Zelensky Bros. Purchases Former Wapawekka Site

Zelensky Bros. Purchases Former Wapawekka Site

Monday, January 18, 2010 at 12:40

The owners of a La Ronge sawmill have finalized a deal to buy the former site of Wapawekka Lumber.

Brian Zelensky says he and brother Perry purchased the Prince Albert-area property because they already owned a planer mill on the site, and didn’t want to tear it down.

Zelensky says that while Wapawekka has been closed for nearly four years, and their own La Ronge mill has been dormant for about a year and a half, they haven’t given up on forestry.

“We closed that planer mill, and we’ve left all the equipment — left everything ready to go again, in anticipation that there may have been a start-up there. And at this point, we’re going to leave it in that position until we see how the forest industry sorts itself out here over the next few years,” he says.

Zelensky says he’s been negotiating a land purchase since last fall, when the site owners’ other buildings and equipment were sold at auction to a company that is moving them to Alberta.

He says while he and his brother don’t plan to re-start milling operations for now, they may look at leasing or renting the rest of the property out, or use it to temporarily house equipment from the nearby family farm.