By TOM KELLY

With 2,200 employees in a diverse vertically integrated forest products operation in its Louisiana-Arkansas Southern division, it makes sense that a leader with a background in human resources management has been chosen.

Wayne Parker, a native of Minden, Louisiana, was appointed Vice President, Southern Region, Willamette Industries, Inc., in October 1999 upon the retirement of Dave Hill.

Parker speaks proudly of the Willamette team - most of whom he had a hand in putting in place during his tenure as human resources manager in the Ruston-based Southern Division. "We are blessed with great people, good plants, and a good timber base." Parker said. "It's a 'we' thing, and we have a great team of people."

Parker grew up in Minden, with exception of two pre-school years in Winnfield, where his father, an employee of the Louisiana & Arkansas (L&A) Railroad, spent time in his training as a locomotive engineer. The family returned to Minden, which was then the major North Louisiana junction and repair shops for the L&A Railroad.

Upon graduation from Minden High School, Parker enrolled at Louisiana Tech in Ruston, and graduated in 1962 with a degree in business. His early employment included a stint with Marvel Box Company, owned by Larkin Greer of Minden, a maker of soft drink boxes and ammunition boxes. From there he went to Shreveport for training and work in banking management. Upon discovering that the best paying positions were usually occupied by persons whose last names were on the bank's marquee, Parker resigned and took a job with General Adjustment Bureau, an insurance adjusting firm.

The insurance work brought him back to Ruston, where he once met the late C.E. (Cap) Barham, the crusty lawyer, former State Senator and Lieutenant Governor, who was representing a client with an insurance claim in Parker's portfolio.

While they settled their business, Barham asked Parker, "Why don't you get out of this line of work? I've got a client who needs a man like you."

The client turned out to be Alex Hunt, Jr., of Hunt Lumber Company in Ruston. Parker interviewed, and accepted the offer of a position as a manager of personnel and the company's self-insured compensation insurance program, In 1973, Hunt Lumber Company merged into Willamette Industries. Mr. Hunt, a third-generation member of the entrepreneurial Hunt family which has been in forestry and lumber manufacturing in Louisiana since the turn of the last century, served briefly as Willamette vice president, before resigning to again form his own company, now Hunt Forest Products, Inc., of Ruston. Parker remained with Willamette in his position in personnel - more currently called human resources. It has been a fortunate connection on both sides.

Once during his tenure at the Southern Region headquarters in Ruston, Parker was offered a position at Willamette's international headquarters in Portland, Oregon. It was tempting, he said, but he elected instead to remain in north Louisiana, where his entire life's connections are centered. That decision turned out to be a blessing, Parker said, when during his football career at Ruston High School, his son, Michael suffered a leg injury during a game with Ouachita. In treating the injury it was discovered by Dr. Billy Bundrick that the fibula in his left leg contained an early-stage cancerous mass, determined to be osteogenic sarcoma. This is a rare and dangerous cancer that normally only strikes the adolescent. M. D. Anderson Hospital in the Houston Medical Center was considered the premier provider for treatment in the country. Because of M. D. Anderson's proximity, Michael was able to get the full treatment protocol over the next two years. Early treatment arrested the sarcoma. Michael was able to return to the team in 1988 and play linebacker in Ruston High School's state championship game in the Louisiana Superdome in New Orleans. Michael is now 30 years old and lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he works in Wood Products as a salesman for Hogan Hardwoods.

Working from the relationships which have grown out of this human resources experiences in the Willamette organization over 25 years, Wayne Parker is getting his arms around the technical and operational aspects of the Southern Region, and how it fits into the company's national and international operations in forestry and wood products manufacturing.

The Southern Region includes forestry offices at Emerson, Arkansas, and Taylor, Ruston, Dodson, and Zwolle, Louisiana. Company logging operations are based at Taylor, Dodson, and Zwolle, Louisiana.

Forestry operations serve the company's own lands, including 738,000 acres in Louisiana and Arkansas, plus over 700 private landowners in the two-state area who have over 125,000 acres under management in Willamette's Landowner Assistance Program. In pursuit of its objective of maintaining forest growth at continuously sustainable levels, Willamette planted four and one-half million pine seedlings on its own lands during the 1999-2000 planting season, plus over five and one-half million furnished free of charge for planting by its cooperating private landowners.

Commenting on recent comments by Dr. Philip Tedder, Oregon-based forestry consultant, who forecasts a shortage of Southern pine timber within the next 15 years, Parker said, "Our scientists do not agree with Dr. Tedder's position."

With the intensive cultivation methods in use today, including site preparation, fertilization, and use of improved seedlings, trees are growing faster than before, Parker said. "There are more cunits growing today than ten years ago. The average size of trees used for logs is smaller, meaning earlier harvest, and fiber that was once left in the woods is now being utilized."

Conversion of wood into chips for oriented strand board (OSB), medium density fiberboard (MDF), and other engineered wood products makes for more complete utilization of every tree.

Southern Region's manufacturing plants are located at Malvern, Arkansas, making MDF; Emerson, Arkansas, making plywood; Lillie, Louisiana, particleboard; Ruston, plywood; Simsboro, Louisiana, particleboard, laminated veneer lumber (LVL), I-joists, and laminated beams; Arcadia, Louisiana, OSB; Dodson, Louisiana, lumber and plywood; and Zwolle, Louisiana, plywood, lumber and specialty timbers.

Willamette's paper manufacturing and converting operations in this region, managed through a separate operating division are located at Campti, Louisiana; Tulsa, Oklahoma; Ft. Smith and West Memphis, Arkansas; Memphis, Tennessee; Dallas and Sealy, Texas; and Huntsville, Alabama.

Of the recent and continuing public controversy over proposed changes in EPA regulations on forestry under the federal Clean Water Act, Parker said that these rules go too far.

"It can be a big thing in our planning to remove the flexibility to respond to such things as fire, beetle attacks, or storm damage," Parker said. "In these situations, permitting requires a lot of valuable time that can mean the total loss of the fiber."

"We want to be good environmental stewards," Parker said. "We are following the Best Management Practices (BMP), and we are proud of the roads we build, culverts, and streamside management zones to enhance water quality. We have been following the BMPs as long as they have been in effect."

We have also been participating in an enhanced program referred to as the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (a program of the American Forest and Paper Association). In adapting SFI, we felt we needed a process to help us affirm to the public that we are, in fact, doing those things we say we do in not only water quality, but also in managing our forests in balance with wildlife and nature.

As a part of the company's SFI compliance, Willamette's logging contractors have Master Logger certification, a continuing education program which gives loggers the latest management and technical information on environmentally correct and safe logging.

Again reaching into his human resources playbook, Parker stresses safety in every part of the forestry and manufacturing operation. "We can make our product without getting our people hurt," he said. "The only way to win the battle is in people accepting responsibility for safety in the woods and in manufacturing."