International Paper

announced in the Savannah Morning News plans to sell all of their lands which have previously contributed to their Savannah Operations. Much of their land has already been sold, with any that is left being in jeopardy.

Along with lands, they will be selling their chemical plant in Savannah along with an undisclosed number of sawmilling operations. No reason was given for this drastic move.

One example of the scope of IP actions over the past 2 or 3 years: The Combahee Forest which IP acquired from Union Camp Corp. once contained 114,000 acres, all of which was in the Low Country of South Carolina. Today, all that remains of this forest is 30,000 acres near the Savannah River. Under their newly announced plans the 30,000 acres will be gone soon.

Most of this land is being sold to developers and speculators with plans to build homes and condos. Much of the land is 30 to 40% wetland and entirely unsuitable for housing. This seems to make no difference.

This seems to be even more bad news for hunters who currently have the lands under lease. This decision not only effects South Carolina lands, but includes all Georgia Coastal lands all the way down to Camden County.

This is a sad report for me inasmuch as 37 years of my life were spent actively in managing as much as 600,000 acres of Union Camp lands. Almost gives one the feeling that all was in vain.

I have lost much of my confidence in Corporate America. People seem to no longer matter. My company of employ (Union Camp) placed great emphasis on Public Relations as well as Employee Relations. Once IP took over the helm, emphasis was on down sizing and disposing of the land base. Money grubbers.

Vernon

Vern,

IP raised me. My dad worked for them from '46 til about 10 years ago when he retired. The company was at one time a true leader in forest conservation with many a program designed to get young folks involved in a balanced way of viewing nature. They were very good proponents of managing the forests in a way that not only made money for the company but in a way that also created and instilled a respect for nature from the public.

At least they always came off that way to me in their literature and programs.

I've been reading for the past 3-4 days about the company's plans to possibly sell off all timber lands, move HQ from Memphis to Connecticut and drop several other holdings under their new "Smaller is better" policy.

Another example of what is making me tired of the fight!

The swamp that borders our farm on three sides was originally owned by two different fine folks before Union Camp bought it in the early 60s(roughly). Like the previous owners, they were as fine a neighbor as you could want and my family continued to hunt it and took care of it like it was our own. When leasin` became popular, they came to us first and offered it at 40 cent an acre, because as they said theirselves, they wanted to be good neighbors. My older cousin leased it and because it had been hunted by friends and family for so long, he didn`t even post it. He let anyone hunt it as they always had. When he passed away, we took the lease over so we could keep our beloved swamp. Several years ago IP bought it and they could have cared less about their neighbors or their thoughts. They immediately raised the price of the lease so we had to scrape to be able to pay it. Two years ago they sold it, unannounced to us, to a gentleman out of Florida for his own personal huntin` paradise. We only found out when we went to renew the lease. He`s a nice feller, but won`t allow anyone to hunt it but his friends, but it`s his now so he can do as he pleases with it, but the loss of that swamp was like losin` a family member. So now, land that borders me on three sides and was hunted by five generations of my family for over one hundred years is now lost, possibly forever. And yes,there`s a good many family members and friends that were raised in there awful bitter about it. The only good thing that can be said now is that it is Oconee river flood plain and if a subdivision is put in there (which I doubt) it`ll wash slam to Altamaha Sound.

We still have not heard anything about our lease from IP. The track is in Wilkes Co and we've had it for 8 years now. IP said they would let us know when the land was "for sale" and give us a shot at buying it. They have not contacted anyone so I guess our club is history.