloch, Dak Giles, and Abdul Khan.
“To meet compliance the employer has erected barrier guarding restricting access to areas of the mill,” Williams wrote in a report. “This has been done rather than guard individual pieces of machinery and equipment.”
The company stated in its notice of compliance that it had invested 360 worker hours plus materials in safety upgrades as of March 15, and estimated it would take 500 hours overall. It said it was further revising and updating safe work practices, procedures, and response plans.
“The owner… has committed to taking a more proactive approach to providing a safe workplace. For example, [the company] has closed the sawmill complex and is in the process of upgrading guarding/barriers throughout,” Williams said in a report dated March 29.
Since the start of the year, there have been at least three serious accidents at the mill, resulting in two workers losing fingers, and another breaking his leg. The company is facing fines, but they haven’t yet been levied.
WorkSafe says another injury was reported recently, but it was not a lost time claim.
• As of last week, Meadow Creek Cedar still had not paid off its remaining debts under a proposal to creditors. The company, which sought creditor protection over two years ago, was granted an extension to March 7 to make its final set of payments.
It owes about $71,000 to Canada Revenue Agency and a total of $91,000 to over 50 unsecured creditors.
Lloyd Murphy of Murphy and Associates, which has been acting as trustee, says company principal Dale Kooner “is still in the process of putting together new financing in an associated company which will provide the funds necessary for the final payments.”
When the proposal was filed in 2009, the company owed $427,000 in outstanding payroll deduction claims to Canada Revenue Agency, a secured creditor. Unsecured creditors, collectively owed almost $1.5 million, were to be paid 25 cents on the dollar.
Five out of six payments to the tax collector have since been made, along with three out of four payments to unsecured creditors. However, Meadow Creek defaulted on its final payments, due in April and November 2010 respectively.
• A transport company associated with Meadow Creek Cedar remains off the road.
Daminis Transport of Surrey, which was hauling for the mill, had four of its trucks taken off the road last year following a roadcheck by Kaslo RCMP and the Ministry of Transportation that found them unroadworthy.
The company faced a provincial audit, but ministry spokesman Jeff Knight says it has not gone ahead: “The carrier has chosen not to provide all of the records that would be needed, therefore the carrier remains suspended and its vehicles aren’t operating.”