Street Roots • July 15-21,2016
News
Members of the Oregon Senate Workforce Committee, chaired by Sen. Michael Dembrow, convened May 24 in Salem to hear testimony about
forestry workers’ working conditions.
Migrant forest workers cheated
on pay, labor investigation finds
Laborers shorted $103,000for work on public lands in Oregon, Idaho and Arizona
BY EMILY GREEN
According to the labor department, Alpha
Services failed to keep an accurate record of
hours worked by employees and provided
he U.S. Department of Labor
investigators with records “that showed a
announced in June that its
reduced number of hours, creating the false
investigators found two reforestation
companies owed more than $103,500 in appearance that the piece-rate earnings
covered the rates required.”
back wages and damages to their employees
The violations occurred during 2014 on
for work performed under government
public lands in Oregon, Idaho and Arizona
contracts in national forests.
including the Malheur National Forest under
As a result, contractor Alpha Services
U.S. Forest Service contract and areas
LLC was fined $59,500 in civil penalties,
around Springfield, Ore., under Bureau of
and its subcontractor, Tualatin-based Eco
Land Management contract, said Tom Silva,
Group LLC, was fined $10,600.
Department of Labor Wage and Hour
In addition, Alpha Services paid $66,295
Division district director in Portland.
owed to 57 employees who investigators
It’s the third time Alpha Services, based
determined were paid wages that fell below
in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, has been cited for
the required minimum wages for
violating the Migrant and Seasonal
reforestation work, and Eco Group paid
Agricultural Worker Protection Act, and the
$37,339 owed to 48 employees.
second time it’s been sited for violating the
Reforestation work includes labor-
Service Contract Act, according to the
intensive forestry-support activities such as
Department of Labor’s database.
tree planting and thinning, pruning and
Between 2007 and 2010, Alpha Services
herbicide and pesticide application.
STAFF WRITER
a
was cited for owing more than $5,000 in
back wages owed to 27 of its employees.
Alpha Services, like many other
reforestation contractors, frequently
employs Latin American guest workers who
are in the U.S. legally under temporary
worker visas, known as H2-B.
“Reforestation workers regularly face
language barriers, often fear stepping
forward when wage or safety violations
occur, and have limited access to public
services since they work and live in isolated
areas,” Silva said in a statement. “When
companies fail to pay these vulnerable
workers their hard-earned wages, the Wage
and Hour Division will continue to use every
tool available to protect their rights. We
encourage workers in similar circumstances
to contact us.”
A 2012 survey conducted by the
Northwest Forest Worker Center of 150
reforestation workers employed by 42
contractors in Southern Oregon showed 48
Page 7
percent of workers reported that they don’t
get paid time and a half when they work
more than 40 hours in a week, and 45
percent said they’ve been shorted on pay
during the year leading up to the survey.
One in eight said it happened more than six
times.
Between 2000 and 2014 Alpha Services
has been awarded government contracts
worth $13.8 million, with contracts in
Oregon accounting for nearly $640,000 of
that figure, according to InsideGov.
Labor fines that Alpha Services was
penalized with in the past never rose above
a couple hundred dollars.
Silva said investigators take several
factors into account that could have played a
role in the high civil penalties charged to
the companies at the conclusion of this
investigation, including violation history, the
severity of the violation and the number of
employees affected.
On June 21, the same day the
Department of Labor publically announced
the fines and monies owed to their
employees, the Spokesman Review reported
the two companies contested the findings of
the investigation to a federal administrative
law judge. But they both paid their
employees the money investigators said they
owed.
Alpha Services co-owner Robert Zahaire
told the Spokane, Wash., newspaper there
Was a dispute over how travel times and
breaks were calculated, and that “It felt like
the investigator was overzealous in defense
of workers.”
He also claimed his company was under
extra scrutiny because he often hires H2-B
workers, and that work on federal lands only
accounts for about 5 percent of his
contracts.
Despite repeatedly being cited for failing
to follow labor laws, Alpha Services
continued to win government contracts from
the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land
Management for reforestation work in state
and federal forests.
Street Roots asked both the U.S. Forest
Service and the Bureau of Land
Management if the agencies will continue to
contract with Alpha Services, now that it’s
been found in violation of labor laws for a
third time.
While neither agency responded to this
inquiry by press time, in relation to Street
Roots previous coverage of worker
exploitation and abuse in the reforestation
industry (see “Timber’s Fallen,” Feb., 2016,
at news.streetroots.org), Bureau of Land
Management spokesperson Maria Thi Mai
said when contractors are found to be in
violation of the law, it is noted and taken
into consideration on future deals.
emily@streetroots. org