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4 CapitalPress.com Friday, January 11, 2019 Judge denies H-2A wage restraining order, will hear case A U.S. District Court judge has denied a request for a temporary restraining order to immediately stop huge increases in the min- imum wage for H-2A-visa foreign guestworkers but will consider a preliminary injunction. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly, a Trump appointee, denied the motion from the National Council of Agri- cultural Employers and a Nevada farm. He also denied a Justice Department motion to stay the lawsuit, Michael Marsh, NCAE president and CEO, told Capital Press. DOJ asked for the stay in light of a lapse in department fund- ing due to the partial govern- ment shutdown, he said. U.S. Department of Labor increases in the Adverse Effect Wage Rate for 2019 are now in effect but job orders and adver- tising should state the rates could be “rescinded by court order or other action,” Dan Wheat/Capital Press H-2A visa foreign guestworkers carry ladders to switch picking spots at Griggs Orchards, Orondo, Wash., Aug. 21. Agricultural employers have sued the federal government over large increases in the minimum wages required when guestworkers are hired. Marsh said. “The impending losses from the DOL notice tak- ing effect are substantial and may support the entry of a preliminary injunction, but the court concluded that they were not ‘imminent’ enough for the court to issue a tem- porary restraining order,” Marsh said. The court ordered a pre- liminary briefing schedule, due Jan. 10, for NCAE’s motion for a preliminary injunction, he said. NCAE and Peri & Sons Farm Inc., Yerington, Nev., filed a lawsuit against DOL in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., Jan. 7, seeking to stop AEWR increases for 2019 from tak- ing effect Jan. 9. The suit seeks “emer- gency relief from DOL’s plan to impose arbitrary and unsubstantiated cost increases on American farms and ranches.” Peri & Sons Farm employed 1,768 H-2A work- ers at the peak of its 2018 season in raising labor-in- tensive, fresh-market onions, organic leafy greens, vegetables and rotational crops of alfalfa and triticale on 15,000 acres, the lawsuit states. The farm was started by three Italian immigrant brothers in 1918, according to the company website. “The work is highly sea- sonal and requires far more labor than is available in the community, forcing Peri & Sons to rely on the H-2A … program to meet its farm labor needs. Without the program, Peri & Sons could not continue to operate as a business,” the lawsuit states. The AEWR for Nevada, Utah and Colorado goes up 22.8 percent, from $10.69 to $13.13 per hour. That equates to an approximate $3.7 million increase for Peri & Sons, which “jeop- ardizes the farm’s viability,” the suit states. The suit gives further examples of business-threat- ening increases of $1.3 mil- Snowpack little below normal By DAN WHEAT Capital Press YAKIMA, Wash. — At the start of the New Year, Washington’s statewide snowpack is 89 percent of normal and Yakima Basin reservoir storage is 91 per- cent of average. Government officials monitoring snowpack and reservoir storage say they are not concerned and that it’s too early to know if the status will improve or worsen. “We’re in the normal range. Our primary basins for irrigation supply look pretty good so far this year,” said Scott Pattee, state water supply specialist for the Natural Resources Con- servation Service in Mount Vernon. “I’m feeling OK right now. Hopefully, we will keep water rolling into the (Yakima Basin) reser- voirs and snowpack build- ing,” said Chris Lynch, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation hydrologist in Yakima. The Yakima Basin’s five mountain water storage res- ervoirs were at 405,732 acre-feet on Jan. 1 which is 38 percent of capacity. They are at 91 percent of normal for this time of year. It takes most of the reservoirs’ 1 million-acre-foot capacity and another 700,000 acre- feet of water from moun- tain snowpack to meet the basin’s annual summer irri- gation needs for 464,000 acres of farmland. Precipitation at the reser- voirs in December was 125 percent of average and is 105 percent of average from Oct. 1 through December, Lynch said. “The fronts (rain and snow storms) haven’t been huge but consistent. If they stay steady we should be good,” Lynch said. So far, winter has lacked much lowland snow- pack and significant cold weather. Washington state snowpack Snow water equivalent snowpack by basin percent of normal on Jan. 2 versus a year ago: % of normal * 2019 2018 Basin Spokane Upper Columbia 87 98 101 113 94 88 91 93 113 99 69 88 81 90 61 92 77 84 81 100 86 86 123 105 (Okanogan and Methow rivers) Central Columbia (Chelan, Entiat and Wenatchee) Upper Yakima Lower Yakima Walla Walla Lower Snake R. Lower Columbia South Puget Sound (Cascade crest to lowlands) Central Puget Sound North Puget Sound Olympics * Basin-wide percent of snowpack compared to the aggregate average (1971-2010). Source: USDA NRCS Capital Press graphic The U.S. Climate Pre- diction Center still predicts a 90 percent chance of El Nino with above average temperatures and below average precipitation for the Pacific Northwest through May. Ocean conditions con- tinue to build toward an El Nino but it hasn’t happened yet, Lynch said. Even with high prob- ability of El Nino, Pattee said he’s not worried sim- ply because it is too early. Major snows typically hit the Washington Cascade Mountains in February, March and April. “We got started late. Normally, we start building snowpack before Thanks- giving but we really didn’t, to speak of, until the third week of December,” Pattee said. The NRCS’s highest SNOTEL (Snow Telem- etry) site in the state, at Harts Pass about 20 miles northwest of Winthrop, is at 6,500 feet and is 114 percent of normal at 20.4 inches of water snow equiv- alent. Snow depth is 63 inches, which is 97 percent of normal. Report: Ag key contributor to Idaho economy By BRAD CARLSON Capital Press Agriculture will con- tinue to be a driver in Ida- ho’s economy again this year despite continued chal- lenges related to on-farm income and expenses and uncertainty over exports, economists say. That’s because the indus- try is so large, University of Idaho Agricultural Econo- mist Garth Taylor told the legislature’s joint Economic Outlook and Revenue Assessment Committee. At just over 4 percent, Idaho’s agricultural econ- omy ranks fourth nation- ally as a percentage of state Gross Domestic Product, Taylor said. That doesn’t include food processing. South Dakota leads at 6 percent, followed by Nebraska and North Dakota. Iowa is fifth. Some 20 percent of Idaho sales come from farming and food process- ing, which together account for 16 percent of state GDP and 14 percent of jobs. In an annual report, Tay- lor and fellow UI ag econ- omist Ben Eborn said agri- culture is Idaho’s largest export-driven base indus- try as ranked by base sales, third largest by base GDP and fourth largest by base jobs. A base industry brings new money into an econ- omy by supplying other geographic markets. Cash receipts from the sale of crops and livestock were estimated at $7.2 bil- lion in Idaho in 2018, largely unchanged from 2017, he and Eborn reported. Economic growth from agriculture over the long term comes from produc- tion, not price, Taylor told lawmakers. For example, infla- tion-adjusted sales of Idaho milk and potatoes from 1980 to 2016 rose despite price declines, the report said. During that period, Strong Since 1959 Trusted Manufacturing Diverse Bag Capabilities milk production per cow and potato yields per acre increased by 65 percent and 48 percent, respectively. The dairy herd more than doubled, and potato acreage increased by 2 percent. Idaho farmers face many challenges this year, Taylor said in an interview. They include milk prices at or just above break-even following four years of decline, high world stocks of grain, medi- ocre corn prices that impact much of the agricultural economy and tough export markets. Idaho agricultural exports, which have grown for four consecutive years, will again be slowed by the strong U.S. dollar and tar- iffs, he said. Regarding tariffs, “it’s hard to sort out which will go into effect, which we can go around, and which will hurt us,” Taylor said. 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The meeting agenda covers SWCC reports, advisor reports, Soil and Water Conservation District pro- grams and funding, Agri- c u l t u r e Wa t e r Q u a l i t y Management Program up- dates, and other agenda items. The Oregon Department of Agriculture complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). If you need special accommo- dations to participate in this meeting, contact Sandi Hiatt at (503) 986-4704, at least 72 hours prior to the meeting. 2-1/999 lion to Olson’s Greenhouse Gardens of Salem, Utah, and $400,000 to Tagawa Greenhouse Enterprises of Brighton, Colo. The suit has dozens of other examples, Marsh said. The 2019 AEWR increases, averaging 6.3 per- cent nationwide will cost farms hundreds of millions of dollars when hourly earn- ings for all U.S. employ- ment are up just 2.8 percent and crop prices are level or decreasing, Marsh has said. The Washington and Ore- gon AEWR is set to increase from $14.12 to $15.03 per hour, the highest in the nation. Washington state had 24,862 H-2A workers in 2018, mostly in the tree fruit industry. When Congress created the H-2A program in 1986, it directed DOL to ensure that employment of for- eign guestworkers would not “adversely effect” wages and working conditions of similarly employed U.S. workers. Congress wanted to avoid a wage depression for U.S. workers caused by foreign workers costing less than domestic workers. To that end, DOL created the AEWR based on USDA surveys of prevailing wages by region. The lawsuit alleges that the surveys result in average minimums that, “contrary to statutory requirements,” do not “evaluate whether any adverse effect exists whatsoever.” DOL has made no effort to test for the existence of any adverse effect, the lawsuit states, and instead “assumes adverse effect and requires an AEWR. The department’s erro- neously named ‘Adverse Effect Wage Rate’ is sim- ply a premium wage for for- eign workers, derived from a weighed average across all agricultural work by state or region based on survey data obtained by USDA.” The number of H-2A workers in the U.S., aver- aging just over five-month stays, grew from 48,336 in 2005 to 242,762 in 2018 — a 400 percent increase, the lawsuit states. Assessor: Skagit elk damage could be $1.5M By DON JENKINS Capital Press Skagit County, Wash., farmers may report roughly $1.5 million annually in elk damage by the time a year- long survey is done, the county’s assessor, Dave Thomas, said Jan. 2. The survey is about three-quarters finished, and 77 landowners have reported losses averaging $15,000 per farm. Some farmers sub- mitted comments with their damage estimates, Thomas said. “There are a lot of under- lying aspects to this that aren’t being reported in the survey results,” he said. “The most frustrating thing we’re hearing is that they’re having to go out and repair fences on a regular basis.” The elk occupy valleys in eastern Skagit County and are in a herd that Fish and Wildlife and American Indian tribes bolstered 15 years ago. Elk were rounded up around Mount St. Helens, trucked to Skagit County and released in hills. The herd grew and elk moved down onto private land. Farmers say elk are eat- ing food crops and live- stock forage, damaging pas- tures and destroying hay bales, as well as breaking down fences. State lawmak- ers directed Fish and Wild- life to get elk off farmland. The department has not had any apparent success. The assessor’s office asked farmers to estimate their losses as part of a rou- tine survey of whether their land still qualifies to be clas- sified as income-producing agricultural land. As of December, the county assessor’s office had 99 responses from farm- land owners in the elk-oc- cupied valleys. More than three-quarters reported dam- age, according to the asses- sor’s office. Some specified losses, while others esti- mated losses more roughly. If other farmers report simi- lar damages, losses will total $1.5 million and be slightly higher than Thomas pro- jected midway through the survey. Don Jenkins/Capital Press Elk gather in a field in Skagit County, Wash. Elk damage to farmland there may total $1.5 million a year, according to a survey by the county assessor. Only property owners with land designated for agriculture received the sur- vey. Losses to gardens and other non-farm property are not included. “If others had received the survey, the loses would have been much higher,” Thomas said. Farmers are eligible to apply for up to $10,000 in compensation for damage to commercial crops. Appli- cants must hire an adjuster, submit business and tax records, and open their land to hunters. No one has filed a claim since 2016, Fish and Wildlife reported last year. Skagit County Farm Bureau President Bill Schmidt said filing for com- pensation was a “pain” and that some landowners, including himself, object to opening their land to hunters they don’t know. “I don’t see why we have to do it to get something off our land that’s creating dam- age,” he said. The department should allow landowners to shoot more elk and to increase hunting, with landowner permission, Schmidt said. Efforts to obtain com- ment from Fish and Wildlife were unsuccessful. Fish and Wildlife issues “kill permits” allowing landowners to shoot an elk to curb damage. Among the hundreds of elk in the val- leys, 16 were shot by land- owners with the permits in 2018, according to a Fish and Wildlife report. .COM MFG OF BRUSH MULCHERS | STUMP GRINDERS | DRAINAGE PLOWS BOOM MOWERS | PTO GENERATORS | AUGER BITS & DRIVES TRENCHERS | TREE SPADES | TREE SAWS | LIMB SHEARS AND MORE ELLIS EQUIPMENT 800-949-2336 2-3-3/103 By DAN WHEAT Capital Press
