November 18, 2016
CapitalPress.com
3
Fruit grower claims DOL harassment
Capital Press
Dan Wheat/Capital Press File
Ernie del Rosario at his orchard fence that is the U.S.-Canadian
border on Feb. 25, 2014. At left is his apple orchard. At right is a
Canadian vineyard and the Canadian town of Osoyoos. Del Rosa-
rio, 80, believes he was unfairly treated by the U.S. Department of
Labor during an investigation.
Area in
Wash. detail
CANADA
3
Osoyoos
Oroville
Palmer
Lake
97
r
Del Rosario
orchard near
international
border with
Canada
Ri v e
torney. Monahan advised del
Rosario to turn over all perti-
nent records, which he did.
“There’s
disagreement
over how hours are calculat-
ed and we are in the process
of checking DOL’s math,”
Monahan said on Nov. 14,
the day he also submitted his
fi rst written responses to a
four-hour preliminary fi nding
hearing that involved him, del
Rosario and Walum on Nov.
3.
Monahan and Kay would
not disclose the prelimi-
nary fi ndings, but del Rosa-
rio said DOL wants him to
pay $122,000 in wages for
21 H-2A workers that DOL
claims he fi red. But he says
they were not ill-treated but
walked off the job in violation
of H-2A rules.
The department is also
seeking $64,000 for workers
who complained they worked
more than 10 hours per day
but were only paid for eight,
del Rosario said. Records
show they only worked eight,
he said.
A foreman and irrigator
worked and were paid for 10
to 12 hours per day and be-
Okano n
ga
ELLISFORDE, Wash. —
A tree fruit grower who lost
his workforce after a 2013
federal immigration audit
says a separate labor investi-
gation is holding him liable
for $186,000 in wages he
doesn’t owe.
Ernie del Rosario also says
Seattle-based U.S. Depart-
ment of Labor Wage and Hour
Division investigator Kather-
ine Walum violated agency
procedure by trespassing on
his orchard to talk to workers
and “barged” into his house to
harass his wife for payroll in-
formation on Sept. 23, 2014.
“It was breaking and en-
tering without a warrant. My
wife said, ‘You have to give
me time.’ But the investiga-
tor said, ‘Now or I call a U.S.
marshal,’” del Rosario said.
DOL “strongly refutes” the
allegations of harassment and
illegally entering the del Ro-
sario home but will not com-
ment on active investigations,
said Leo Kay, a DOL spokes-
man in San Francisco.
Del Rosario said he does
not know if the unannounced
inspection was connected to
a U.S. Immigration and Cus-
toms Enforcement audit on
Nov. 5, 2013. In that case,
ICE ultimately required him
to fi re 65 of his 66 workers for
mis-matching identifi cation
documents, indicating they
were probably illegal immi-
grants.
After struggling with too
few workers the next spring,
del Rosario began hiring 50 to
60 H-2A visa foreign guest-
workers annually for his 670-
acre Northwestern Orchards
north of Tonasket in Okano-
gan County, Wash.
Within days of the DOL
inspection, del Rosario hired
Brendan Monahan, a Yakima
agricultural labor and crop at-
OKANOGAN
NAT’L
FOREST
OKANOGAN
N
97
Omak
20
20
Okanogan
5 miles
155
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
cause of that DOL says the
rest of the crew should be
paid for the same hours even
though they didn’t work them,
he said.
When the 21 workers left,
he had to hire more workers
and paid a 33 percent manage-
ment fee to a labor contractor,
del Rosario said.
“In the last 30 years, we’ve
paid over $9 million in taxes
and this is what we get?” del
Rosario asked. “I want ev-
eryone to know what’s being
done to us. This is wrong.”
Wage and Hour investiga-
tions usually begin from tips
or random inspections, Kay
said.
Investigators
interview
workers, owners, managers
and review fi les before de-
termining if back wages are
owed, Kay said.
“We show the utmost re-
spect to workers and business
owners alike with a bottom
line goal of ensuring all work-
ers get paid according to fed-
eral labor law,” he said.
Alleged potential civil vio-
lations of the Fair Labor Stan-
dards Act, the Migrant and
Seasonal Agricultural Worker
Protection Act and H-2A reg-
ulations are all in play, Mona-
han said.
“Under consideration is
everything from whether or
not wages were correctly cal-
culated and paid to whether
garbage can lids were ap-
propriately affi xed. We’re
responding to a broadly
structured investigation,” he
said.
Monahan would not com-
ment on what triggered the
inspection and investigation.
He would not comment on
whether Walum trespassed
on the orchard, broke into del
Rosario’s home and harassed
his wife.
“I handle wage and hour
audits for growers and in the
vast majority of cases the in-
vestigation is initiated and
concluded within a three- to
nine-month period. This one
is unusually long,” Monahan
said.
The closing conference,
which took four hours, was
unusually long, he said, while
declining comment on why.
Monahan said he expects
fi ndings from DOL in two to
three months that del Rosario
will likely appeal.
Fallout over water ruling heats up in Washington
Rural senators eye
legislation
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
OLYMPIA — Several
senators criticized Tuesday a
recent Washington Supreme
Court decision that threatens
to halt home building in farm
communities and said they
will try to counteract the deci-
sion in the upcoming legisla-
tive session.
“It’s totally ridiculous,
what’s going on. It’s killing
rural America,” said Repub-
lican Sen. Brian Dansel, who
represents the state’s sparsely
populated northeastern corner.
The 6-3 ruling in Hirst v.
Whatcom County in October
struck down the routine ap-
proval of new domestic wells.
It also gave the 2017 Legisla-
ture another major battle along
rural and urban lines.
The issue of whether
wells can be drilled in places
not served by waterlines has
“bumped its way to the top
of our list,” said Moses Lake
Republican Judy Warnick,
chairwoman of the Senate Ag-
riculture, Water and Rural De-
velopment Committee.
The committee was briefed
on the ruling by the Depart-
ment of Ecology and others.
Domestic wells statewide are
responsible for 1 percent of
water consumption, and Ecol-
ogy said new wells for sin-
gle-family homes were OK in
Whatcom County.
The high court, however,
agreed with the environmental
group Futurewise and other
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
Washington state Sen. Brian Dansel, R-Republic, gestures during
a meeting Nov. 14 in Olympia of the Senate Agriculture, Water and
Rural Development Committee. Dansel warned that if left in place
a recent decision by the state Supreme Court could halt develop-
ment in rural areas.
plaintiffs that cumulatively
new wells could cut into ex-
isting water rights, including
minimum stream fl ows for
fi sh.
The ruling jeopardizes
home building statewide.
Prospective
homebuilders
may have to prove to county
building departments that their
wells won’t harm other users,
a potentially expensive and
diffi cult undertaking for resi-
dents and counties.
The Washington Farm Bu-
reau and other groups have
condemned the decision for
dashing the dreams of rural
homeowners.
“I can’t overstate the im-
pact of this decision on av-
erage people,” Washington
Realtors policy director Bill
Clarke said.
Ecology water resources
manager Dave Christensen
told the committee that the
agency has been receiving
dozens of calls a day from
worried residents. “Landown-
ers are upset and concerned,”
he said.
Sen. Jim Honeyford,
R-Sunnyside, said the Hirst
decision would force people
to live in crowded cities.
“That’s really not the life a
lot of Washingtonians want to
have, but that seems to be the
end goal of what’s happening
here,” he said.
Futurewise state policy di-
rector Bryce Yadon said in an
interview that the group wants
to protect senior water rights,
not end rural homebuilding.
The Hirst decision, he said,
“doesn’t shut down rural de-
velopment. It just makes sure
it’s not occurring in inappro-
priate areas because there is
no water.”
Yadon said lawmakers
could help rural homebuild-
ers by setting up a process for
fi nding water for new wells.
“It’s a great area for the Legis-
lature to step in,” he said.
The session was tilted
heavily toward nullifying the
ruling with legislation. War-
nick said she expects a long
and complicated battle once
the session begins.
“I think they (environmen-
tal groups) are probably more
than pleased about the deci-
sion,” she said. “We’re look-
ing at less than 1 percent of the
water usage. It makes wonder.
It really does.”
Futurewise was founded
more than 25 years to support
the state’s Growth Manage-
ment Act. One of the group’s
goals is to concentrate growth
in cities, according to its web-
site.
Whatcom County Execu-
tive Director Jack Louws said
county offi cials are hearing
from people who spent their
savings on land and hoped to
build.
“I want you to know the
calls are heart breaking,” he
told senators.
Sean Ellis/Capital Press FIle
People stroll in downtown Boise Sept. 24. A USDA study found
that while rural and urban economies have rebounded from the
recession, rural areas still have not reached pre-recession levels.
Rural areas lag in
economic recovery,
USDA study shows
Growth in urban
areas more robust,
USDA fi nds
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
Employment in rural ar-
eas has improved in recent
years but hasn’t returned
to pre-recession levels and
lags employment growth in
urban regions, according to
USDA.
The agency’s new re-
port, “Rural America at a
Glance,” shows that while
the economy has stabilized
for many rural residents,
their urban counterparts are
experiencing a more robust
recovery.
Between 2013 and 2015,
rural employment rose 1.3
percent and grew 0.5 percent
in the fi rst half of 2016, but
it’s still lower than in 2007,
when the “Great Recession”
began, the report said.
“Meanwhile, urban em-
ployment has risen more
than twice as rapidly in re-
cent years and was 4 per-
cent above its 2007 level by
2015,” the report said.
The percentage of people
working or actively seeking
work, known as labor force
participation, has declined
in both urban and rural areas
in recent years.
While labor force partic-
ipation in rural areas is con-
sistently lower than in urban
areas, this “refl ects the fact
that a larger share of rural
adults are older than the typ-
ical working age,” the report
said.
Rural residents have
narrowed the gap in medi-
an earnings with their ur-
ban counterparts, but that’s
largely because earnings fell
more steeply in cities during
the recession and haven’t
yet fully rebounded, the re-
port said.
Earnings in rural areas
were 16 percent lower than
in urban areas in 2015, com-
pared to 23 percent lower in
2007.
In terms of household in-
come, rural counties depen-
dent on recreation have gen-
erally fared the economic
downturn better than others,
but agriculture- and min-
ing-reliant counties outper-
formed those dependent on
manufacturing, government
payments or that aren’t spe-
cialized, the USDA found.
“The highest poverty
rates and the lowest medi-
an household incomes are
in those county types not
associated with a clear pri-
vate-sector economic base
— that is, non-specialized
and government-dependent
counties,” according to the
report.
Urban population growth
has outpaced rural population
growth since the recession.
The number of people in
urban areas has increased 8
percent since the recession,
while the number in rural
areas is up only half a per-
centage point, USDA found.
With about 46.2 million
people, rural areas are home
to just 14 percent of the U.S.
population but represent
about 72 percent of its land
mass.
“Across many rural re-
gions, slow rates of popula-
tion growth from natural in-
crease (births minus deaths),
together with net population
losses from migration, are
netting little or no growth
in the total rural population,
with signifi cant declines in
some rural areas,” the report
said.
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