Dryden puts 'minds to the test': diversification plan seeks less reliance on big mill jobs.

• Author: Ross, Ian
• Position: DRYDEN/KENORA

Dryden Mayor Anne Krassilowsky promises next year's centennial celebration of the city's establishment will be an uplifting experience.

"You can't lose the spirit and life of the community," said the feisty and resolute two-term mayor of this forestry mill town of 8,200 in northwestern Ontario.

The planning of this chin-up, feel-good party in 2010 is asking former residents to "Come on Home" will kick off after New Year's with a welcoming civic reception for the Vancouver-bound Olympic torch as it temporarily detours off the Trans-Canada Highway and onto a six-lane ice road on Wabigoon Lake.

"The potential for it to be minus 42 is a big challenge," Krassilowsky chuckles.

But that's been the least of her worries.

This spring, there's no white plume of steam emanating from the towering Domtar mill which dominates the skyline for kilometres. The pulp operation was in the midst of a 10-week shutdown in early June affecting 500 workers. Last fall, the company permanently switched off the last of its three paper machines, putting 195 employees out of work.

While most of the industrialized world is feeling the impact of last September's global market crash, the economic hits in the forestry sector have kept on coming in Dryden for five years with waves of layoffs and temporary closures.

Homeowners are struggling to pay their taxes and keep their jobs, families have been fragmented as breadwinners commute long distance to oil and mineral boom jobs in Alberta, Saskatchewan and to mines in the Far North.

While Krassilowsky sympathizes with laid-off autoworkers in southern Ontario, here there's no talk of an industry bailout package to save hemorrhaging forestry companies from a digital world that uses less newsprint.

"We realize in Dryden it's a restructuring of the world economy and we've been restructured for five years. But we've put our minds to the test and we're going to meet that challenge. We'll come out of this with a stronger and more diversified community."

For Krassilowsky, it means standing up for Dryden and rural Ontario by travelling at every opportunity to get face time with a cabinet minister passing, or hitting the road with staff and business leaders in tow to meet a potential investor.

"Dryden will always be a forestry town," she said, "but only a portion of it will revolve around it. We're bent on moving away from single industry."

Talk of economic diversification is always spouted by Northern mayors.

This time it's different...