Aiming to ease farm labor shortages, the Bush administration issued sweeping changes to the nation's agricultural guest worker program Thursday, but California growers said the action would have only a minimal effect on their needs.
The controversial rules, many months in the making by U.S. labor and immigration officials, would streamline the guest worker application process, revise the way wages are calculated, and modify requirements for demonstrating that a labor shortage cannot be filled with U.S. workers, among other changes. Congress' failure to pass a comprehensive immigration bill, along with crackdowns on illegal immigrants, stimulated efforts to alter the guest worker program.
Several farm labor advocates attacked the changes, saying they would drive down wages, displace U.S. workers and reduce federal oversight of potential abuses.
But Leon R. Sequeira, the Labor Department's assistant secretary of policy, defended the changes as necessary to boost use of the H2A visa program, which has long been criticized as too cumbersome.
"Wrong, wrong, wrong," Sequeira said of the criticism. "We think the reforms will improve the operation of the program for both employers and workers."
The revisions are expected to have little effect in California, the nation's largest agricultural state, whose growers employ nearly 40% of the 1.2 million farmworkers in the U.S. Only about 1% of the state's 450,000 farmworkers are recruited through the guest worker program.
On Thursday, California farm officials said the changes would probably not lead them to significantly increase their use of the program.
"Some changes will help us on the margins, but it doesn't change our overall focus on seeking legislation" to legalize existing farmworkers, said Jack King, spokesman for the California Farm Bureau Federation, a Sacramento-based farm advocacy organization representing 91,000 members.
King said the variety of California crops and their sometimes unpredictable harvest times made it difficult to use the H2A program. Previously, growers had to apply for workers at least 45 days before they were needed. The new rules require them to apply 60 days in advance.
"There is a lot of uncertainty when help will be needed in California, but under H2A you almost need a crystal ball," he said.
