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The Day-Labor Shuffle
A center is neither here nor there. So says the city of Gaithersburg.

Monday, September 25, 2006; A20



GAITHERSBURG is a city of 58,000 people shoehorned into 10 square miles in upper Montgomery County; wherever you are, you are never very far from homes, schools and businesses. That, in a nutshell, is the excuse city officials give to explain why they have failed to find a site for a badly needed day-labor center to handle the scores of immigrant workers who congregate each morning looking for jobs. Even after examining some 30 sites over the past nine months, the city has come up empty-handed: Some prospective neighbors, it seems, always object.

The obvious answer is that it's time for city officials -- Mayor Sidney A. Katz and the five members of the City Council -- to exercise leadership by picking a site, making their case and settling a problem that should have been settled months ago. Instead, they seem more inclined to throw up their hands, declare defeat and beg Montgomery County to deal with the problem. That is an unacceptable abdication of responsibility.

Gaithersburg's dilemma is no different from that of other growing suburban localities in this area and elsewhere, where day laborers -- most of them Hispanic and many of them illegal immigrants -- are in demand. Like it or not, they are an integral part of the local economy, and their services are welcomed as house painters, construction workers, landscapers and odd-jobbers. Like other jurisdictions, Gaithersburg has been saddled with a problem that is the product of the federal government's failed immigration policies. But also like other jurisdictions, Gaithersburg must make accommodations for a group of workers from whom the city and its residents clearly benefit.

A year ago the city seemed on its way toward doing just that. It had chosen a site -- a disused water treatment facility -- to convert to a day-labor center. The site was just across the street from the parking lot where the workers had gathered daily for months. The county had leased the new site and was prepared to renovate it. All systems go -- until some neighbors complained that there had not been adequate notice.

Back at square one, officials scoured the city for a better site. But this one was too close to a school, that one too near homes, the other one adjacent to stores. The problem became a crisis last week when the city, acting on behalf of the owners of the parking lot where the workers gather, sent in the police to enforce trespassing laws.

In Silver Spring and Wheaton, Montgomery County has been operating day-labor centers for some time, without incident. Gaithersburg should take its cue from those. As the city itself has recognized in principle, a day-labor center makes eminent good sense; it would move the workers indoors and provide an organizational structure, toilets and possibly classrooms to teach English. A center could still be established at the county-leased site, but the city objects. A Catholic church not far away is also offering some of its property -- but the city objects to that, too. Wouldn't it make more sense for the city to say what it will do and stop saying what it won't?