PORT TOWNSEND — Roger Loney, president of Port Townsend Paper Corp., will leave his position within two months to “pursue other business interests” and spend more time with family in the East.

Follows is a memo this afternoon to Port Townsend Paper employees from Dave Stahl, executive chairman:

Roger Loney has resigned as President of Port Townsend Paper to pursue other business interests and spend more time on the east coast where his family resides. His original commitment when he joined the mill in 2008 as Mill Manager was to work in the Pacific Northwest for three to five years.

During the last five years Roger has worked diligently to develop a transforming strategic plan and to implement capital and process improvements to better position the company for success. Notably, he has strengthened the management team, improved the mill safety record, overseen implementation of $33 million in capital, and has led efforts to make process improvements to reduce energy consumption and our environmental footprint. Due to a combination of energy conservation, process improvements and new computer controls, mill-wide consumption of fuel oil was down 20% in 2012 which is the equivalent of eliminating over 20,000 tons of CO2 per year. We also have just completed four years of continuous year over year improvement in measurements related to our environmental performance.

Looking forward and in support of the strategic plan developed by Roger and the management team, this week we placed major equipment orders for our $6.8 million investment in electrical transformers and other equipment.

On behalf of the entire company, I would like to thank Roger for his commitment, leadership and efforts in moving the company meaningfully forward at a critical time in the company’s history. We wish him well in his future endeavors.

Roger will assist us in making a smooth transition to new leadership over the next two months.