Hollister
– A recent immigration reform agreement reached between U.S.
senators and President George W. Bush could be essential for San
Benito County’s future prosperity, according to local business and
agriculture officials.
Hollister – A recent immigration reform agreement reached between U.S. senators and President George W. Bush could be essential for San Benito County’s future prosperity, according to local business and agriculture officials.
After all, agriculture is a huge part of the local economy, generating $268 million countywide in 2005. And, as many farmers said Thursday, workers – many of them undocumented – are the key to agriculture.
“We definitely need a guest worker program,” retired farmer Peter Graff said. “You’ve got to have labor.”
Al Martinez, executive director of the county’s nonprofit Economic Development Corporation, said that if the federal government doesn’t work fast to ensure that businesses have an affordable source of labor, more and more companies will be moving to other countries.
“Our food production has been heading south, and it is continuing to head south,” Martinez said.
The measure agreed upon by Bush and a group of bipartisan senators on Thursday morning attempts to address the problem by creating a temporary worker program and a path to legal residency.
The proposal would establish a temporary worker program for 400,000 migrants per year; each migrant would receive a work visa good for two years. That visa could, in turn, be renewed three times, as long as the worker leaves the United States for one year between each renewal.
In addition to creating a path to legal residence for undocumented workers through a “Z Visa,” the agreement also includes an “AgJobs” pilot program that would legalize immigration status for those who have worked in U.S. agriculture for at least 150 days over the previous two years.
“Basically, we feel this is a huge step forward for farmworkers in this country,” said Diane Tellefson, executive director of the United Farmworkers of America Foundation. “It recognizes that they deserve the right to earn citizenship.”
Exactly how large an undocumented population lives in San Benito County is uncertain, but Martinez and Graff agreed that it’s substantial.
“Between here, Watsonville and Salinas, there is a very heavy population of illegals,” Graff said.
George Bonacich, president of the San Benito County Farm Bureau, said he’s lobbied in Washington, D.C., for a guest worker program. Bonacich said that although he doesn’t believe national labor shortages have hit San Benito County yet, it’s only a matter of time.
“It’s going to hit us,” Bonacich said. “We just don’t know how severe it’s going to be.”
Craig Ruggleberg, co-chair of the national Agriculture Coalition for Immigration Reform, said a shortage of legal labor has been a longtime problem for farmers. In the last 12 to 18 months, Ruggleberg said, there has been a 10 to 30 percent overall shortage in labor.
He added that those shortages can be particularly hard on farmers, where a few days’ delay can lead to massive losses.
However, Ruggleberg said that although the details of the agreement may change as it goes to the full Senate, he’s confident that progress will be made.
“Something’s going to pass,” he said. “This is the year.”
Anthony Ha covers local government for the Free Lance. Reach him at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or [email protected].
