Thread: Illegal worker law sees results in South Carolina

Sunday, Jun. 27, 2010
Illegal worker law sees results in South Carolina
S.C. rule kicks in for smaller firms this week
By Adva Saldinger

Comments (1)

South Carolina is combating illegal immigration with a less aggressive law than other states, with the second phase starting this week of a program that politicians and business owners say is working.

Arizona's tough immigration law passed earlier this year set off demonstrations and controversy, while South Carolina's regulation has quietly been putting illegal immigrants out of work, officials say. The South Carolina Illegal Immigration Reform Act, which created the new regulations, was debated intensely but ultimately passed two years ago.

In the first year, the rule - which requires employers to verify every new worker's immigration status and penalizes businesses that knowingly employ illegal immigrants - resulted in citations for about 10 percent of the businesses audited, including about a dozen in Horry and Georgetown counties, according to state records.


The citations weren't significant and all but one of the businesses quickly fixed the problem, said Jim Knight, a spokesman for the state Department of Labor Licensing and Regulation and the administrator of the Office of Iimmigrant Worker Compliance.

"Unlike a lot of laws that Congress or our state legislature might pass, this one is fairly easy to understand and comply with," he said.

The regulation went into effect last year for businesses with more than 100 employees, and goes into effect Thursday for all other companies.

Sen. Ray Cleary, R-Murrells Inlet, said that the law may prove to be the most effective state immigration law in the country without causing the kind of upheaval that the much publicized Arizona law has created.

Other programs have been a burden, especially for small businesses, but once employers understand the requirements there haven't been many complaints, said Brad Dean, the president and CEO of the Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce.

"The new measures have been met with minimal resistance from employers," he said. "It is a first but important step to stopping illegal immigration."

Illegal immigration is a problem that needs to be addressed at all levels of government and the regulation is a step in the right direction, Dean said.

"There has been and continues to be a problem in illegal immigration. A key step to solving that problem is controlling illegal immigration through quick easy regulation of employment status," he said.

Jack Culler, the director of Immigrant Community Access Point, an organization that helps immigrants, said that some immigrants have already left because they haven't been able to find work, and he expects others will leave too once the law applies to all companies this week.

"Undoubtedly it's a loss for the state," he said, adding that immigrants provide a labor force for jobs many locals don't want to do. "It's going to be hard for employers to replace some of the labor that is being supplied now by the immigrants."

Though officials say the new rules are helping, there aren't statistics showing how many immigrants - legal or not - are along the Grand Strand, and whether the regulations are working.

Some business owners aren't sure that the regulations will actually help the immigration problem.

"I myself think it's more just for show," said Mike Callahan, an owner of the Lazy Gator stores along the Grand Strand. "I think it's more of a pacifier for people to say, 'hey we're doing something.'"

How the regulations work and enforcement

In the first year under the new rules, there has been nearly full compliance with the regulations, but as the pool of businesses grows Thursday, there will likely be more violators, Knight said.

The law applies to new hires only, but if an employer finds out at any time that an employee is not legally allowed to work in this country, the employer must investigate and fire the employee if he or she is working illegally.

There was a 92 percent compliance rate among businesses in the first year, which Knight said was not surprising because most large employers have more resources to comply with labor laws.

"A lot of times smaller employers don't have the same resources and as a result we don't anticipate that high of a compliance rate when we start looking at smaller employers," he said.

Businesses that don't meet the verification requirements can face fines of up to $1,000 per employee and if a business is found to knowingly employ illegal workers, it can lose the ability to operate in the state.

Eleven businesses in Horry and Georgetown counties were cited, including stores, hotels and a restaurant. (The Sun News was among those cited.) Fees for the citations ranged from $850 to $42,500, though most fees were waived when businesses fixed the problem. All of the businesses now verify the status of employees, according to the Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.

Through May, the Department of Labor Licensing and Regulation found about 200 violations statewide, with penalties of about $550,000. All of those violations, except for one, were fixed within the first 72 hours and the fines erased.

The department collected $11,500 from a landscaping company in Charleston, the only company that did not comply. That company also had its operating license suspended for 10 days and will be on probation for a year because it was knowingly employing illegal immigrants.

About 23 investigators will audit businesses throughout the state, and because there are 110,000 businesses, not all will be examined.

"We will be going into places or businesses that statistics show employ large immigrant populations," Knight said.

Hotels, landscaping companies, cleaning companies, golf courses, construction companies, some manufacturers and restaurants would likely be on the target list for audits, but all companies should be in compliance.

"I think it's been effective the first year, and I think it's going to be effective the second year," he said. "We have gone in on audits, and we have identified illegal workers working in an establishment. The employer has terminated those workers."

An easy process

Local small businesses that are preparing for the regulations starting this week said that it seems like a simple process that won't have much of an impact.

"It's actually been really easy," said Ed Friend, the owner of Excalibur Construction in Myrtle Beach. "We're very small in the scheme of things because employee-wise we've only got five of us ... hopefully it should be the same for everybody."

Friend has also asked all of his subcontractors to verify that they are legally allowed to work in the United States. He said there are several subcontractors the company works with regularly that has a mix of citizens and immigrants. Friend said that he and his secretary took the e-verify training course and are prepared to use it to verify the immigration status of any future hires. In all, there has been maybe 12 hours of work to get ready for the regulation, he said.

The new rules may also be good for the industry and help ensure that businesses are legitimate, he said.

"It is just another requirement that's out there to make sure that the people who are doing this type of work are doing it properly, and if you want to be doing it the right way, then this is something else you should be doing anyhow," Friend said.

Callahan said the regulation won't have much of an impact because he already checks identification and will just have to do a little more paperwork.

"I'm not hiring from that pool, so it doesn't affect me," he said, adding that most of the people he hires are either retired women from the east or local high school or college students.

Callahan said that immigration is part of the country's history and it should continue to be but it must be controlled better and have stricter regulations.

A potential labor shortage

As illegal immigrants leave the state, they will leave behind job openings that may be hard for employers to fill, according to some business owners and an organization that works with immigrants, whether they are here legally or illegally.

"The jobs that are occupied by the immigrants are probably jobs that people who are born here and lived here all their lives probably do not want," said Culler, the director of Immigrant Community Access Point. "There are some employers that are really going to be adversely affected by it because the labor source is going to be disappearing for them."

Some workers might be willing to consider those jobs given the economic downturn, but some businesses that lost most of their labor force when the law went into effect have had a hard time finding new employees to fill the spots, Culler said.

Sharon Turner, the president of Creative Landscapes Inc., said that while her company has never hired immigrants, some landscaping companies, especially those that do regular yard maintenance, may employ immigrants.

"I think what we will end up with is labor shortages," she said. "Though there's unemployment in large numbers, there's not a lot of people that want to do landscaping work. What it does is it just eliminates the labor pool for our type of industry and why they target us with margins at such low percentages I can't even imagine."

Is it working, is it enough?

Immigrants have left and appear likely to continue to leave as a result of the rules, according to an organization that works with immigrants, and local politicians say this law will be a success and help solve the illegal immigration problem in the state.

All of the immigrants, legal or illegal, that Culler has worked with come to the U.S. to try to earn money and have a better life, so if there is no work, they will likely move on to other states with immigration laws that are not quite as strict, he said.

"They are going to be moving out of South Carolina, I don't think there's much doubt about that. If they can't find work, there's no reason for them to stay," he said.

Culler said he saw many immigrants leave once the first phase of the law was implemented and he expects more will leave starting Thursday, when the law goes into effect for smaller businesses.

State Rep. Tracy Edge, R-North Myrtle Beach, said that while the bill was contentious when it was debated and ultimately passed in 2008 and there were some concerns this year about funding the program, it appears that the law will work to address the immigration issue.

"It certainly was something that the public demanded we do something about, and I think it remains to be seen still if the law is going to do everything it's intended but I think it will," he said. "I think it's going to be a success and do what it was designed to do, which is ensure that employers are hiring people that are legal."

Edge said the reason immigration is such an important issue for people is because taxpayers don't want to have to pay for immigrants who aren't here through a legal process. The issue has resurfaced lately with the passage of the contentious Arizona immigration law, which is the toughest in the nation and aims to find, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants. The law, set to take effect in July, empowers police, after making a lawful stop, to verify the immigration status of people they reasonably suspect are in the country illegally. Opponents have protested, held demonstrations and strongly voiced opposition to the law, calling it discriminatory.

"It certainly has not died down in the public's eye," Edge said.

In January, when the state legislature is back in session, Edge expects that the regulation and implementation will be reviewed and changes may be made.

Cleary said that the law has given employers time to get ready and make changes and is easy to comply with using e-verify, which is accurate.

"I think to be honest it may be the most effective law in the nation," he said. "The federal government has the obligation to create a right way to do it. We can't do that at the state level, but we can make sure employers don't take advantage by doing it the right way."

He said that maybe this law will help force the federal government to better enforce existing laws, create new ones and improve the immigration situation.

Cleary said that most of the illegal immigrants are probably very hardworking people and if the opportunity to work here doesn't exist the immigrants will likely leave.

He said the Arizona immigration law has created a lot of controversy and hard feelings and that South Carolina's approach can be effective and less antagonistic.

"It's a whole [lot] less controversial than what the Arizona law said," he said. "I'm glad that we have an opportunity to see how this law works before we move forward with anything else."

www.thesunnews.com

5000

Originally Posted by Richard

5000

Congrats Richard!

Unless I am missing something here their law is the same as ours (Arizona) that is the same requirment that Arizona employers statewide cannot hire illegal aliens and they must E-verify all new hires. We have been doing that since 2008 and I have probably run 100 people through their system since the llaw went into affect.

Our law is now up in the US Supreme court on a challenge and will be reviewed sometime in the next year. The lower courts ruled our Employer Sanctions law legal but it was challenged and accepted by the Supreme Court.

Originally Posted by jean

Sunday, Jun. 27, 2010
Illegal worker law sees results in South Carolina
S.C. rule kicks in for smaller firms this week
By Adva Saldinger

As illegal immigrants leave the state, they will leave behind job openings that may be hard for employers to fill, according to some business owners and an organization that works with immigrants, whether they are here legally or illegally.

"The jobs that are occupied by the immigrants are probably jobs that people who are born here and lived here all their lives probably do not want," said Culler, the director of Immigrant Community Access Point.

Bull. Those jobs always were done by Americans. Some businesses may have to raise wages and/or improve working conditions. That'll give us all a chance to evaluate how much it's worth, to get Americans working again and to maintain stable communities. There will also be a significant emotional benefit: South Carolinians will see that their state government is once again working for them.

The only problem I can see is that 'Bama's Justice Department is likely to challenge this law, to try to hold South Carolinians hostage to his incessant campaign to legalize all those undocumented Democrats. (He's already doing that in Arizona.)
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