[Mb-civic] Help Wanted as Immigration Faces Overhaul - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Help Wanted as Immigration Faces Overhaul
Congress Considers New Rules, and Businesses Worry About Finding Workers

By S. Mitra Kalita and Krissah Williams
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, March 27, 2006; A01

Year after year, Professional Grounds Inc. runs a help-wanted ad to find 
landscapers and groundskeepers. Starting wage: $7.74 per hour.

In a good year, three people call. Most years, no one does.

So the Springfield company relies on imported labor -- seasonal guest 
workers allowed to immigrate under the federal guest-worker program -- 
to keep itself running. For 10 months this year, 23 men from Mexico and 
Central America will spend their days mulching and mowing, seeding and 
sodding for Professional Grounds.

Occasionally, company President Bill Trimmer asks himself: If I doubled 
wages, would native-born Americans apply? He thinks he knows the answer.

"I don't think it's a wage situation. It's the type of work and the 
nature of the work. It's hard, backbreaking work," said Trimmer, who 
started the company 31 years ago. "I think we're a more affluent society 
now. They expect more. Everybody expects more. . . . I have contracts, 
and they want an affordable price, too."

Here lies the dilemma facing Congress as it attempts an immigration 
overhaul. Businesses say it is hard to persuade Americans to perform the 
unskilled jobs that immigrants easily fill. Significantly higher wages 
might work, but that increase would be passed on to unhappy consumers, 
forcing Americans to give up under-$10 manicures and $15-per-hour paint 
and lawn jobs.

Yet against a backdrop of heightened scrutiny of those who cross U.S. 
borders and the estimated 12 million migrants already here illegally, 
most everyone agrees that the current immigration system warrants a 
severe makeover.

A recent study by the Pew Hispanic Center estimated that unauthorized 
immigrants make up nearly 5 percent of the labor force. In the 
Washington region, they make up nearly 10 percent of the 3.1 
million-strong workforce, providing mainly unskilled labor.

The federal government has a work visa -- known as H-2B -- that aims to 
help unskilled migrants enter the country legally. But the government 
issues only about 66,000 new H-2B visas each year. The guest workers, 
who generally take jobs in businesses such as restaurants, amusement 
parks, cleaning companies and landscaping firms, are allowed to stay for 
10 months.

The immigration measure passed by the House last year would allow the 
guest-worker program to lapse. Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee 
resumes debating legislation proposed by Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.). It 
would create a new guest-worker program that would allow foreigners to 
enter the United States for three years, with the possibility of renewal 
for another three years.

Both House and Senate plans place on employers the onus for verifying 
the legal status of workers with the creation of a national database of 
Social Security or work identification numbers. Besides requiring 
enforcement, the proposals would impose criminal penalties on employers 
who hire someone not authorized to work in the United States.

Under current law, companies must review two forms of government-issued 
identification to verify that a job applicant is a legal resident. 
Beyond keeping copies of IDs on file, many businesses say they do little 
more than take workers at their word. While some readily dismiss illegal 
workers, they don't necessarily report them and their whereabouts to the 
federal government.

Businesses say they already patrol job applications to sift out 
counterfeit documents. At least four out of 10 applicants for jobs at 
Harry's Essential Grille in Vienna present work documents that look like 
frauds, such as Social Security cards that feel too thin, said Jason 
Steward, manager of the restaurant.

"You have a gut feeling," Steward said. The company he works for, 
Essential Restaurant Holdings LLC, has hired 200 people since opening 
its two Northern Virginia restaurants 2 1/2 years ago. About half of its 
workers are immigrants. He does not object to checking a Social Security 
number in a national database. But he worries about being the first line 
of defense for the company. If he messes up, Essential Restaurants could 
be fined or face criminal penalties under some of the proposals before 
Congress.

Brett McMahon, vice president of Bethesda-based Miller & Long Concrete 
Construction Co., one of the biggest concrete contractors in the 
country, with $300 million in annual revenue, said his concern is that 
the legislation would essentially turn his company into "an enforcer of 
who's legal and who's not." McMahon said, "It's nowhere near that simple 
to check."

In the past 15 years, the Labor Department has audited McMahon's company 
five times looking for illegal workers -- each time finding none, 
McMahon said. He added that the House bill threatens to bring his 
business to a "screeching halt" because there is no provision for a 
guest-worker program or for dealing with the undocumented immigrants 
already working.

But advocates of tighter borders say hiring foreigners should be 
difficult, not just for security but to limit competition between 
less-skilled immigrants and Americans.

"Employers in many of these sectors have gotten themselves into a 
Catch-22 situation where if they do not look the other way and hire 
illegal workers, they will not be competitive with other businesses," 
said Jack Martin, a spokesman for the Federation for American 
Immigration Reform, an advocacy group governed by business leaders and 
activists favoring national immigration limits.

"The wages and working conditions where there are large numbers of 
illegal workers have been driven down to the point where those jobs are 
not as attractive to American workers," Martin said.

According to the Pew Hispanic Center data, undocumented workers tend to 
be clustered in service and construction jobs and make up more than half 
of the region's janitorial and landscape workers. Forty-three percent of 
the region's construction workers are illegally in the United States or 
have only temporary work authorization, the data show.

Wages for landscaping and groundskeeping workers in the Washington area 
have risen slightly in recent years, according to the Bureau of Labor 
Statistics, from an average of $9.61 per hour in 1999 to $10.51 in 2004. 
Professional Grounds' Trimmer said most employees, including guest 
workers, earn $9 to $11 per hour.

Construction wages in the Washington area have risen from an average of 
$15.86 in 1999 to $17.19 in 2004, according to the bureau. McMahon 
estimated that construction wages these days are even higher -- roughly 
$20 an hour, plus health care.

"People think construction is about hiring day laborers in a Lowe's 
parking lot and throwing them in a pickup and paying them $2 an hour," 
McMahon said.

The company has roughly 60 projects underway, including offices, hotels 
and condominiums, and employs about 2,800 workers in the Washington area 
-- three-fourths of them immigrants.

"Every time I put up a crane, they are the guys who show up," McMahon said.

At Professional Grounds' Springfield office, Trimmer said the 
guest-worker program insulates him from having to deal with forged 
documents. Trimmer started using the H-2B program about five years ago 
to fill the void left by high school and college students who preferred 
air-conditioned summer internships over the work he could offer.

The guest workers arrive in February or March and pay $40 a week for 
housing subsidized by the company. A van picks up and drops off those 
who can't drive; workers who have driver's licenses pay $3 per day for 
the use of a company car. Workers pay income, Social Security and 
Medicare taxes.

One of his workers, Abelardo Flores, said he likes returning to his wife 
and three children in Mexico after making money for 10 months. Two other 
workers, Luciano Arango and Marcos Ochoa, said they would like to 
permanently live in the United States someday. All said they had worked 
for the company last year. Trimmer cited investments he makes in the 
guest workers, from English classes to housing, as proof that he views 
them as more than cheap labor.

Once, Trimmer confessed, he did hire an illegal worker: a Nicaraguan man 
named Victor Parrales on a tourist visa.

Next week will mark Parrales's 22nd year with the company; Professional 
Grounds sponsored his green card, and he eventually became a citizen. 
Parrales now owns a house in Alexandria and boasts the title of vice 
president.

A piece of paper taped to Parrales's office door advertises that 
Professional Grounds needs more workers. In fact, the company says it 
will pay workers who bring forward qualified candidates a $1,000 
referral fee.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/26/AR2006032601058.html?nav=hcmodule
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