Packer Daily
(UPDATED COVERAGE, Sept. 22) Any pretense that the Legal Workforce Act would accommodate the needs of agriculture was dissolved with the votes of the House Judiciary Committee Sept. 21.
The mandatory E-Verify bill, H.R. 2885, was approved out of committee by a vote of 22-13. At the same time, the committee approved an amendment offered by Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif.
Berman’s amendment stripped out a provision that would have allowed seasonal agricultural workers returning to past employers from having to use the E-Verify system. The Berman amendment passed 19-12, said Craig Regelbrugge, vice president of government relations for the American Nursery and Landscaping Association, Washington, D.C.
“I think what that does is that it strips the bill of any pretense that agriculture’s problem is solved,” he said. “Even though on the surface it is a negative, it may help us to drive this thing in a direction that it is all about the need to take care of agriculture in a serious way.”
An industry-favored amendment offered by Rep. Dan Lungren, R-Calif., to create a market-based guest worker program administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture was ruled not germane.
“If the (Legal Workforce Act) should pass the House without a mitigation for agriculture, domestic agriculture is in serious trouble,” said Frank Gasperini, executive vice president of the Washington, D.C.-based National Council of Agricultural Employers.
Cathy Enright, Washington, D.C.-based vice president of government affairs for Western Growers, said Sept. 22 that Smith promised to mark up his own agriculture guest worker amendment before moving on the mandatory E-Verify bill.
“That process is stalled which we are taking as a positive sign,” she said. Enright said that Western Growers is working with chairman Smith and Rep. Lungren to work toward an E-Verify bill that would be amended on the House floor.
Enright said Western Growers opposes E-Verify without a workable agricultural program attached to it. She said simple reform of H-2A is not enough.
“We’re not in any way opposing changes to H-2A to make it operate more effectively, but it is not the whole answer.”
In a member alert, the Washington, D.C.-based United Fresh Produce Association said the Legal Workforce Act doesn’t address the needs of agriculture.
“Without an ag worker program, this legislation threatens the viability of fruit and vegetable growers across the country, with significant impact on the entire fresh produce marketing chain,” the United Fresh alert said.
Regelbrugge said the stripping of the provision for seasonal agriculture workers may reduce the likelihood of Senate action on the bill unless there are substantial changes.
With the House in recess until October, it is not known when the full House will take up the Legal Workforce Act, according to a spokesman for the Judiciary Committee.
In a news release, House Judiciary Committee chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, said the mandatory E-Verify bill will help Americans find jobs.
“The Legal Workforce Act could open up millions of jobs for unemployed Americans by requiring employers to use E-Verify,” he said in the release. “It makes no sense to rely on the paper-based, error-prone I-9 system when a successful, Web-based program is available.”
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Comments (19)
Leave a commentlewis
Report Abusehow you pretend to pick all of your harvest?
Jimmy Johnson
Report Abuseare you being a little short sighted Lewis?
who is going to plant it?
who is going to irrigate it?
who is going to QA it?
who is going to load it?
who is going to unload it at destination?
M and M
Report AbuseI worked in AG from the time I was 11, picking strawberries..I like the work but in the early 90's I was being confronted by non English speaking contractors who would state "We don't hire Americans." I was told I needed a "green card" to work in packing sheds and I had to join the Union to work in the fields. I have other friends have recently been told "We don't hire Americans."
I had a landscape business for a while until a person with a pickup load of illegals undercut my price. The person charged $10 an hour per illegal and paid cash to the workers of $3..
I am not buying the "boo hoo" from AG...I like the work..and I did a good job for very little money..so start hiring Americans..I have friend who have shown up in the fields in the past months..and been turned away..
JP
Report AbuseM and M, what world are you living in. As an Ag employer, we have have been trying to hire Americans for years. They may show up for a couple days and then quit. They do half the work of the latinos and expect twice the pay. Truth is our government has set up a system where people can sit on their couch and collect a check equal to what they would get working in a field. Illegals may take construction and hospitality jobs from Americans, but to say they take Ag jobs from Americans is ignorant.
john
Report AbuseJP with this economy,those americans who didn't stay working on the fields for more than 2 days will do now.Jobs are nonexistent.What worries me is that the quality of our food products will decrease because you said they do half of the job that latinos do.
Colleen
Report AbuseJP, I beg to differ. I'm an "American" and grew up in an agricultural community. In my youth and early 20's, I was told repeatedly I was not hired for ag jobs because I was a "white woman" as they put it..their words, not mine. I eventually did get hired, and was as or more productive, than my "Latino" and other counterparts. Over time, I became a labor contractor and got very well educated on the unethical, illegal and political manipulation that pervades the ag worker industry. Anyone is capable of doing this work, all is required are willing workers, willing employers, and minimal training. I assure you, Latinos are not born with field worker skill sets, they learn them like every one else. Stating our food quality would suffer if "Americans" worked in the fields is just plain ridiculous.
bill
Report AbuseI believe that Americans would do these jobs if paid a living wage. Illegals are being paid ten times what they would make back in their home country doing the same type of work. But if they try to raise a family in the USA on what they are paid they are just above the poverty line like any other American would be. The current wage level works only if illegals get the benefit of the COL exchange with their home country. In essence, agriculture has come to depend on a deceiptful and unsustainable labor system that depends on illegal workers and does not stimulate strong communities, local investment, or civic responsibility.
Ali
Report AbuseThe fruit growers in NY are paying ABOVE a living wage and cannot get US citizens willing to do the work. This is SEASONAL work. You are not realistic when it comes to human nature - why work when you can receive a check from the government to do nothing?
Dan
Report AbuseColeen, I can not speak for where you live but i have lived my entire life in an apple orchard and in the last 30 years there has only been 2 non hispanic people come to my orchard looking for work. And as stated above the amount and quality of work they did was pathetic . Attitudes similar to yours illustrates the problem . I do not know ANY farmers (not labor contractors) that would give a hoot if you were female and white if you could prove you could do the work and if you really could you would be by far the exception. So if you want to put in 12 hour days picking apples I know about 2000 apple growers that will be looking for you. My bet is you and the other "out of work americans" don't show up. Then what am I supposed to do?
Frank
Report AbuseColleen,
As a white female labor contractor, what percentage of your workforce was/are caucasion. I have worked in the ag industry for well over 30 years and would find it a stretch of the imagination to suggest that this percentage would be over 1%-2%. We are not talking about high school kids working because their mom or dad knows someone in the industry, but those workers who earn a living harvesting crops.
Concerned
Report AbuseI am very concerned, what no one seems to concider here is the 100's of thousand of American jobs that will be lost when Agriculture farming acreage is reduced. Agriculture starts in the South, works its way North and back again sometimes only 6 weeks in each state so what American can survive on a 6 week paycheck and are they going to move from state to state to follow the crops (even if they would do the labor)? Now what happens to the chemical, packaging, farm equipment, transprotation.. and so on... jobs that our created from the farmers that grow our food when they they reduce volume because they cannot get enough workers to pick the crops. We the people of the Great Nation must demand is a worker program that allows our farming community to grow..... If not we have not seen the worst in unemployed Americians as well as hunger.... I am not a grower, packer or shipper, but I do work for a company that supplies the agriculture segment products accross the United States and will be effected if a reduction in their output occurs.
JC
Report AbuseI wonder about the relationship is between the decrease in labor supply and increased costs? Face it, Hispanics do the hard work that whites and blacks DONT want to do. Look at housing, road construction, ag, etc. There may be pockets of whites and blacks who do the work now, but that is not the norm. I can see contracts going up for highways, bridges as well as costs of food. I may not know the whole bill either.
John Ramos
Report AbuseThere needs to be a formal meeting of the minds. For example. there exist today every type of ag-machinery, planting,picking, and packaging. That is if the farmer will spend the money on them rather than something else.
Another cure is they obey labor laws and e-verify. For example Florida and Georgia were fined by the USDA for paying less than minimum wage, and back pay as well. This goes to show you how concern farmers are about the problem. Note this is not all farmers but most of them.
They want labor, then the USDA should provide for it and keep the books as well. This way the farmers pay minimum wage and up, and we can e-verify those that want to work in a seasonal program. Farmers ,this means paying the USDA minimum wages in advance to provide workers and their temporary housing and transportation, plus new administrative cost for USDA. Either way it has to change. Machinery or USDA program to provide workers. Someone needs to be an adult.
Tony Glover
Report AbuseIf farmers could have possibly replaced labor with machines they would have already done so. I just toured an auto plant with 2500 laborers and 400 robots. Producing fresh vegetables and fruits in the elements for fresh market consumption is 100 times more complex than making a car.
Paul
Report AbuseTony- I disagree with your statement, "If farmers could have possibly replaced labor with machines they would have already done so". Innovation has been stifled due to cheap labor, because there was no incentive to invest in it or demand for it. In the last few years, you are seeing more innovation in agriculture and you will continue to, due to the crackdown on illegal immigrants and reduction in available labor. Yes, agriculture is complex, but innovation doesn’t mean a complete elimination of labor, just a reduction.
The immediate solution is a two step process: introduce and implement a guest worker program that is effective—covers the grower’s needs in a timely manner--with accountability to insure the guest workers are accounted for, and then mandate E-verification. There is no question that the vast majority of domestic workers will not do the work, as long as they don’t have to, and the social programs that provide for the citizens will always be there because of politics.
The short term solution is an effective guest worker program, and the long term solution is greater innovation.
Forums4Justice
Report AbuseSTAND UP AMERICA!!
step #1 http://bit.ly/oBuTUd
Tim
Report AbuseThe bottom line is higher food costs and/or reduced food production in the U.S.A.
farmer
Report AbuseAs a farmer part of me would like to see this everify go forward just to say I told you so when fruit, veg. and dairy prices go thru the roof for the consumer. We can then thank the republicans for it. And I am a republican and am ashamed of it.
Doug
Report AbuseThen you are a fool to remain a Republican. But if you think this is a problem Republicans created, I am afraid you can't see the forest for the trees. The influx of illegal aliens that provided Ag cheap, plentiful labor is seismically changing the US economy ... and not in a good way. Here is a question: what is the unemployment rate in towns like Salinas, Yuma, Yakima, Belle Glade, Watsonville? When a person files for unemployment in those places, what does the unemployment office require applicants to do in order to receive their checks? Do growers stay in contact with their local unemployment bureaus to connect to the unemployed who show up to register? I for one am not at all convinced that Ag is telling the truth when they say that illegals do the work that Americans won't do. That might have been true in 2006 - not now.