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Here’s The Pitch

Story by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief I was in a good mood on a recent Friday, thinking ahead to the weekend and planning to watch college football, when our receptionist placed the Western Wood Products Assn. 2009 lumber production report on my desk. End of good...

Housing Trends

Story by Jennifer McCary, Senior Associate Editor As a baby boomer I grew up with certain expectations and accepted truisms. One of them was: Renting a home is as foolish as throwing money down the drain. Perhaps borne out of the Great Depression when so many became...

Old School Reporting Will Return One Day

Story by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief I teach now and then at my undergraduate alma mater, Auburn University, which is only an hour up the interstate from our office in Montgomery, Ala. I usually teach when the journalism faculty finds itself one instructor short of...

The Great (Okay, Not So Great) Debate

Story by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has approved ArborGen permit applications for planting and growing genetically engineered (GE) eucalyptus trees in several Southern states. APHIS reached a finding of no...

Seeking Signs Of Sustainable Recovery

Story by Dan Shell, Managing Editor Right now housing starts are up for the past three months, and after a revision of March statistics to an annual rate of 636,000, housing starts are currently at their highest level since November 2008. Of course, it’s important to...

Sawdust Musings

Story by Jennifer McCary, Senior Associate Editor During the last 25 years, sawdust, trimmings and shavings have gone from being a waste disposal problem to being a revenue stream that helped some mills keep running even in the face of declining lumber demand. Today...