By STEVE MARRONI
Evening Sun Reporter
Article Launched: 03/30/2008 04:05:45 AM EDT
Kay Hollabaugh's jaw dropped when she learned this week that the state's largest tomato grower would not plant a crop this year because there might be too few workers to harvest it.
It begs the question, she said, if the day will ever come when Adams County's fruit growers face a similar decision.
And while Hollabaugh Bros. Fruit Farm and Market outside of Biglerville has not had to take such a drastic step, Kay Hollabaugh said she's noticed fewer and fewer migrant workers, most of whom are Mexican, coming back to the orchard each year.
"I'm very fearful of what the future holds for us," she said. "Agriculture is a hands-on business, and if we can't get people to do the hands-on labor, we will go out of business."
It's a frightening trend, she said - a trend that could slow production.
But American consumers will still need to eat.
Continued...
Monday, March 31, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Major Grower Ends Crop, Lacking Workers
By MICHAEL RUBINKAM – 17 hours ago
CLARKS SUMMIT, Pa. (AP) — Saying the nation's immigration system is broken, Pennsylvania's largest grower of fresh-to-market tomatoes announced Monday he will no longer produce the crop because he can't find enough workers to harvest it.
Keith Eckel, 61, a fourth-generation farmer and the owner of Fred W. Eckel Sons Farms Inc., said he saw a dramatic decline last summer in the number of migrant workers who showed up to pick tomatoes at his 2,000-acre farm in northeastern Pennsylvania.
He said Congress' failure to approve comprehensive immigration reform had hindered his ability to hire enough workers to get his crop to the market. Most of Eckel's workers came from Mexico.
"There are a number of workers hesitant to travel, legal or illegal, because of the scrutiny they are now under," said Eckel, whose tomatoes have been shipped to supermarkets and restaurants throughout the eastern United States. "So there are less workers crossing state lines."
Eckel, who planted 2.2 million tomato plants last year, said he also will stop growing pumpkins and will plant half as much sweet corn as usual, resulting in a loss of nearly 175 jobs.
Eckel, one of the largest growers of fresh tomatoes in the Northeast, said it cost him $1.5 million to $2 million to plant and harvest a tomato crop — too much of an investment to risk not having enough workers at harvest time.
"The system to provide our labor is broken and the emotion surrounding the immigration issue is standing in the way of those in the political arena moving forward to solve it," Eckel told a news conference at his farm in Clarks Summit.
Continued...
CLARKS SUMMIT, Pa. (AP) — Saying the nation's immigration system is broken, Pennsylvania's largest grower of fresh-to-market tomatoes announced Monday he will no longer produce the crop because he can't find enough workers to harvest it.
Keith Eckel, 61, a fourth-generation farmer and the owner of Fred W. Eckel Sons Farms Inc., said he saw a dramatic decline last summer in the number of migrant workers who showed up to pick tomatoes at his 2,000-acre farm in northeastern Pennsylvania.
He said Congress' failure to approve comprehensive immigration reform had hindered his ability to hire enough workers to get his crop to the market. Most of Eckel's workers came from Mexico.
"There are a number of workers hesitant to travel, legal or illegal, because of the scrutiny they are now under," said Eckel, whose tomatoes have been shipped to supermarkets and restaurants throughout the eastern United States. "So there are less workers crossing state lines."
Eckel, who planted 2.2 million tomato plants last year, said he also will stop growing pumpkins and will plant half as much sweet corn as usual, resulting in a loss of nearly 175 jobs.
Eckel, one of the largest growers of fresh tomatoes in the Northeast, said it cost him $1.5 million to $2 million to plant and harvest a tomato crop — too much of an investment to risk not having enough workers at harvest time.
"The system to provide our labor is broken and the emotion surrounding the immigration issue is standing in the way of those in the political arena moving forward to solve it," Eckel told a news conference at his farm in Clarks Summit.
Continued...
Monday, March 24, 2008
Comprehensive plan needed on immigration
March 23, 2008
In place of meaningful immigration reform, both conservative and liberal politicians have hatched piecemeal plans. This won't work.
Conservative Democrats, including Rep. Melissa Bean of Illinois and Rep. Heath Shuler of North Carolina, are joining Republicans to sponsor the Secure America with Verification and Enforcement Act, which calls for beefing up the border with Mexico and requiring employers to do more to not hire -- and to fire -- undocumented workers.
The problem with the SAVE Act is that it is an enforcement-only piece of legislation and does not include a plan to legalize any of the 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. It amounts to "deport them all."
Continued...
In place of meaningful immigration reform, both conservative and liberal politicians have hatched piecemeal plans. This won't work.
Conservative Democrats, including Rep. Melissa Bean of Illinois and Rep. Heath Shuler of North Carolina, are joining Republicans to sponsor the Secure America with Verification and Enforcement Act, which calls for beefing up the border with Mexico and requiring employers to do more to not hire -- and to fire -- undocumented workers.
The problem with the SAVE Act is that it is an enforcement-only piece of legislation and does not include a plan to legalize any of the 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. It amounts to "deport them all."
Continued...
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Nation of immigrants shapes 2008 election
By KATHERINE GYPSON
Observer Staff
March 19, 2008
Today’s foreign-born citizen faces an array of choices when deciding how they will award their highly desirable vote. Candidates can be seen courting the foreign-born vote by the Spanish-language sites devoted to John McCain and Hillary Clinton, and the translation of Barack Obama’s detailed policy briefings into Korean, Mandarin and Vietnamese.
More than 15 million Americans are foreign-born naturalized citizens, the majority of them concentrated in the delegate-rich states of California, New York and Texas. With today’s booming immigrant population, even key swing states such as Pennsylvania and Ohio have increased foreign-born voting populations. According to the Migration Policy Institute, a non-profit group that studies world migration, immigrant voting in these two bell-weather states has increased by 23 and 13 percent respectively.
Continued...
Observer Staff
March 19, 2008
Today’s foreign-born citizen faces an array of choices when deciding how they will award their highly desirable vote. Candidates can be seen courting the foreign-born vote by the Spanish-language sites devoted to John McCain and Hillary Clinton, and the translation of Barack Obama’s detailed policy briefings into Korean, Mandarin and Vietnamese.
More than 15 million Americans are foreign-born naturalized citizens, the majority of them concentrated in the delegate-rich states of California, New York and Texas. With today’s booming immigrant population, even key swing states such as Pennsylvania and Ohio have increased foreign-born voting populations. According to the Migration Policy Institute, a non-profit group that studies world migration, immigrant voting in these two bell-weather states has increased by 23 and 13 percent respectively.
Continued...
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Presidential Candidates on Immigration Reform
Comprehensive immigration reform failed to pass congress in 2006 and 2007, and the prospect of change at the state level is also grim. Last week an Indiana immigration bill to penalize businesses who knowingly hire illegal immigrants died after a legislative conference committee could not agree on a final version that would have yanked the license of offending employers.
With immigration reform at a veritable stalemate nationwide, the onus will be upon the next President to institute real change. Hence, a critical look at where the leading candidates stand and what they have done on the issue is of paramount importance.
The primary debate drivers on immigration are:
* How to secure the borders?
* What to do with the illegal aliens already in the country?
* How to improve the bureaucracy and red tape surrounding visa and green card processing?
Continued...
With immigration reform at a veritable stalemate nationwide, the onus will be upon the next President to institute real change. Hence, a critical look at where the leading candidates stand and what they have done on the issue is of paramount importance.
The primary debate drivers on immigration are:
* How to secure the borders?
* What to do with the illegal aliens already in the country?
* How to improve the bureaucracy and red tape surrounding visa and green card processing?
Continued...
Monday, March 17, 2008
An Economy Dependent on the Abuse of Land and Labor
John Kaufman @ 8:27 pm
Lost in all the recent debate on illegal immigration is why the United States is so dependent on cheap migrant and illegal labor and whether or not this is a good thing. The assumption made by almost everyone is that such labor is a good thing, for the illegal immigrants, it is said, do work the rest of us are not interested in. But this reasoning neglects the abuse that occurs both to our agricultural lands and the migrant workers and illegal immigrants themselves.
Industrial, large-scale agribusiness is dependent on cheap labor, just as multi-national corporations are dependent on cheap foreign labor. To claim that this is the only possible work for desperate people, as the apologists for the big corporations do, is simply hogwash. Nations such as Mexico and China ought to be working to revitalize and secure their own local economies, for this is the only practical solution to global, corporate exploitation and ecological degradation. Forcing rural people to seek degrading, often unhealthy work in domestic or foreign fields and factories is not a viable and moral answer to rural poverty. And while the United States is a large and wealthy nation, it simply cannot economically or ecologically absorb everyone. There are limits to what even we can responsibly allow, and that is why we have immigration laws. But all the merciful and well-enforced laws in the world won’t help if our economic life is undermining our ideals.
Continued...
Lost in all the recent debate on illegal immigration is why the United States is so dependent on cheap migrant and illegal labor and whether or not this is a good thing. The assumption made by almost everyone is that such labor is a good thing, for the illegal immigrants, it is said, do work the rest of us are not interested in. But this reasoning neglects the abuse that occurs both to our agricultural lands and the migrant workers and illegal immigrants themselves.
Industrial, large-scale agribusiness is dependent on cheap labor, just as multi-national corporations are dependent on cheap foreign labor. To claim that this is the only possible work for desperate people, as the apologists for the big corporations do, is simply hogwash. Nations such as Mexico and China ought to be working to revitalize and secure their own local economies, for this is the only practical solution to global, corporate exploitation and ecological degradation. Forcing rural people to seek degrading, often unhealthy work in domestic or foreign fields and factories is not a viable and moral answer to rural poverty. And while the United States is a large and wealthy nation, it simply cannot economically or ecologically absorb everyone. There are limits to what even we can responsibly allow, and that is why we have immigration laws. But all the merciful and well-enforced laws in the world won’t help if our economic life is undermining our ideals.
Continued...
Sunday, March 16, 2008
We invited them
Our history demands we welcome Mexican immigrants; our free trade policies set them in motion
By BARBARA MINER
Posted: March 15, 2008
Two years ago, on March 24, 2006, Milwaukee's immigrant Latino community proudly marched across the 6th Street Viaduct proclaiming, "No human being is illegal." It was the largest demonstration in Milwaukee in recent memory, and the first of several protests that spring involving thousands in Milwaukee and millions nationwide that underscored the vital role of undocumented immigrants in United States society.
But then the politics of fear took over. Before long, raids on work sites and plans for bigger and better border fences were all the rage. Talk of immigration reform was replaced with sensationalist rhetoric, exemplified by Bill O'Reilly's claim on Fox News that reform was a left-wing plot "to break down the white, Christian, male power structure." CNN's Lou Dobbs, meanwhile, kept alive inaccurate claims linking immigrants to thousands of new cases of leprosy - evoking centuries-old images of the leper as the dreaded "other" that, if not banished, would destroy society.
Continued...
By BARBARA MINER
Posted: March 15, 2008
Two years ago, on March 24, 2006, Milwaukee's immigrant Latino community proudly marched across the 6th Street Viaduct proclaiming, "No human being is illegal." It was the largest demonstration in Milwaukee in recent memory, and the first of several protests that spring involving thousands in Milwaukee and millions nationwide that underscored the vital role of undocumented immigrants in United States society.
But then the politics of fear took over. Before long, raids on work sites and plans for bigger and better border fences were all the rage. Talk of immigration reform was replaced with sensationalist rhetoric, exemplified by Bill O'Reilly's claim on Fox News that reform was a left-wing plot "to break down the white, Christian, male power structure." CNN's Lou Dobbs, meanwhile, kept alive inaccurate claims linking immigrants to thousands of new cases of leprosy - evoking centuries-old images of the leper as the dreaded "other" that, if not banished, would destroy society.
Continued...
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Bill Gates Asks Congress to Act Now to Maintain U.S. Innovation Lead
In House testimony, Gates urges improvements in country's math and science
education, reform of immigration policies, and increased investment in
basic research.
WASHINGTON, March 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Microsoft Corp. Chairman
Bill Gates will testify before the U.S. House Committee on Science and
Technology today at 10 a.m. EDT on the future of innovation and U.S.
competitiveness. At a hearing to commemorate the committee's 50th
anniversary, Gates will focus on issues of U.S. competitiveness, including
education and work-force development, the need for immigration reform to
allow highly skilled workers to remain in the U.S, and the need to continue
to invest in basic research.
Continued...
education, reform of immigration policies, and increased investment in
basic research.
WASHINGTON, March 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Microsoft Corp. Chairman
Bill Gates will testify before the U.S. House Committee on Science and
Technology today at 10 a.m. EDT on the future of innovation and U.S.
competitiveness. At a hearing to commemorate the committee's 50th
anniversary, Gates will focus on issues of U.S. competitiveness, including
education and work-force development, the need for immigration reform to
allow highly skilled workers to remain in the U.S, and the need to continue
to invest in basic research.
Continued...
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Bush Administration Pressured On H-1B Visa Reform
A Senate committee has become impatient with promises from Homeland Security and Labor to visit reforms on visa programs for highly skilled workers.
By Marianne Kolbasuk McGee
InformationWeek
March 11, 2008 04:12 PM
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) on Monday sent a letter to the U.S. Homeland Security Deptartment quizzing secretary Michael Chertoff about what progress the Bush administration has made toward H-1B visa reforms.
In his letter, Grassley -- the co-sponsor of a Senate bill last year to counter H-1B visa abuse and fraud -- asked Chertoff for an update on immigration reforms promised last August by the Bush administration.
Specifically, last year Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez announced that Homeland Security and the Department of Labor "would study and report on potential administrative reforms to visa programs for highly skilled workers," said Grassley.
Continued...
By Marianne Kolbasuk McGee
InformationWeek
March 11, 2008 04:12 PM
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) on Monday sent a letter to the U.S. Homeland Security Deptartment quizzing secretary Michael Chertoff about what progress the Bush administration has made toward H-1B visa reforms.
In his letter, Grassley -- the co-sponsor of a Senate bill last year to counter H-1B visa abuse and fraud -- asked Chertoff for an update on immigration reforms promised last August by the Bush administration.
Specifically, last year Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez announced that Homeland Security and the Department of Labor "would study and report on potential administrative reforms to visa programs for highly skilled workers," said Grassley.
Continued...
Monday, March 10, 2008
U.S. immigration well served through DHS commitment
Surya B. Prasai
March 08, 2008
According to Mr. Carl Shustermann, an American writer and legal columnist who contributes to the U.S. immigration debate through his blog spot and once served as Trial Attorney with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, "There will be a lot of talk about immigration in 2008, but what are the odds that substantive immigration legislation will be passed this year? A look at the recent past indicates that the odds are long indeed. After all, 2007 was supposed to be the year Congress finally addressed the challenge of comprehensive immigration reform. It didn´t happen." It is the belief of many American lawyers who deal regularly with DHS such as Mr. Schustermann, that immigration is shaping up as one of the key domestic issues in the 2008 presidential elections. Mr. Schustermann states the only issue rivaling immigration is health care but which is also related somewhat. One cannot disagree with this argument.
Continued...
March 08, 2008
According to Mr. Carl Shustermann, an American writer and legal columnist who contributes to the U.S. immigration debate through his blog spot and once served as Trial Attorney with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, "There will be a lot of talk about immigration in 2008, but what are the odds that substantive immigration legislation will be passed this year? A look at the recent past indicates that the odds are long indeed. After all, 2007 was supposed to be the year Congress finally addressed the challenge of comprehensive immigration reform. It didn´t happen." It is the belief of many American lawyers who deal regularly with DHS such as Mr. Schustermann, that immigration is shaping up as one of the key domestic issues in the 2008 presidential elections. Mr. Schustermann states the only issue rivaling immigration is health care but which is also related somewhat. One cannot disagree with this argument.
Continued...
Friday, March 7, 2008
Immigration Reform? Senate GOP Weighs In
Thu Mar 6, 3:39 PM ET
The Nation -- Yesterday, seemingly unperturbed by the recent failure of immigration-as-a-wedge efforts at the ballot box, Senate Republicans introduced their most jerkily reactive set of immigration bills yet. One would dock 10% of highway funding from states that provide driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. Another would end language assistance at federal agencies and the voting booth for people with limited proficiency in English. Still another would block federal funding to cities that bar police from asking about peoples' immigration status (a proposal not only fraught with public-safety issues, but one that would also dry up anti-terror funds for cities most at risk--New York, Los Angeles, et cetera).
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) is leading the crusade, with a bill that would impose a maximum two-year prison sentence on someone caught illegally crossing the border for the second time. (That would, after all, only cost the federal government some $44,500 per detainee.)
Continued...
The Nation -- Yesterday, seemingly unperturbed by the recent failure of immigration-as-a-wedge efforts at the ballot box, Senate Republicans introduced their most jerkily reactive set of immigration bills yet. One would dock 10% of highway funding from states that provide driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. Another would end language assistance at federal agencies and the voting booth for people with limited proficiency in English. Still another would block federal funding to cities that bar police from asking about peoples' immigration status (a proposal not only fraught with public-safety issues, but one that would also dry up anti-terror funds for cities most at risk--New York, Los Angeles, et cetera).
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) is leading the crusade, with a bill that would impose a maximum two-year prison sentence on someone caught illegally crossing the border for the second time. (That would, after all, only cost the federal government some $44,500 per detainee.)
Continued...
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Border Insecurity
Published: March 4, 2008
From San Diego on the Pacific to Brownsville on the Rio Grande, a steel curtain is descending across the continent. Behind it lies a nation so confused and conflicted by its immigration problems that it has decided to wall itself off and wait for things to fix themselves. This country once was a confident global magnet for an invigorating flow of immigrant workers and citizens-to-be. Now it is just hunkering.
Skip to next paragraph
The Board Blog
The evidence of this neurosis is visible at the border with Mexico, where the Department of Homeland Security has been rushing to reinforce an ineffective system of fencing and sensors, trucks and boots on the ground. The mission, imposed upon it by Congress after a wearying stalemate on immigration reform, is a mandate to do the impossible, at record speed and at record expense.
Continued...
From San Diego on the Pacific to Brownsville on the Rio Grande, a steel curtain is descending across the continent. Behind it lies a nation so confused and conflicted by its immigration problems that it has decided to wall itself off and wait for things to fix themselves. This country once was a confident global magnet for an invigorating flow of immigrant workers and citizens-to-be. Now it is just hunkering.
Skip to next paragraph
The Board Blog
The evidence of this neurosis is visible at the border with Mexico, where the Department of Homeland Security has been rushing to reinforce an ineffective system of fencing and sensors, trucks and boots on the ground. The mission, imposed upon it by Congress after a wearying stalemate on immigration reform, is a mandate to do the impossible, at record speed and at record expense.
Continued...
Monday, March 3, 2008
A Nation of Immigrants, Divided Over the Subject of Immigration
Debate centers on millions of illegal immigrants in U.S. Congress failed to agree on a reform plan, so states are passing their own laws. Transcript of radio broadcast:
02 March 2008
VOICE ONE:
Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I’m Faith Lapidus.
VOICE TWO:
And I'm Steve Ember. Our subject this week is immigration.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Just about every family in the United States has at least one member, now or in the past, who came from another country. Even American Indians may have immigrant ancestors through marriage.
The United States is one of the few industrial countries with a growing population. The main reason is immigration. Today America has just over three hundred million people. A new report says if current growth rates continue, the nation will have four hundred thirty-eight million in two thousand fifty.
Continued...
02 March 2008
VOICE ONE:
Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I’m Faith Lapidus.
VOICE TWO:
And I'm Steve Ember. Our subject this week is immigration.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Just about every family in the United States has at least one member, now or in the past, who came from another country. Even American Indians may have immigrant ancestors through marriage.
The United States is one of the few industrial countries with a growing population. The main reason is immigration. Today America has just over three hundred million people. A new report says if current growth rates continue, the nation will have four hundred thirty-eight million in two thousand fifty.
Continued...
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