Truck driver faces uncertain Christmas after Georgia Pacific closed Perry mill

Daniel Withers hopes to be home in Tallahassee for Christmas. But nothing is certain for an over-the-road truck driver when the company leaves a company town.

Withers has spent the past five years driving a semi-trailer tanker truck across stretches of I-10 and U.S. 19, transporting chemicals from Alabama to the Foley paper mill outside of Perry – a forested community in Florida’s Big Bend.

The plant's sudden closing in November disrupted the lives of some 2,000 workers in north Florida and raises questions about the relationship between corporations and the communities where they're located.

While the Foley mill was up and running, Withers was on a route that enabled him to make a six-figure living, look after his 82-year-old mother who maintains her own home in Tallahassee, enjoy a social life, and sleep in his own bed every night.

But Georgia Pacific abruptly closed the mill in September and that sent Withers and others who held jobs tied to the mill’s operation scrambling for work.

The Pittsburgh-based trucking company he works for laid off four Tallahassee drivers but Withers held onto his position by accepting routes from other terminals.

He spent much of the last six weeks based out of Cincinnati, hauling a 20-ton tanker to and from Chicago and North Carolina.

Instead of returning home every night and having a home-cooked meal, he slept in his truck, showered at truck stops and ate a fast-food diet of fried chicken and burgers.

“The glamorous lifestyle of a semi-trailer truck driver,” Withers reflected, while checking out his truck for a Christmas week-run into northern Alabama and then Central Florida.

“Being on the road for weeks at a time, takes away from your home life tremendously. It just changes everything. It’s a different lifestyle,” Withers said.

Withers and other workers in Taylor County are adjusting to life without the Foley mill. It had operated for 69 years, becoming a community fixture for generations of families who relied on it for jobs and economic growth.

A report from the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Science found that the mill and related employment provided a $77 million payroll for a county of 22,000 people. The Taylor County Development Authority said that 28% of the county’s tax base was paid by Georgia Pacific.

Then it was no more.

Papermill economics: The staggering numbers behind Perry paper mill closing: 2,000 jobs, $10 million in taxes lost

After Georgia Pacific announced the mill’s closure, Withers was no longer part of a convoy of five tanker trucks heading out of Tallahassee to Perry every day.

And a steady revenue stream that flowed for 69 years for workers and local governments slowed to a trickle and turned off completely.

Some, like Withers, had recently refinanced their homes and made other financial commitments unaware of Georgia Pacific's plans to close the mill.

That the company kept its plans to itself raises questions among labor academics. While economists say change is constant in a dynamic economy, communities are often unprepared when markets, consumer choices or business priorities change and work disappears.

In April of this year, Taylor posted its lowest unemployment rate ever at 2.5%. Today it stands at 4.1% compared to the state rate of 2.8%, according to the Florida Department of Commerce.

Dawn Perez of the Taylor Chamber of Commerce called the mill’s closure the biggest hit to the county’s economy ever: “People are going to consider relocating to another area. The trickledown effect has not even really begun yet.”

Florida International University history and economics professor Kenneth Lipartido said politicians and governments have yet to develop a response to assist communities and workers when a corporation closes a plant after decades of operation.

“We see what happens when an industry shuts down and we scratch our heads and ask, 'Why is it so grim here? Why are the storefronts boarded up?' These things have happened forever in America and the answer is usually to say, 'Move away. Go where the jobs are,' ” said Lipartido, author of "Corporate Responsibility: The American Experience."

'Following the work' is what Withers is doing in hopes he will not have to relocate. Recently, he turned a semi-trailer truck that can carry 40,000 pounds of chemical on to I-10 and headed to Tuscaloosa, where he will load up a whitening agent to be used by a paper mill in Baton Rouge.

Then he’ll head back to Tuscaloosa and pick up another load for delivery to Palatka.

If everything goes according to plan and another opportunity to make a delivery does not pop up, Withers will roll back into Tallahassee in time to celebrate Christmas with family.

He’s paid by the mile. With the Foley mill closing, he reduced his expected income for the year by 25%. That's a hole in his budget he is trying to fill. If the company has an open route, he intends to take it.

“I have to go where the loads are. With trucking, if the wheels aren’t turning, you aren't earning,” Withers said. “If they get the Foley plant back up, then I can stay in Florida and won’t have to venture out to make a living.”

Earlier this month Georgia Pacific confirmed it had been in contact with companies interested in purchasing the plant, one of a half dozen in the world capable of extracting cellulose from lumber pulp and dissolving it into a chemical used for touchscreen electronics and as a food additive.

The company declined to share any further details and repeated an earlier statement that any information about the sale of the Foley facility will be kept confidential for business reasons.

Is a deal possible? Georgia Pacific keeps Perry in suspense as inquiries for closed mill pour in

James Call can be reached at jcall@tallahassee.com and is on X as @CallTallahassee.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: With Georgia Pacific mill closed, trucker must drive far from home