 photo by TANISHA WALLACE-PORATH |
BY PATTY WENTZ |
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Sen. Ron Wyden, who has long enjoyed strong labor support, is bringing unions together once again. This time, however, they are lining up against him. Wyden is taking heat for helping fellow Oregon Sen. Gordon Smith hammer out a guestworker bill that allows temporary farmworkers from Mexico to enter the country for a limited time. Farmworker advocates say guestworkers will take jobs from domestic laborers and will be unlikely to protest poor working conditions ("Help Wanted," WW, July 1, 1998). While Wyden insists that everything is on track, Oregon's farmworkers union--Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste--says the Portland Democrat took a bad bill and made it worse. There is, however, a silver lining of sorts for PCUN, as the maverick labor group is now enjoying unprecedented support from other, mainstream unions. Union critics of the Wyden/Smith bill say it has several problems. First, they note that the bill was supposed to require farmers to pay a fee that would cover the costs of transportation and housing for the workers. But the funding provision was wiped out right before the vote. The fear is that if the bill went through as is, Mexican workers would have to pay their own way north and find their own place to live. In addition, while Smith first proposed a five-year pilot program that would have allowed 25,000 guestworkers per year, the Wyden-Smith bill proposes a permanent program that would allow unlimited workers into the country. Wyden spokesman David Seldin says the unions don't need to worry. Wyden, he says, joined this battle to protect workers. If safeguards aren't reinstated, he says, Wyden will withdraw his support. "The bill will not become law without the transportation and housing provisions paid for," Seldin says. PCUN President Ramon Ramirez says such assurances are cold comfort. Even if Wyden drops his name from the bill, Smith--a Republican who owns a pea-packing plant in Pendleton--will still be there working on behalf of the growers. "It's the Republican leadership of the house, not Ron Wyden, that will decide the fate of the bill," says Ramirez. "He's not in control. We told him all along: 'Don't submit a bill, you're going to give momentum to the growers.'" PCUN wasn't the only union to tell Wyden that he shouldn't propose the bill. Karla Spence, president of the Oregon Public Employees Union, says OPEU representatives met with Wyden and told him that the only labor-related shortage on farms is a willingness to pay fair wages and benefits. OPEU--which represents state, county and city employees--and PCUN have long worked together, most recently to fight the exclusion of farm and restaurant workers from Oregon's increased minimum-wage law. But last month, OPEU went further, nominating PCUN to receive official support from its umbrella organization, the AFL-CIO. Given that PCUN's critics have charged they don't have mainstream union backing, this support, while largely symbolic, is significant, according to Ramirez; members of Teamsters Local 670 have refused to join the farmworker union's boycott of Norpac Foods. The Teamsters are the AFL-CIO's largest member group. Spence says PCUN has earned the support of other unions. "I would challenge anybody to find a labor organization in this state that doesn't sympathize and support the work PCUN is doing on a shoestring," she says. As part of that support, she says, OPEU will ask national AFL-CIO headquarters to send PCUN some money. In the meantime, she has pledged the strength of her union to fight the guestworker bill. "As we say, 'an injury to one is an injury to all,'" she says.
originally published August 5, 1998 |
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