A Small Business Owner in GP Packs for the US

Dear Ed,

We have a small oilfield rental business in Grande Prairie; we've been in business for 5 years. We have 3 children and are very concerned with your recent decision on raising the royalties. We lived through the national energy program nightmare in the early 80's and witnessed many devastating consequences to the federal decision and feel that you have done exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time. Allow me to explain my side of the story.

The dollar is too high to attract US investment; the commodity price is too low and unstable as natural gas is all over the map. The storage reserves are too high to stimulate new gas drilling along the foothills. The price of labor and services is through the roof as the last seven year flurry of activity has driven costs up dramatically. The US lumber exports are dropping and will continue to stay down as the "Baby Boomers" retire and sell out/downsize their living accommodations.

Weyerhaeuser is shutting down the OSB side and will lay off 130 employees. Ainsworth in GP is also shutting down for a period. Calf prices are in the toilet over the US dollar and feed prices are rising, thus we can kiss the Ag industry goodbye for a while longer. In summation, our diverse and boisterous economy is losing ground in the Ag, Forestry, and now the oil & gas exploration/production industry due to your recent push for "Alberta’s Future".

The opportunity to ask the oil & gas sector for a raise is not when they are handing you your lay off notice, the time was 2 years ago when natural gas was $14, oil was $60 and the dollar was $.80. My point is, when the farmer was being beaten down, at least he could get a job working a rig, pipelining, driving cement truck to rigs, seismic work, service rigs, endless service companies, maintenance, lease construction, hotshot driver, mechanic, Kal Tire… hopefully your getting this. When the log truck driver needed a job due to soft wood lumber disputes with the US, he too could find employment in any number of the aforementioned fields. The reason I know this is not from a book or study or any review panel, but from personal experience as a farmer /rancher, class 1 driver, derrick man of 11 years (that’s on a drilling rig in case you don't know), environmental consultant, production tester, small business owner that used to employ 4 people. I know this as I've laid off the guys that did work here before you were so bold as to take on the big bad oil companies.

Your timing could not have been worse, the mishandling of the decision making process was unbelievable, why were the decisions not made behind closed doors before getting the entire industry ready to bolt out of the province, did I mention that CNRL shut down 10 rigs in GP in a single phone call, or the 7 in one day in Edson. I understand that Ralphy gave too much for too long and that sucked for all of us, but now wait... we are debt free, lots of money in the account, jobs galore (3% Unemployment) Canada's golden goose that gives lots in transfer payments to other provinces because we seem to have an excess of cash, some of the largest and newest finds in the oil sector throughout the world, let alone what could have happened in Peace River if you would have stayed the course, or did I mention the activity that was planned for Grande Cache south to Rocky Mtn House....not so much now.

In second summation, you say Alberta's future is your priority; my future consists of the 3 kids I have to take care of. The bank will let me miss 3 payments, Daimler Chrysler has a thing about there money as well and there's $3000/mth that they want consistently. After that short future, I'm pretty much done as are the rest of the service companies, car dealerships, drilling contractors...etc, all in the name of Alberta = having more money 3, 4, 5 years from now, or maybe not even then.

By the way, what is the plan with this windfall you were hoping to get from royalties? Should we use it to bail out the farmer/rancher going down or the lumber industry, certainly it won't go to the oil & gas worker or maybe it will be in the form of a UI cheque. No that’s the Fed's problem. Maybe we can build an 80 million dollar aquatics center in GP that mayor wanted so bad, and we can all go for a swim at $15 admission per adult $12/ teen and $10/youth.

I hope through my snide comments that you, your staff, your buddies (advisors), review committee members, professors of economics and party members, etc will realize you've made a grave error in how you went about handling the affairs of the public which you represent. That’s right, did you forget, you work for me as a public official not the other way around! We now are looking at refinancing everything and moving to Colorado or Wyoming for work now as GP is going down. Please advise me on this issue of where the future money is going, and if you say it's for the teachers union, bleeding heart lobbyists, cabinet member raises, campaign expenses, or anything of that nature, you should probably watch your "political back".

Where the hell is Ralph anyway?