FORT KENT – The Legislature’s Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry Committee will hold a daylong hearing on new payment models for the logging industry on Friday, Sept. 12, at the University of Maine at Fort Kent.

The hearing comes from legislation sponsored by state Reps. Troy Jackson, an independent from Fort Kent; William Smith, D-Van Buren; Rosaire Paradis, D-Frenchville, and Sen. John L. Martin, D-Eagle Lake. The legislation looks to set rates for harvesting and handling of lumber from Maine forests and to allow loggers the right to have collective bargaining.

The committee will hear testimony on logging and trucking rates, collective bargaining, independent contractor status, new scaling methods, timely payment, bonded labor and other logging issues.

The session, which starts at 10 a.m., will be held in the Nadeau Conference Room at the University of Maine at Fort Kent.

“Although this stems from legislation proposed by us, this was actually born after the blockade of roads we did on the border,” Jackson, a logger, said Saturday afternoon. “This involves recommendations made by a round-table committee on logging.

“We are bringing Augusta to the St. John Valley because loggers cannot always travel to Augusta to make their views known,” the legislator said. “Unlike landowners and large contractors, independent loggers don’t have lobbyists and money to pay people to attend hearings in Augusta.”

Jackson was one of the leaders of loggers who blockaded roads along the Maine-Quebec border about five years ago. Still a delimber operator for Pelletier Logging Inc. of Allagash, Jackson was elected to the Legislature in the last election. A delimber operator runs a machine that removes branches from harvested trees.

When a hearing was held in Augusta on LD 1318, about 50 northern Maine loggers attended the session, and several testified. The House of Representatives passed LD 1318, but it was stalled and passed on to the next regular session by the Senate.

“Collective bargaining is important for loggers,” Jackson said Saturday after spending the day posting notices about the hearing along Route 11 at Ashland and Portage. “I’m hoping to have a large number of loggers attend the session at Fort Kent.

“This can make a big difference for them to have the committee hear firsthand testimony,” Jackson said. “This is the best possible chance for the loggers to be heard.”

Jackson said landowners, logging mills and contractors also will be at the hearing.

By order of a joint resolution in the Legislature, the committee is directed to examine how logging contractors and their employees are paid, the impact of public policies on forest management, and state labor and educational policies pertaining to logger apprenticeship programs.

The committee will submit a report to the Legislature by Dec. 3.

In his arguments, Jackson cites a 1999 Pan-American Study on Bonded Labor. He said the study, based on information from the last two decades, shows that landowner profits have risen 169 percent, while worker productivity has gone up 74 percent. During the same period, he said, workers’ wages have fallen 32 percent.

The agenda for Friday’s hearing includes a history and information session at 10 a.m., public comment and discussion starting at 1 p.m. and committee discussion from 4 p.m.

People who cannot attend the hearing can submit written comments to the committee, the legislator said.