empowering farmworkers to improve their living and working conditions since 1981

Farmworker Advocates Contest Hydroponic Tomato Operation’s Proposed Employment of Temporary Guestworkers

Immigration Labor - H-2A

Friday, 11 May 2012 09:43

The Department of Labor Reverses Course on the Safety of Farmworker Children

Immigration Labor - Labor Law

Tuesday, 01 May 2012 10:18

The Obama Administration has withdrawn its proposed policy change that would reduce deaths and injuries among children employed in industrialized agriculture.  The Department of Labor recognized the need to end the discrimination that for decades has allowed employers in agriculture to require youth to perform especially hazardous tasks that would be prohibited in other occupations. The proposed Child Labor Hazardous Orders (HOs) would have annually saved the lives of an estimated 100 child farmworkers but apparently were scrapped in response to a selfish, disingenuous campaign by some agribusiness representatives.    

Despite their duty to ensure that all workers come home safely, the Obama Administration sided with industry instead of with child farmworkers. One of the most outrageous agribusiness claims was that the children of family-farm owners would be prohibited from performing work under their parents’ supervision. The proposed regulation specifically exempted family farms from coverage and would have allowed parents to subject their own children to hazardous tasks; however most farmworker children don’t work for their parents on a family farm.

In fact, farmworker children work alongside their migrant and seasonal farmworker parents. For decades, agricultural exemptions have impacted the working and living conditions of farmworker children. These predominantly Latino children, many younger than the legal working age of twelve, work for 10 to 12 hour days in excruciating weather conditions, in fields regularly treated with pesticides, and with dangerous machinery and tools. In addition to these harsh working conditions, Latino farmworker children also face language and cultural barriers at school. As a result, many farmworker children do not regularly attend classes and fall behind in their studies. The withdrawal of the Child Labor HOs will continue the endangerment of Latino children and the discrimination against farmworkers in industrialized agriculture.

The proposed child labor regulations attempted to eliminate some of the disparities that exist between the agricultural and non-agricultural HOs. Historically, the agricultural HOs have provided limited protections for farmworker youth with respect to a number of particularly dangerous activities. The proposed regulations –the first revisions since 1970 – would have included prohibiting farmworkers under age 16 from working:

• as pesticide handlers;
• in occupations involving the production and curing of tobacco;
• at elevations greater than 6 feet;
• and in occupations involving the operation of many forms of machinery.

Florida Potato Grower, Contractor Charged With Labor Trafficking

Immigration Labor - Labor Law

Thursday, 26 April 2012 08:36

Farmworker Advocates Say Contractor Preyed on Homeless Men,

Lent them Drug Money at 100% Interest, Left them Penniless When the Season Ended

HASTINGS, FLORIDA – Florida Legal Services and Farmworker Justice filed a federal lawsuit today on behalf of two farmworkers who were victims of labor trafficking and other violations of federal and state labor laws while employed in 2009 and 2010 by Bulls-Hit Ranch & Farm, a potato grower in Hastings, Florida.

The complaint alleges that Bulls-Hit’s labor contractor, Ronald Uzzle, recruited drug-addicted men from homeless shelters in urban Jacksonville, Florida, to form work crews for Bulls-Hit’s potato packing operations.  According to the complaint, Uzzle took advantage of the workers’ drug dependencies to provide Bulls-Hit with a compliant and low-cost workforce, and that as joint employers of the workers, both Uzzle and Bulls-Hit are liable for having cheated them of the wages and for damages resulting from violations of federal trafficking laws and migrant agricultural worker protection laws.  Federal labor trafficking laws prohibit the procurement and exploitation of a person for labor through the use of force, fraud, or coercion.

“This lawsuit exposes deeply disturbing labor practices that should have no place in modern agriculture, but that all too sadly are still employed by the most unscrupulous employers,” said Bruce Goldstein, President of Farmworker Justice, a leading advocacy group for the rights of farmworkers.

Bulls-Hit was also sued in 2004 when using a different labor contractor for similar abuses, including preying on vulnerable homeless workers, feeding their drug addictions, and driving them into debt.

The new complaint alleges that the contractor took the workers to a squalid, overcrowded labor camp, where they were supplied with decrepit housing, illegal drugs, and credit to make drug and other camp purchases at interest rates of up to 100 percent.  When the workers received their pay each week from Bulls-Hit, money was taken from their wages to pay for their rent, food, and weekly debts.  As a result, the workers were left in a constant state of destitution, indebtedness, and undue dependency on their employers. Workers were afraid for their safety if they tried to leave while still indebted, and effectively indentured to their work for Bulls-Hit.

Filed in a federal court in Jacksonville, the suit charges Bulls-Hit and Uzzle with violations of the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act and minimum wage provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.   The case also includes a class action on behalf of all Uzzle and Bulls-Hit workers who suffered violations of the federal Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act regarding wage payment, record-keeping, and health and safety standards, as well as state minimum wage laws.

“Bulls-Hit is now a repeat offender and clearly failed to learn its lesson last time,” said Weeun Wang, one of the attorneys representing the workers.  For their part, the farmworkers say that they hope their lawsuit will deter other employers and contractors from using similarly despicable labor practices.

Farmworkers and Advocates Sue California Onion Grower Over Labor Abuses

Immigration Labor - Labor Law

Monday, 02 April 2012 07:58

Federal Lawsuit Charges Large Southern California Employers With

Wage Theft, Health and Safety Violations

BRAWLEY, CALIFORNIA - California Rural Legal Assistance Inc. (CRLA), Farmworker Justice, and the law firm Nava & Gomez filed a federal lawsuit today on behalf of two migrant farmworkers seeking to create change and recover damages for wage theft and other labor abuses suffered by hundreds of farmworkers at the hands of an onion grower and the grower’s labor contractors in California’s Coachella Valley.

The lawsuit claims that the grower, Calandri SonRise Farms, along with a number of its contractors, subjected the workers to extreme unsafe and unhealthy conditions in its Los Angeles County and Riverside County fields; and routinely underpaid the workers by manipulating their time records and paystubs, and by failing to reimburse them for the tools they need to plant, harvest, and pack the onion crop. The workers were made to live in squalid, makeshift camps on the edges of the onion fields; workers in SonRise’s onion fields resorted to bathing in irrigation reservoirs and other unsafe places because their employer-provided housing lacked running water or adequate toilet facilities.

The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in Riverside, charges SonRise Farms with multiple, related violations of federal and state law. The case includes a collective action under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act for minimum wage violations, as well as an action under California’s Private Attorney General Act that allows the two plaintiffs to seek relief not only for themselves but for their co-workers who suffered similar labor abuses.

The workers and their allies also charge the grower with violating the federal guarantees of the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act regarding wage payment; record-keeping; and health and safety standards, as well as state laws governing minimum wages; farm labor contracting; employee housing; and unfair competition.

“These two workers have stepped forward,” said Megan Beaman, a CRLA attorney representing the workers, “but there are thousands more like them who face the same abuses on the job every day. Growers who play by the rules shouldn’t have to compete with employers like SonRise who try to help their bottom line by breaking the law. To do so at the expense of the health and safety of hardworking farmworkers is just inexcusable.”

Farmworker Justice Urges Legislators to Avoid Creating an Army of Agricultural Guest Workers

Immigration Labor - Other Guestworker Programs

Thursday, 09 February 2012 11:19

Following a hearing at the United States House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary on agricultural guest worker programs, Bruce Goldstein, President of Farmworker Justice, made the following statement:

“While some members of Congress have introduced bills that would expand our nation’s guest worker programs, these proposals are the wrong approach for United States agriculture.  Guest worker programs treat farmworkers as commodities, not as human beings. 

“Since these proposals would encourage employers to hire the cheaper, more vulnerable guest workers over U.S. citizens and documented immigrants, thousands of U.S. workers would be displaced while already-low wages and working conditions for all farmworkers would deteriorate.   And for the undocumented farmworkers who compose a majority of today’s workforce, the proposals fail to provide any pathway to legal status.

“As a nation of immigrants, we should remember that our country’s immigration system reflects our core national values.  The United States can and must do better than these harsh, inhumane and unworkable proposals.  Instead, Congress should adopt a compromise that includes an earned legalization program for the undocumented workers on our farms and ranches.  Such a compromise on immigration policy that will ensure a productive agricultural sector, treat farmworkers humanely and stay true to our democratic traditions.”

FJ Statement on USDA & Federal Contract Labor Law Compliance

Immigration Labor - Labor Law

Wednesday, 01 February 2012 15:17

USDA Withdraws Final Rule Requiring Federal Contracts to Comply with Labor Laws

Following the United States Department of Agriculture’s announcement that it would withdraw its  final rule requiring companies working with the USDA to certify that its subcontractors are in compliance with labor laws, Bruce Goldstein, President of Farmworker Justice, made the following statement:

“We’re disappointed that the USDA has chosen not to pursue this important final rule. We urge them to move forward with the proposed rule.  A rule requiring beneficiaries of federal contracts at USDA to certify labor law compliance should be a no-brainer. 

Requiring labor law compliance would have been a victory for the workers who harvest our food, consumers of government-subsidized food sales and purchases, and law-abiding employers. Consumers of USDA products, as well as American consumers at large, want to know that the food industry is taking responsibility for complying with basic labor protections for farmworkers.  For the men and women working to put food on America’s tables, there are still far too many cases of rampant employer abuse of existing labor laws. 

Workers frequently face exposure to toxic pesticides; sexual harassment and assault; dangerous housing; lack of access to toilets, drinking water and hand washing facilities; and wage theft.  It’s unfortunate that the USDA has put off a chance to curb these abuses.  Together, the USDA and the Department of Labor should look for another opportunity to help our nation’s victimized agricultural workers.”