By JACK M. WILLIS
Journal Correspondent

Around August 6, 2002, Louisiana-Pacific Corporation announced that they were halting operations at their plants in Urania, Louisiana. It's now almost five months later, and The Piney Woods Journal made a return visit to this sleepy little turpentine heritage hamlet to gauge the economic impact of the shutdown, as well as attempt to take measure of the spirit of the townspeople since a century of dedicated lumber product manufacturing had ceased to exist.

One of the first people we contacted was the lovely Mayor of Urania, in the person of Ms. Terri Corley. In our previous meeting concerning the news of the closing down of the towns biggest and only major industry, with a stiff upper lip she portrayed a confident attitude towards the town's future. Her confidence has not diminished, and she's just as optimistic as ever. She believes that in time a signal will come down from the corporate offices of Georgia Pacific, the new owners, to crank the mill's facilities back up.

She related that most of the young men at the plant that were laid off have found gainful employment offshore in the oil patch. Others are still drawing unemployment benefits and in reality, she couldn't point to a definite downturn in the fortunes of the local citizenry. She said the LaSalle Parish Corrections facility located just south of the city limits had restored and refurbished over 1,000 bicycles for underprivileged children for Christmas. The drug store where she is employed has not noticed any definite drop in business, but the local convenience store had suffered some, because the mill personnel working the various shifts weren't stopping by for food, tobacco products, work gloves and the like.

Next we stopped by Nita's Crafts and Gifts Shop owned and operated by Nita and Joe Macek located on US 165. Ms. Macek related that her business was off to a certain degree, but nothing like she had first envisioned when the mill closing news started making the rounds in Olla. She said the bulk of their business was furnished by tourists and travelers and by locals whose income was not dependent upon the plywood and fiberboard plants.

In chatting with Olla's personable Mayor, the Honorable Ray B. Miller he stated that there have been a few households that had difficulty with their utilities, but he and the Town Council had been able to work out a satisfactory arrangement for payment in most cases. He said the civic organizations for Tullos-Urania-Olla had given out about 30 more Christmas baskets of groceries than in preceding years. The Mayor also related that most of the laid-off employees were still able to draw unemployment benefits at this time. He said, "I don't know what's going to happen when that's exhausted."

In talking to several business people who didn't want to be identified or quoted directly, the general consensus was upbeat rather than morbid. One person stated that the town has managed to survive through feasts and famines so much through the last fifty years that this current crisis was really nothing new.

In summation, the people of Tullos, Urania and Olla seem to be rolling with the punches and would appear to be weathering the present economic storm.

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