The New York State Wood Products Development Council (The Council) met on February 12 at SUNY College of Environmental Science & Forestry. WDI staff presented a progress report on a grant recently awarded to WDI from the Northern Border Regional Commission. The grant supports several actions to ensure New York’s Forest Economy (meaning from the Forest to the Factory Floor) has the workforce it needs.
One component of the grant is to support Commercial Drivers Licensure (CDL). Across the state, CDL is a tough certification to find. Employers in the forest economy have encountered challenges finding and retaining interested, qualified CDL drivers to transport logs and other harvest products. Training is expensive and supervised drive-time (or practice time) is difficult to schedule and support.
Greg Hart, WDI’s North Country Regional Director and Eliot Cresswell, WDI’s Policy Analyst, reviewed with the council a draft survey that will be sent to forest economy employers to deepen our understanding of CDL needs and help define next steps in terms of training. The goal is to get CDL trainees the much-needed supervised drive-time in a more cost-effective way.
As WDI continues its work within the forest economy, it is worth noting that many other industry sectors have noted shortages in qualified CDL drivers. Our intent is to spread the knowledge gained from this effort to all. More to come on this!
