Thread: Arizona: 2 employer sanction bills clear panel

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2 employer sanction bills clear panel

Associated Press
Feb. 15, 2006 04:33 PM


A committee of the Arizona Legislature approved two proposals Wednesday that would create a state law prohibiting employers from knowingly hiring illegal immigrants.

Some advocates for lessening Arizona's role as the nation's busiest illegal entry point said employers are fueling the problem by giving construction, agricultural and service industry jobs to immigrants.

Illegal immigrants account for 10 percent of all Arizona workers and more than 4 percent of all workers in the U.S. economy, the Pew Hispanic Center estimates.

Federal law already prohibits illegal hirings that are intentional, but some state lawmakers said Arizona needs its own law because the federal government has done a poor job of holding businesses accountable for employing illegal workers.

While both state proposals would prohibit illegal hirings, the key distinction between the two is that one bill would protect businesses from prosecution if they trained their human resource employees to comply with federal hiring rules and if they followed other requirements.

"If you have done everything you are supposed to do, you can't be tagged with it," said Republican Sen. Barbara Leff of Paradise Valley, sponsor of the proposal (SB1513).

Arizona serves as a hub for smugglers who transport illegal workers across the country. Even though immigrants provide the economy with cheap labor, Arizona and other border states shoulder huge health care and education costs for illegal workers and their families.

Public pressure is mounting for state politicians who face re-election races this year to confront the problem, even though immigration has long been considered the sole province of the federal government.

Employer-sanction proposals have failed at the Legislature over the last two years after heavy opposition from the business lobby.

Business groups said the protection in the latest bill was needed to separate honest employers from those who intentionally break the law.

Scott Peterson, a lobbyist for the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said employers aren't opposed to the punishments, but expected reasonable sanctions that wouldn't hurt the economy.

Democratic Sen. Ken Cheuvront of Phoenix, who voted against the bill, questioned whether creating a state law that mirrors federal rules would result in fewer illegal hirings. "This looks like window dressing," Cheuvront said.

Under Leff's proposal, a first-time violator would face civil fines ranging from $200 to $2,000 for each illegal employee. Subsequent penalties could range from $2,000 to $10,000 per illegal worker, depending upon the number of previous violations.

The proposal cleared the Senate's Commerce and Economic Development Committee in a a 5-3 vote.

Democratic Sen. Bill Brotherton of Phoenix, author of the other employer sanctions bill, said the movement for Arizona to crack down on illegal immigration has focused on denying illegal border-crossers government benefits and has done nothing to confront employers who illegally hire undocumented workers.

His bill would carry civil fines of up to $5,000 for each violation. The bill (SB 1216) was approved in a 5-3 vote by the committee.

Lawmakers rejected another proposal (SB1215) by Brotherton that would have required employers to check the employment eligibility of job prospects by running their names through federal databases - systems that are now used on a voluntary basis.

Business groups said the federal government's rules place unreasonable burdens on employers, such as making them scrutinize records presented by new employees to show employment eligibility at a time when forgeries abound.

Farm Bureau lobbyist Joe Sigg said the federal government's employment eligibility system also isn't robust enough to handle the demands of tens of thousands of businesses checking up on their workers.

Martin Thompson, an executive for a meat processing company in Phoenix that has used the verification system for the last five years, said the database is easy to use and that the company's reputation for checking employment eligibility has deterred illegal immigrants from seeking jobs with the company.

It also has led to less scrutiny from federal agents who check employment records to see whether the law is being followed, Thompson said.

"It gives us more of an assurance that we won't have to go through those audits," Thompson said.

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On the Net:

Arizona Legislature: http://www.azleg.state.az.us

http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/hourlyupdate/116039.php

Published: 02.15.2006

Employers not forced to use online immigrant system check
By Howard Fischer
CAPITOL MEDIA SERVICES
PHOENIX - State lawmakers refused Wednesday to force employers to use an online system to check whether job applicants are in this country legally, instead adopting a measure crafted by the business community that one legislator said will do nothing to solve the problem.

The 4-4 vote to kill SB 1215, the identity check, came despite testimony from a vice president for Bar-S Foods on how his company has used a pilot federal program successfully for the last year. Marty Thompson said the system has enabled the meat packing firm to weed out would-be employees who are using fraudulent documents to get jobs.

"It doesn't take very long," he told members of the Senate Committee on Commerce and Economic Development.

But Joe Sigg, lobbyist for the Arizona Farm Bureau, said that system is now being operated only as a pilot project. He said it would collapse if all employers tried to use it, leaving the companies potentially liable for $5,000 fines if they end up hiring someone who really is not here legally.

Instead, committee members voted 5-3 for SB 1513 -- the alternative supported by businesses.

That measure says employers could face fines for knowingly hiring undocumented workers.

But it also says that no penalty can be assessed against companies that fill out the federal I-9 form to show what documents they have checked, keep copies of any documents submitted by applicants, and do not pay employees "under the table" in cash. And all those things already are covered under existing federal law.

"This doesn't really seem to do anything," said Sen. Paula Aboud, D-Tucson. Despite that, Scott Peterson, lobbyist for the Arizona Chamber of Commerce, said the measure has merit.

He said it separates out the good employers from the bad ones. And it also would impose criminal penalties and prison terms on job applicants who use forged documents.

Aboud said that points up another disparity: Companies found guilty of knowingly hiring undocumented workers - assuming any would under SB 1513 - would face only civil penalties, starting at $250, though they could reach $10,000 for multiple violations.

The committee also approved SB 1216 which separately allows fines of up to $5,000 for companies that knowingly hire "illegal aliens."

There appears to be little dispute that illegal immigrants are living and working in Arizona. Estimates by the Pew Center for Hispanic Studies concluded that in 2004 there were more than 500,000 people living in

Arizona illegally, or more than one out of every 12 people here.
Peterson said employers would be more than willing to use some sort of simple computer system - the kind envisioned in SB 1215 - to verify that job applicants.

"That system does not exist today," he said. Peterson said only when there is a fully functional and reliable federal system would his organization be willing to support such a mandate.

Sen. Bill Brotherton, D-Phoenix, sponsor of the mandatory check legislation, said the problem with current federal law - and the business-backed proposal - is that it does not really deal with people who use fake documents to get jobs.

He said people can make up licenses and other cards, pick a phony social security number and get hired. And all an employer has to do now is list that he or she saw those documents.

What the mandatory checks would do, Brotherton said, is tell an employer whether the name on the document correctly matches the date of birth and social security number. If there is no match, the documents may be forged and the person cannot be hired unless and until the disparity is cleared up.

Brotherton offered to alter it to deal with some of the concerns. For example, he said if there is a fear of overloading the federal system there could be a delayed enactment date, or the bill could be narrowed to only cover industries that have a history of hiring undocumented workers like hotels and restaurants.

But Peterson said his organization is unwilling to compromise and try to narrow this bill.