
Natchitoches Parish is reeling over Thursday’s announcement that International Paper is closing its Red River containerboard mill in Campti. 300 permanent jobs will go away when the facility ceases operations in April. Economic developer Jon Maynard, who is a Natchitoches native, says closure of the mill will increase unemployment and reduce local spending.
“There purchases, when they go out and create sales tax, the lifestyles, the housing market, all of the things that can be impacted from a closure of a plant like that come from mostly the people themselves,” Maynard said.
Maynard says Natchitoches Parish’s economy was already suffering an economic decline that began 20 years ago.
“There are already things that were troublesome, low incomes, low median-household income, low participation rates, high poverty levels,” Maynard said.
Maynard says adding to Natchitoches Parish’s economic troubles is the 16-percent decline in employment at Northwestern State since 2019 and a declining Natchitoches-based student population.
He says for Natchitoches to reverse it’s downward trend, it needs to fully embrace itself as a college town and attract more students back to campus.
“Without the students, without the faculty at the university and now without the people have been working at International Paper you are going to have even more problems to really build on, you got to do everything you can to attract human beings one way or another,” Maynard said.
Maynard says more Northwestern State students living in Natchitoches would increase consumer spending, lead to greater housing demand and job creation.
Comments