BAILEYVILLE – Layoffs for the 99 hourly workers at Louisiana-Pacific Corp.’s oriented strand board mill will begin the first of the year, a company spokesman said Tuesday.

L-P announced last week that it would idle the plant Dec. 8 and may resume operations in April. It blamed a shortage of logs for the shutdown.

L-P spokesman David Dugan said Tuesday that employees would continue to work on special projects and maintenance.

L-P intends to operate its OSB mill in Houlton at current levels throughout the winter.

The curtailing of operations comes after the mill’s successful startup in June after 10 months of sitting idle.

L-P’s acquisition of the mill from Georgia-Pacific Corp. in September 2002 had given hope to many that the mill would be operated year-round without production stops.

The OSB mill had been operated on a limited basis for almost two years under G-P, and that company gave pink slips to its 115 workers after the sale to L-P.

L-P is Baileyville’s second-largest employer, behind papermaker Domtar Industries Inc. and its nearly 600 workers.

Oriented strand board is an engineered panel product made of strands sliced from small logs and bonded together.

L-P says it is the world’s largest manufacturer of OSB, producing 6 billion square feet annually.