October 27, 2017
CapitalPress.com
9
Washington
More farmworker housing planned
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
CASHMERE, Wash. —
The farm labor association
WAFLA plans to build farm-
worker housing in Cashmere
while continuing projects in
Okanogan and Chelan.
Pear growers in the
Wenatchee Valley, from
Wenatchee through Cashmere
to Leavenworth, increasingly
struggle with too few domes-
tic workers to tend and har-
vest crops.
They have been turning
to WAFLA to help them hire
H-2A-visa foreign guest-
workers and would hire more
if they had more housing that
the federal program requires
them to provide.
“A lot of small growers
around Dryden and in the
valley need housing. Brender
Creek is full,” said Dan Fazio,
WAFLA’s director in Olym-
pia.
Brender Creek is a $6
million, 200-bed migrant
farmworker housing facili-
ty in Cashmere constructed
Dan Wheat/Capital Press File
Brender Creek migrant farmworker housing in Cashmere, Wash.,
shortly before it opened in 2015. The facility is mostly full now, and
more farmworker housing is being planned.
with state and private funding
and opened by the Washing-
ton Growers League in May
2015. The League also oper-
ates the 270-bed Sage Bluff
facility near Malaga, south
of Wenatchee, that it built in
2010.
The League reserves
about 10 percent of the beds
at both facilities each season
for walk-in individual work-
ers who pay $8 per night to
stay. The rest is full most of
the time.
The state and Chelan Coun-
ty are working to extend state
funding and county operation
of the 380-bed migrant farm-
worker camp in Monitor, just
west of Wenatchee, through
2019, said Cathy Mulhall,
county administrator.
Preliminary planning calls
for groups of growers to own
a 150- to 200-bed facility at
Apples top crop, but varieties in ‘turmoil’
Value of production
($ millions of dollars)
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
OLYMPIA — Agricultur-
al production in Washington
dropped 1 percent to $10.6
billion in 2016 with apples as
the top value commodity for
the 12th year in a row, accord-
ing to the National Agricultur-
al Statistics Service.
Apples represented 22 per-
cent of the total agricultural
value at $2.39 billion, up 3
percent from 2015 but down 4
percent from the record high
of $2.48 billion in 2012.
Those numbers belie the
“terrifi c turmoil going on
within the different varieties”
in the industry, said Desmond
O’Rourke, retired Washington
State University agricultural
economist and apple analyst
in Pullman.
Honeycrisp,
Granny
Smith, Cripps Pink and Gala,
along with about a dozen
proprietary varieties, are car-
rying the industry while Red
Delicious, Golden Delicious,
Braeburn, Jonagold and Cam-
eo tend to generate losses for
growers but usually not for
packing houses, O’Rourke
said.
The proprietary, club or
managed varieties are con-
trolled by individual compa-
nies and are not open to all
growers. Established club va-
rieties including Jazz, Envy,
Pacifi c Rose, Ambrosia,
Kanzi, Kiku, Autumn Glo-
Rank/item
1. ......... Apples
3. ...... Potatoes
813.3
4. Cattle/calves
704.5
5. .......... Wheat
565.8
6. Cherries (all)
502.7
7. ....... Hay (all)
479
8. ............ Hops
382.2
9. .. Grapes (all)
359.6
10. ...Pears (all)
Capital Press
1,097.3
233.4
ry, Lady Alice, Pinata, Rave,
Koru, Smitten and Opal each
range from 50,000 to 2 mil-
lion, 40-pound boxes annu-
ally in volume and are doing
well while others are coming
along, O’Rourke said.
“Honeycrisp is durable.
No one fi gured it would get to
10 million boxes and still be
selling at the price its selling,”
he said.
Honeycrisp is estimated at
12.4 million boxes for 2017
and usually sells at $50 to $60
per box.
The industry is hopeful the
new Cosmic Crisp apple will
be a big money maker as it
becomes established in 2020
and beyond.
The Oct. 13 report from
the NASS Northwest regional
Top 10
Washington
agricultural
commodities,
2016
Source: USDA NASS
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
offi ce in Olympia lists milk in
second place, after apples, at
$1.1 billion, down 3 percent
from 2015 and at its lowest
value since 2010.
Potatoes moved up 5 per-
cent and one place to third at
a record high $813 million.
Cattle and calves, valued at
$704 million, fell one spot to
fourth, down 17 percent.
Wheat completed the top
fi ve commodities at $657 mil-
lion, up 9 percent.
of Commerce grant last De-
cember to build 166 beds of
seasonal farmworker hous-
ing in the city of Okanogan.
WAFLA planned to kick in
$750,000, break ground in
May or June and be ready for
occupancy in spring of 2018.
The project has been de-
layed by zoning changes
taking longer than expected.
Now the hope is to be open
for the apple and pear harvest
next year but maybe not for
cherries, Fazio said.
WAFLA and others will
shoulder costs of just under
$4 million, he said.
The site is 20 acres along
the Okanogan River in the
north end of town. Zoning
allows a second phase of 106
beds for a total of 272 beds.
In Chelan, WAFLA plans
to build an 180-bed facility
near Chelan Fruit Cooper-
ative’s new packing plant
No. 1. Grower groups have
donated nearly $500,000 in
land and other services for
that project and WAFLA has
applied for a $3 million Com-
merce grant, Fazio said.
The grant could be award-
ed this December but is in
doubt because the Legisla-
ture has not passed a capital
budget, he said. The plan is
for construction in 2018 for a
spring 2019 opening, he said.
The Growers League has
a $3 million grant application
pending for 192 beds for the
$5.3 million Phase 3 of its
Mattawa housing.
Construction on the fi rst
two housing units of the 190-
bed Phase 1 just began a cou-
ple of weeks ago, a year be-
hind the original schedule do
to utility issues with the city
of Mattawa, said Cody Chris-
mer, League housing program
manager. Phase 2 is another
190 beds, and eventually the
League hopes to have more
phases for a total of 2,000
beds, Chrismer said.
Even if Congress changes
or replaces the H-2A pro-
gram, farmworker housing
will be needed, Fazio said.
It’s difficult for the private
sector to invest in housing
when occupancy is seasonal,
he said.
Otto top wheat variety in Wash. survey
By MATTHEW WEAVER
2,389.2
2. .............. Milk
Cashmere that would be de-
veloped by WAFLA with pri-
vate money and managed by
WAFLA.
State grants — used at
Brender Creek, Sage Bluff
and by the League for a proj-
ect in Mattawa and WAFLA
for projects in Chelan and
Okanogan — are restricted to
H-2A and domestic migrant
seasonal workers only, Fazio
said.
The Cashmere property
owners prefer private funding
because it allows them more
options such as housing local
and year-round workers, he
said.
The plan is to remove or-
chard to make room for the
housing after the 2018 harvest
and have it ready for use in
2019, Fazio said.
Meanwhile, WAFLA is
open to more privately fund-
ed projects of 150 to 250 beds
each in the next several years
and is proceeding with plans
in Okanogan and Chelan,
Fazio said.
WAFLA was awarded a
$3 million state Department
The Washington Grain
Commission has released
its survey of wheat varieties
planted for the 2017 harvest
season, and Otto came out
on top.
The top fi ve winter wheat
varieties were Washington
State University’s Otto with
221,975 acres; Syngenta’s SY
Ovation with 189,244 acres;
WSU Clearfi eld variety Curi-
osity CL+ with 155,421 acres;
ORCF-102 with 126,593 acres
and WestBred’s WB1529 with
64,552 acres.
Commission CEO Glen
Squires said farmers plant
varieties with good agro-
nomic characteristics, good
emergence, disease packages
and good yields. The survey
helps identify what’s avail-
able for growers, the indus-
try and overseas buyers.
Other varieties move up
as time progresses and farm-
ers get more comfortable
with them, he said.
Arron Carter, WSU winter
wheat breeder, said Otto is do-
ing well across environments.
“It’s one of those varieties
people can plant and rely on
from year to year,” he said.
In 2016, SY Ovation
led the pack with 248,368
acres, followed by Otto with
221,398 acres; ORCF-102
with 208,608 acres; Curios-
ity CL+ with 144,675 acres;
WSU variety Xerpha with
118,720 acres and WB1529
with 71,184 acres.
In 2017, soft white winter
club wheat Crescent, from the
USDA Agricultural Research
Service, rose to 98,484 acres
over Bruehl, with 55,574
acres.
Last year, Bruehl had the
top spot, with 188,030 acres
to Crescent’s 60,944 acres.
Squires believes the change
was a refl ection of concerns
over falling numbers, the
quality test used to measure
starch damage. Bruehl is sus-
ceptible to starch damage, but
typically a top variety, he said.
For hard red winter
wheats, Keldin came in
fi rst with 100,911 acres.
Limagrain Cereal Seeds’
LCS Jet had 97,830 acres,
followed by SY Clearstone
2CL with 50,006 acres and
Farnum with 30,444 acres.
In 2016, Keldin was tops
with 99,101 acres, followed
by SY Clearstone 2CL with
31,117 acres; LCS Jet with
25,594 acres; LCS Azimut
with 19,025 acres and Far-
num with 17,880 acres.
Louise led the top fi ve
soft white common spring
wheats in 2017 with 56,368
acres, followed by WB6121
with 36,623 acres; Diva with
18,384 acres; WB-1035 CL+
with 18,280 acres and Whit
with 17,199 acres.
In 2016, WB6121 led the
pack with 66,846 acres, fol-
lowed by Louise with 53,712
acres; Diva with 37,158
acres; Whit with 34,661 acres
and WB-1035 CL+ with
22,823 acres.
JD was the only soft
white club spring wheat with
21,477 acres in 2017, down
from 22,041 acres in 2016.
Hard white spring wheat
totaled 389 acres, with 219
planted to WB-Hartline and
171 planted to Dayn in 2017.
That’s down from 2016’s
1,114 acres, with 820 plant-
ed to WB-Hartline and 294
planted to Dayn.
BUYING
or SELLING a
Yakima Basin reservoirs
higher than normal
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
YAKIMA, Wash. — Yaki-
ma Basin irrigators fi nished
their season with more water
in their mountain reservoirs
than in the past two years and
a bonus of 15 to 20 inches of
rain and snow last weekend.
The storm, starting Thurs-
day, Oct. 19, and ending
Sunday, Oct. 22, brought 15
inches of precipitation in the
mountains feeding the basin
and 20 inches of snow in the
highest elevations, said Joe
Gutierrez, assistant river op-
erator of the Yakima system
for the U.S. Bureau of Recla-
mation in Yakima.
“It was a good event. More
than I expected. We’ve had
larger in the past but this was
the fi rst of more to come we
hope. It’s a good start for the
water year,” Gutierrez said.
The Oct. 1-24 precipitation
for the basin is 42.24 inches
or 325 percent of average and
241 percent of the month’s av-
erage, he said.
It added 53,064 acre-feet
of water to the basin’s fi ve
mountain reservoirs in fi ve
days, bringing the total to
361,077 acre-feet, which is
134 percent of average stor-
age for this time of year.
Irrigation diversions end-
ed Oct. 20 with the collective
low point of the fi ve reser-
voirs most likely reached
three days earlier at 306,840
acre-feet, said Chris Lynch,
the Bureau’s Yakima Basin
hydrologist.
“That should be the low
point unless we get dry after
this rain,” he said.
The low a year ago was
244,500 acre-feet on Oct. 12.
Two years ago it was 107,323
acre-feet following the 2015
drought. The 30-year average
low is 261,000 acre-feet.
Full pool of Keechelus,
Kachess, Cle Elum, Rimrock
and Bumping reservoirs is
1,065,400 acre-feet and is
usually obtained before irri-
gation season begins in June.
The system serves 464,000
acres, most of it farmland,
along 175 miles of the Yaki-
ma River in the Kittitas and
Yakima valleys.
The long-term outlook
calls for a La Nina weather
pattern which Lynch said usu-
ally is good news. It should
mean normal to above-av-
erage precipitation and tem-
peratures on the cooler side,
he said.
“It should mean a typical
winter of normal snowpack
and normal is good. But na-
ture can always throw a curve
ball. I’m hopeful we will be
fi ne for the next irrigation sea-
son,” he said.
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