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Employers want faster verification system for workers


By Anabelle Garay
ASSOCIATED PRESS

4:14 p.m. July 31, 2006

PLANO, Texas – Lawmakers who want to verify electronically whether job applicants can legally work in this country must design a system that is quick and accurate, employers said during an immigration and border security hearing Monday.
A verification program currently used by some businesses has an error rate estimated as high as 20 percent and sometimes take more than 10 days to respond, employers told a subcommittee of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce.

“We need to speed up the process,” said Abel Martinez, vice president of risk management and compliance at San Antonio-based H-E-B Grocery Co.

Many business have declined to participate in the voluntary program. It tries to verify employees' Social Security numbers and check them against other federal databases. But employers say the government databases contain misspellings, have last names entered as middle names and struggle to keep name and status changes updated.

Lawmakers aimed to detect document fraud by applicants and deter employers from seeking out illegal workers by going beyond the current system. In their competing bills, the House and the Senate included requirements for U.S. employers to check the legal status of workers through an electronic employment eligibility verification program.

The new system could extend to more than 7 million employers and up to 140 million employees.

Experts warn employer sanctions don't necessarily deter unscrupulous employers from circumventing the rules. It actually increased the number of employers hiring workers off-the-books, classifying them as independent contractors or hiring middlemen, said Bill Beardall, an attorney testifying on behalf of the Equal Justice Center and the National Immigration Law Center.

“There are employer that seek out undocumented immigrant workers and exploit them,” he said. “There are those who know they rely on undocumented workers and look the other way.”

Dozens of audience members booed when Beardall said employer sanctions need to go along with legalizing illegal workers and enforcing labor protections for all people, regardless of their immigration status.

More than 100 people attended the hearing in Plano, an affluent and rapidly growing suburb just north of Dallas. Held at City Hall, it was a few miles from a day-labor site where contractors frequently stop to pickup workers for construction, gardening and other jobs. Many held signs reading “Secure Borders,” or “No Amnesty.”

“Assimilate, don't come here to bring Guatemala with you. Don't come here to bring Honduras with you,” said Cherie Willkinson, a Wylie resident who brought her two daughters to the hearing. “That's what making Americans so angry.”