Migrant Workers in Southeast Ohio

by Danny Burridge

On Tuesday October 25, about twenty Ohio University students received a rare and informative glimpse into one of the most overlooked segments of the population of southeastern Ohio- migrant workers.

United Campus Ministries and the Latin American Student Union sponsored a lecture/ discussion led by Humberto Gonzalez, the Regional Administrator for the non-profit organization Rural Opportunity Inc. (ROI). Humberto gave a presentation about his group, which focuses on helping migrant farm workers find permanent employment, and providing social services to the migrant worker communities in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York.

Also present at the discussion were Lucy and Dora, two migrant workers from Oaxaca, Mexico who have been in the United States for two years and have been aided immensely by ROI.

Here in Athens, we are not overly exposed to the world of migrant workers, but right next door in Meiggs County there is a thriving and growing community of migrant workers, primarily from southern Mexico.

Humberto said, “We did not even know there was a migrant camp in Meiggs County. We found them about a year ago and have been working with them ever since.”

He estimated that at any one time there are at least 400-500 migrant workers in the largest camp in Meiggs County. In the county as a whole, he said, there could be close to 1,200. In the state of Ohio, there are about 16,000 migrant workers, half of which are undocumented. By government regulations, ROI is not permitted to provide services to any undocumented workers.

Workers like Lucy and Dora typically stay in Appalachian states like Ohio for the summer and fall seasons. During the fall, many migrant workers work in plant nurseries. During the summer months, they pick vegetables such as tomatoes, cucumbers, celery, and lettuce- typically from sunup to sundown.

Lucy mentioned, “You know its time to stop for the day when you cannot tell if the tomato is ripe or not because it is too dark.”

This was in Spanish, though. A representative from UCM, Kerri Shaw, interpreted for them. Lucy and Dora both expressed the desire to learn English but have no access to any type of classes and probably would not have the time to take them anyway, because of their work schedules.

Very few migrant workers are proficient in English. Not only does this make it difficult for them to get anything but a minimum wage, labor intensive job, but it also makes it almost impossible to integrate fully into U.S. society.

For many Latinos, U.S culture can be quite an obstacle, but at the same time, they take a certain amount of pride in maintaining their own communities and cultures. Humberto, who was a migrant worker for ten years before joining ROI said, “You can put us wherever you want, but you are not going to brainwash us. You are not going to change us. A lot of people try to intimidate us. They say we are taking their jobs. But Americans do not want the jobs we take.”

On the other hand, Lucy and Dora said they have never felt any intimidation from U.S. citizens. Perhaps times have changed since Humberto was a worker and U.S. citizens are treating migrant workers with more respect.

However, migrant workers still face grave conditions as they try to make lives for themselves in the U.S. For this reason, ROI attempts to make it easier for migrant workers tosustain themselves through the National Farm Workers Job Program, which provides job training that migrant workers need to acquire permanent employment in fields such as nursing, early childhood development and retail. ROI also provides social programs dealing with housing, mentoring, drug and alcohol abuse prevention, economic development, and women’s reproductive health. Lucy and Dora have both received benefits from the reproductive health program.

Kerri Shaw worked for ROI for a year and was the person who picked up Lucy for her bi-monthly doctor visits when she was pregnant. Shawwould right now be getting ready to do the same for Dora who is currently five months pregnant, but federal funding for ROI has been drastically cut, causing ROI to drop Shaw’s former position. This year alone, grant money for ROI from the Department of Labor, who is the organization’s largest donor, was cut by $250,000.

Dora has been hitching rides to the medical clinic with various members of the migrant camp. Unfortunately, she has no interpreter such as Kerri to tell her what is truly going on with her pregnancy.

ROI does not only deal directly with migrant workers and communities, but also works to educate and raise awareness about migrant issues in the U.S. Congress and among the farmers who employ the workers. Effectively lobbying Congress is becoming more and more difficult, as shown by ROI‘s funding cut, but farmers have started to become more receptive of working with representatives of ROI.

“They (the farmers) used to think we were trying to bust them for hiring undocumented workers, but now they are starting to realize that we just want to ease their relations with the workers,” said Humberto.

Of late, ROI has been working extensively to try to get farmers to train their workers in the proper use of potentially harmful pesticides and fertilizers. Lucy and Dora said that they were exposed to pesticides during the summer when they worked on the farms, but did not feel any adverse side effects. Many effects of exposure to harmful chemicals are not seen until years after the exposure, so their testimony is not too reassuring.

Agriculture is one of the driving forces of the U.S. economy, and migrant workers are one of the driving forces of Ohio agriculture.

Some of them may not speak English too well, but migrant workers are here to stay, and here to grow. Tuesday’s discussion forged the kind of links between the Latino community and the dominant U.S. community that will be vital in ensuring that these cultures can coexist in mutually beneficial ways.