Street Roots • Aug. 3-9, 2018
Community
Page 7
FARMWORKERS, from page 5
Since the program started, OSHA has
issued 317 heat-stress related violations to
Oregon employers. Of those, 38 violations
were on farms. That’s not counting any
violations that may stem from the agency’s
nearly 80 open investigations so far this
summer. Of the farms that were inspected,
64 percent were in compliance.
Portland-based Northwest Workers’
Justice Project, which provides legal
resources to immigrant workers in the
region, has convened a coalition charged
with improving standards for low-wage
workers across the state.
This coalition, Safe Jobs Oregon, is
hoping Oregon OSHA will create new heat-
stress regulations at the end of its data
collection this fall, said the coalition’s
coordinator, attorney Kate Suisman.
“At that point, if they don’t decide to
make their own rule, we and a few other
groups will petition for rulemaking,” she
said.
While undocumented workers and guest
workers are able to file workers
compensation claims and collect benefits
when they are injured on the job, Suisman
said they typically don’t seek compensation.
“What often happens, as soon as the
worker is released back to work, they are
told there is no more work for them,” she
said. “It’s just known that if you make a
claim, you will lose the job.”
She said for farmworkers who live in
housing provided by their employer, and
who may also be in Oregon on guest worker
visas, the fear of retaliation is even greater.
status, lack of rental history and language
barriers, farmworkers are faced with being
priced out of Oregon’s tight rental markets
given their low wages, according to a report
from Oregon Housing and Community
Services released in January.
“These conditions are exacerbated during
peak harvest seasons. Many Farmworkers
are forced to share crowded housing
conditions because of cost and lack of
options. Farmworkers are sharing homes or
apartments with other families. Many rely
on hotels, garages, and live three or four *
people to a room. Farmworkers have moved
away from areas with agricultural work for
lack of housing options,” stated the report.
hile the labor housing on Thomsen’s
When the agency’s director, Margaret
orchard may be a bit cramped, the
senator said he offers it to his workers free Salazar, spoke about these findings at the
Farmworker Housing Conference, she said
of charge.
in Oregon, the lack of affordable housing is
Oregon farmworkers who are left to find
contributing to farm labor shortages.
their own housing often find few options
Increased U.S. Immigration and Customs
when they enter local rental markets.
Enforcement raids aren’t helping either.
A recent survey of 310 farmworkers
Ramon Ramirez, former director of
across six regions of Oregon revealed that in
addition to challenges related to immigration Oregon’s farmworker union, Pineros y
W
PHOTO BY EMILY GREEN
Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (PCUN),
called the labor shortage and U.S.
immigration policies a potential threat to
national Security when he spoke at the
conference.
He pointed to the early 2017 ICE raid in
Woodburn, which is home to many
farmworkers, and ICE’s employment
verification audit of Canby’s Kendal Floral as
drivers of fear among Oregon’s agricultural
employees.
Federal immigration policy is affecting
every link in the food chain, said Ramirez,
from growers a n d p ic k e r s t o g r o c e r s a n d
restaurants.
“When we put the food supply in our
country in danger, that is a national security
question,” Ramirez said.
If Oregon voters pass Measure 105 this
November, effectively repealing the state’s
sanctuary status law that prevents local law
enforcement from using resources to
enforce federal immigration laws, it will
likely exacerbate farm labor shortages
across the state.
Since the time of Cesar Chavez’s
leadership, fear and uncertainty permeating
immigrant communities has forced an
evolution in United Farm Workers’ advocacy
strategies, said Rodriguez.
“The reality is that probably 95 percent, if
not more, of the workers today in
agriculture are immigrants,’’ he said. “That
wasn’t the case back in 1993. And the
reality also is that they don’t have access to
legal status, and that number just continues
to grow - and it becomes more and more
difficult for farmworkers without legal status
to be able to survive here.”
Rodriguez said that inevitably, anytime
farmworker unions attempt to improve the
situation for farmworkers in California,
Oregon or Washington, employers argue
that any changes will be too expensive and
will destroy the industry.
“And agriculture, at least in the state of
California, has Continued to thrive
throughout the years,” he said. “Somehow
they figure out one way or another.”
The impact on food costs to consumers
has been a popular argument against raising
wages for farmworkers over the years, but
Rodriguez said that’s a myth that’s been
disproven with numerous studies. All you
really have to do is look at the numbers, he
said.
An average strawberry picker, for
example, will pick about 100 flats of berries
a day, with 12 pints in each flat. In season,
assuming each pint sells for about $3, that’s
$3,600 retail, explained Rodriguez.
What the worker is paid for each pint is
nothing compare to the retail price
c o n s u m e r s p a y , h e s a id .
Agriculture labor economist Philip M artin
told the National Geographic in 2016 that if
farmworker wages were raised to match a
$15-an-hour minimum wage, the average
American shopper would pay just $20 more
per year.
A transcript o f Street Roots’ interview
with United Farm Workers President
Arturo Rodriguez is available at
news.streetroots. org.