The Chasm lumber mill will close in September, and the questions for people in Clinton, like many other affected communities, is what’s next?

Mayor Susan Swan says nearby hiking trails and mountain biking opportunities will bring in revenue to the village coffers, but it won’t be close to the same degree as the lumber mill did.

She says the village was in the middle of a five year economic development plan, when news of the closure first broke.

“We have surveys going out to all of our residents, and this is obviously something that is going to change those survey questions a little bit, but hopefully we’ll get enough feedback from our residents to give us some direction,” she said.

Another possible option could be exploring commercial hemp production and processing, an idea also raised by TNRD area director Sally Watson.

“A couple of us were sitting around talking about hemp and hemp production and using hemp fibre and somebody said, ‘yeah, we need to have somewhere to process it,.'” noted Swan. “Is that an option? I don’t know.”

As for how residents have been handling the closure, set to take place sometime in September, which will leave 176 people out of a job.

“It’s just all too fresh. We haven’t really had time to process it.”