Thread: On New England's dairy farms, foreign workers find a home

On New England's dairy farms, foreign workers find a home

By Jenna Russell, Globe Staff | September 22, 2007

It looks like the quintessential Vermont dairy farm, like a page out of a storybook, with its red barns, rolling green fields, and black-and-white cows. And this farm is also typical in another way: Inside the barns, the men milking cows are from Mexico and Guatemala.

Some have documents that allow them to work in this country. Others do not, said the farmer who employs them. Legal or not, he said, they have improved his life.

"Before, labor was the biggest headache we had," said the farmer, who spoke on the condition that his name and location not be published to protect the farm from investigation by immigration authorities. "Now our life is so much better."

The dairy farms that define the northern New England countryside have come to depend on foreign workers in the past five to 10 years. Farmers say they have faced a crippling shortage of Americans willing to do the physically demanding, round-the-clock job of milking cows and cleaning barns. To fill the burgeoning gap, many farms have hired workers from Mexico and Central America, who often speak little English and lack proper documents but show up on time, learn quickly, and work tirelessly, farmers say.

That pipeline of largely illegal but dependable labor is threatened, however, by paperwork, fees, and government limits on the work that laborers can do and the length of time they can stay, some farmers say. Worsening the prob lem, they say, is a crackdown by federal agencies, felt in the past two years, including heightened scrutiny of hiring practices and a beefed-up Border Patrol presence at the Canadian border.

Critics of the crackdown say the resulting atmosphere, charged with fear and tension, has also eroded the quality of life of some foreign workers, and may discourage others from coming to the region. Many foreign workers stay indoors day and night because they fear discovery by authorities. Some have given up grocery shopping, playing soccer, and walking outside. Although most dairy workers who illegally enter the country cross the border from Mexico, farmers and advocates say that some fear the extra scrutiny found in northern New England, where Border Patrol agents roam the countryside on patrols.

Some dairy farmers, and other concerned Vermonters, shop and wire money for workers and drive them to visit relatives on other farms.

The farmer at the picture-perfect Vermont dairy farm said he has advised his workers not to open their doors to border officials. He does not allow them to work outdoors because he fears they could be caught.

The workers cut through the barns on the property to reach the trailers where they live instead of walking on the road, the farmer said.

"If we had a tunnel, they'd use that," he said. "We have to do a good job on the border, but I don't think we need the Border Patrol driving into the yard, looking for guys who milk cows."

He said agents have driven through his farm on patrols.

Before he hired foreign workers five years ago, the farmer said, he thought about selling the farm because of his labor problems. He said some of his friends "despise" his decision to hire illegal immigrants.

Some Vermonters say farmers should employ only immigrants who have permission to work. Because taxpayers pick up the costs of healthcare and other services for illegal workers, farms can pay them less than a living wage, said Tom McKenna, a leader of Vermonters for a Sustainable Population, a group that advocates for controls on immigration, among other measures.

"When people say they can't get Americans to do these jobs, they leave out the reason, which is that they can't get them at the rate they want to pay," McKenna said. "Why are we coddling and encouraging illegal aliens to come and drive down American wages?"

Dairy farmers say workers earn about $8 per hour and often choose to work 60 or 70 hours per week. Many farms provide housing.

"It's not because they're cheaper," said Sheldon Sawyer, a New Hampshire dairy farmer who employs two foreign men with working papers. "We get them because we need them."

Among immigrant workers, dairy farm laborers are especially likely to lack papers, say their employers. Because dairy farms operate year round, they do not qualify for the seasonal visas that allow other foreign workers to participate in agricultural work including blueberry and apple harvests. New England dairy farmers have urged federal legislators to create a new guest worker program to accommodate them.

In Maine, where blueberry farmers, wreath makers, and potato packers also rely on foreign workers with and without documents, blueberry growers found themselves shorthanded during last month's harvest. Some farms reported that half as many workers showed up as in previous years, said Juan Perez-Febles, who monitors migrant workers for the state Department of Labor. As a result, many berries went unpicked.

Some workers were probably scared off by New England's increasingly strict reputation, said Perez-Febles.

"Migrant workers are kind of an underground community, where news spreads by word of mouth, from brother to cousin to uncle, and my guess is that the word must have gone out about increased enforcement," he said.

Stories circulate around the region about workers who have been apprehended. Police chiefs in Hudson and New Ipswich, N.H., made headlines two years ago when they started charging foreign workers with trespassing as a way of detaining them. Last winter in Ellsworth, Maine, 10 men with no documents were turned over to customs agents after police stopped their van because it had a broken window.

Latino workers are easy for police to identify in northern New England, employers and advocates say, because of the region's lack of racial diversity.

A spokesman for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement said the agency has stepped up its scrutiny of all work sites, focusing on employers who knowingly hire illegal workers. Agents pursue tips, and may go undercover to pose as workers, but they do not round up employees randomly to check IDs, said Bruce Foucart, special agent in charge of New England.

Cases are difficult to prove, he said, because workers present fake documents, and employers often say they thought the papers were real. Employers are not expected to be experts in detecting counterfeits.

"If employers are using documents they've been given in good faith, then they've taken the action they're required to take," said Michael Gilhooly, a spokesman for the immigration agency.

Some Vermonters say foreign labor is essential to preserve the rural landscape. The state lost 2,000 farms from 1977 to 2003, according to the Vermont Dairy Promotion Council.

Residents, church leaders, and health and social service workers in dairy-rich Addison County, south of Burlington, help legal and illegal foreign laborers find healthcare in the face of language barriers and fear of deportation. They have formed the Addison County Farmworkers Coalition, which also lobbies for federal policy changes that would make it easier for foreigners to work on dairy farms legally.

"Vermonters want a 9-to-5 job, and this is 24 hours a day, 365 days a year," said Cheryl Mitchell, a coalition member. "We're spending money detaining people who aren't doing anything wrong except being here to work."

Most foreign workers on dairy farms are Mexican men ages 18 to 35, advocates said. They come to earn a specific sum and then go home, and farmers say they show a boundless appetite for work.

The farmer in Vermont said some of his men were unhappy until he let them work all seven days.

"They have nothing else to do but work," the farmer said. "So I said OK."

Jenna Russell can be reached at jrussell@globe.com.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/artic ... nd_a_home/

"Vermonters want a 9-to-5 job, and this is 24 hours a day, 365 days a year," said Cheryl Mitchell, a coalition member. "We're spending money detaining people who aren't doing anything wrong except being here to work."

TRANSLATION: WE WANT SLAVE LABOR.

Before he hired foreign workers five years ago, the farmer said, he thought about selling the farm because of his labor problems. He said some of his friends "despise" his decision to hire illegal immigrants.

TRANSLATION: I AM NOT SMART ENOUGH TO STAY IN BUSINESS WITHOUT BREAKING THE LAW.

Just like the New York apple farmers, they are making excuses for breaking the law. The American people, meanwhile, have to subsidize social services and education of these illegals, not the mention the crime rates against American citizens.


NO TEARS HERE!

Originally Posted by CCUSA

Just like the New York apple farmers, they are making excuses for breaking the law. The American people, meanwhile, have to subsidize social services and education of these illegals, not the mention the crime rates against American citizens.


NO TEARS HERE!

How long do you think it will take them to start seeing the turnaround in their town?
How long will it be before these illegal men start bringing in wives? and girlfriends and dropping anchors for the kind townsfolk to support.

I give it one year before they see what they've invited in.Less than a year for some entreprenuerial illegal to open a business there.

Head 'em up,move 'em out Rawhide!