Thread: Campaign to tout role of Hispanic workers

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Campaign to tout role of Hispanic workers
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
ROY L. WILLIAMS
News staff writer
Metro Birmingham's construction building boom has been good news for Jose Martinez.

His company, Martinez Masonry Arts, has 30 Hispanic workers laying brick and pouring concrete at job sites from Westside Baptist Church in Alabaster to Bright House Network's new operations center in East Lake.

The role of Hispanic immigrants like those who work for Martinez, a Mexico native reared in Los Angeles, are being touted by two Birmingham-based trade groups participating in a national effort to promote the importance Hispanics are playing in the construction industry.

Bill Caton, spokesman for the Alabama chapter of the Associated General Contractors, says Hispanics have filled 40 percent of new jobs on building projects. As Congress debates a controversial immigration reform bill, Caton said the AGC is joining its national office in an expanded role as advocates for the Hispanic population.

Among proposals by the AGC and Associated Builders & Contractors are implementation of a reasonable guest worker program that stops the incentive to sneak across the U.S. border, offer earned citizenship to immigrants who voluntarily come forward.

Martinez, who has worked in construction most of his adult life, formed his company 10 years ago. "I'm pleased that companies have reached out to us and supported us," he said.

To attract more Hispanic workers, the AGC program will include a quarterly bilingual publication extolling the virtues of the association and the commercial construction industry, brochures in Spanish and English designed to brand the AGC with the work force and employment opportunities with its member companies.

The AGC and ABC both provide English-speaking help for Hispanic workers and free OSHA safety courses in Spanish. ABC recently hired Tressie Hird to oversee its training efforts for Hispanics.

Caton said the program is part of an overall plan to help solve work force shortages. The national AGC estimates the construction industry will need 300,000 workers a year to keep up with demand.

"We are focusing on bilingual publications because we don't want to ignore a large percentage of our potential work force," Caton said. "We must face the fact that the Latino work force is a crucial part of our economy and we must develop a realistic way to deal with it. The construction industry - among others - is dependent on these skilled workers. At less than 4 percent unemployment, these people are not taking jobs away from anyone."

The Alabama AGC has developed bilingual recruiting materials and has joined forces with KPI Latino, a Hispanic marketing group. Hernan Prado, president of KPI Latino, applauded both construction groups for actively supporting Hispanic immigrants.

"The construction industry understands the important economic role Latinos are playing in our community," said Prado, who immigrated to Birmingham from Ecuador 11 years ago.

Jay Reed, vice president of ABC, said contractors are getting confused as several states have passed laws addressing immigration as talks have stalled in Washington, D.C. Next Tuesday, his group and Bradley Arant law firm will host a seminar aimed at educating members about the issue.

E-mail: rwilliams@bhamnews.com

The construction industry - among others - is dependent on these skilled workers.

Tell the truth, what you're dependent on is "cheap labor."

Tell the truth, what you're dependent on is "cheap labor

Now that's the truth. I hate when they do that like as if a vast majority of our population just vanished off the face of the earth and if it weren't for them.......lordy where would we be?