Day Laborers In West Palm Beach
Anyone that knows of areas with illegals looking for day labor jobs or companies that hire them should call and report them to ICE. That is how they get their investigative leads. ICE is cracking down now.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/ ... -headlines
West Palm Beach day laborers need a place to go, city and police say
By Jerome Burdi
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Posted July 2 2007
West Palm Beach -- They've traveled across hot deserts in search of a better life, but this isn't what they had in mind: waiting for hours, beginning before the sun rises, until it's so hot it burns. Negotiating their day's wage in a foreign language or getting cheated out of it isn't why they left their families in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico.
But there they wait in an abandoned lot on the corner of 40th Street and Broadway. Their hats pulled low, eyeballing every truck and car that pulls in.
"Do you need help?" they ask in Spanish.
Then they slouch beneath the Police Department's "No Trespassing" signs.
The Broadway corridor is slated for redevelopment and it's unclear what will happen to the workers, where they will go. The Police Department's Latino liaison, Officer Freddy Naranjo, is worried they'll move throughout the city, causing traffic nightmares. He likes that the city's migrant workers are easy to find if he has questions for them.
Fred Farhoud, who works in the convenience store next to the empty lot, said that after 10 a.m. there sometimes are problems.
"After 10, people start to drink," Farhoud said. "They should learn there are no jobs after 10 a.m."
City officials said they are studying a day-labor center similar to the El Sol center in Jupiter. There, if there is no work for the day, laborers can take English classes or clean the center for the next day's lineup.
"There's been a dramatic change in the neighborhoods where these workers used to gather," said Mike Richmond, chairman of the Jupiter resource center and a volunteer at El Sol.
Miguel Lopez, 25, of Mexico, waiting with a group of men, said he wished there was a day-labor center. A sea of heads nodded. They spoke about El Sol as if it were a dream and just as distant.
Immigrant advocates here have been complaining about federal immigration sweeps. Though local numbers were not available, Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said 61 undocumented immigrants were arrested statewide the week of June 18.
ICE spokeswoman Barbara Gonzalez said there's nothing unusual about the number.
"Anyone who's in the country illegally shouldn't be surprised if they are arrested," she said. "We're enforcing the law."
Gonzalez added that ICE does not make random arrests, but relies on investigative leads. She would not elaborate.
Immigration lawyer Aileen Josephs said she is concerned that until a West Palm Beach center is opened, the sweeps will continue.
"When you develop a city you have to develop with what you have on the ground," she said. "You can't develop beautiful buildings and not take care of the people."
