YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC

January 4, 2006

Global Horizons fixed all but one labor violation

A front-page story in Saturday's Yakima Herald-Republic about labor contractor Global Horizons erroneously reported that the company had failed to correct a series of violations imposed by the state of Washington.

In fact, the Los Angeles-based company had corrected all but one of the violations. That lone failure, however, resulted in the state revoking the company's farm-labor contractor license.

As of a Dec. 30 deadline, Global had fully paid taxes demanded by the departments of Labor & Industries and Employment Security, L&I spokesman Steve Pierce said Tuesday. The company, which recruits foreign guest workers to Yakima Valley orchards, had also provided Employment Security with a copy of a contract with an independent third party who will monitor Global's compliance with state rules.

The two prior violations were mentioned in Saturday's story. The story did not identify a number of other prior violations.

The departments announced the license revocation in a letter Friday to Global Horizons. Pierce said the letter did not clearly identify which violations had been corrected.

He said the lone outstanding violation was Global's failure to file a certified audit of taxes, premiums and wages paid in the third quarter by Dec. 30.

Global must pay for the audits, which are to be conducted quarterly by an independent certified public accountant.

Global has 30 days from last Friday to file an appeal of the state's decision on its contractor's license.

Mordechai Orian, president of the company, said Tuesday in a telephone interview that he will appeal the state's decision to revoke the license and that he expects to file for a 2006 license.

Orian equated the last remaining violation to a minor motor-vehicle infraction. "That's what we got, a traffic ticket," he said.

He said the certified audit in question will be ready to file today. "We have only one thing and that can happen to anyone doing business. We have complied with everything," Orian said.

Demand for farm workers from Thailand, where Global does much of its recruiting, could top 2,000 in the state's apple industry this summer, Orian said.