Miami Herald February 13, 2005 COMPLEX OFFERS A SAFE PLACE FOR CHILDREN In an effort to keep good workers, two farm owners near Tampa built their own development, including a day-care center.
BALM, Fla. - Sister Maureen Smith remembers when migrant workers had no choice but to take their young children to the fields and leave them unattended through the long days of harvesting. She remembers one little boy who wandered away in a citrus grove and drowned in an irrigation ditch and another boy who suffered disfiguring burns when the car where he was left caught fire. Those days were a generation ago, and on a sunny late January morning with the perfume of ripening strawberries wafting across JayMar Farms near Balm, they seemed even more distant. Instead of following their parents into the field, the youngest children of JayMar workers now spend the days in a brightly painted center where babies nestle in the arms of caregivers and toddlers learn their numbers in both English and Spanish. The center is just a few dozen yards from their homes, gray-blue cinderblock duplexes where on this particular Monday rows of fresh laundry dry in the breeze. Despite its simplicity, it remains a remarkable place both because of who built it, and that it exists at all. The owners of Jaymar Farms - Jay Sizemore and Marvin Brown - turned 18 acres of farmland southeast of Tampa into a $5 million development for their workers two years ago. The Head Start center opened in January. The development did not come easily in a state where migrant housing is often dilapidated trailers parkers plagued with drug use, prostitution and poverty. The farmers battled a lawsuit against the development brought by some Balm residents who argued the 72-unit complex would mar their rural lifestyle. A judge ruled against the neighbors following a 2000 trial. "It was an uphill battle," said Barbara Mainster, executive director of the Redlands Christian Migrants Association. "These are two very tenacious people." For workers such as Itandehoi Ventura, 20, the daycare has put the first-time mother's fears at ease while she works. While she picks strawberries in JayMar fields, her 5-month-old daughter Yamil is cared for at the center. On a recent weekday, Ventura arrived in mid-afternoon to collect her daughter and was handed a bag of donated clothes for the infant. "I wouldn't be able to support her," Ventura said through an interpreter. "This makes it much easier." The duplexes were built partly with low-interest, government backed loans, including a $1 million loan from Hillsborough County, but JayMar's paid for the majority of the construction. Redlands Christian Migrant Association paid for the $700,000 construction cost of the 6,800-square-foot daycare center and now runs it. It is one of 70 centers operated statewide by the Immokalee-based migrant advocacy center, which is also supported with state and federal funds. The school serves 58 children under the age of 5 and another 20 children up to the age of 9 in an after-school program. The childcare programs are free to the parents. Longtime migrant activists in the area are applauding the JayMar development as a significant step in the treatment of migrant workers. "I think the farmers are really trying to do their dead-level best to give the people decent homes," said Anna Yuninger, a community activist who has long fought for better housing for migrant workers. Yuninger, herself a property owner who rents to migrant workers, said the conditions some seasonal workers live under are abhorrent. She tells of one trailer park in southern Hillsborough County that was shut down by county inspectors who found children playing near an open sewer and "rats as big as cats" feeding on garbage. "I think the migrant workers - the few who are coming here - are above being shoved around," she added. "They are beginning to be educated. My main beef still is to get those children out of the fields. That is no place for children today." Brown said the idea to create clean, affordable housing for migrants and safe place for their children began when the two came to southern Hillsborough County in 1998, where they farm on more than 1,000 acres and employ about 900 workers. Brown said the concern was that much of the housing available to seasonal workers was substandard and Jaymar was interested in attracting both families and a higher-quality workers to its operations. They knew that if they wanted to attract good workers who would return season after season, they had to offer them a better life than what many migrants know. "We wanted something better for them than just mobile homes," he said. "We wanted something more permanent, we planned on being here for a longtime." The need to offer better accommodations only became more crucial as shortages of agricultural workers have become worse, he said. Tightened restrictions on who crosses the border and the lure of jobs in the construction industry has made it difficult for some farmers to find enough workers to harvest their crops. "These 18 acres of land would be worthless to us if we didn't have the labor to work those acres," he said. "I am investing in the future. Especially the kids, we just love the kids." No detail was spared in creating the center, which despite its rural settings rivals the nicest suburban daycare. New, red tricycles are lined up for the children to ride on a playground filled with topflight equipment and educational toys crowd the shelves. Mike Stuart, president of the Florida Fruit and Vegetable Association, said the JayMar project is not only important in demonstrating what can be done for farmworkers, but its success could create momentum for similar ventures elsewhere. That's particularly important now since many migrant trailers took a heavy hit from this summer's hurricanes. "There is a recognition within the industry that it's important that good quality housing is available," Stuart said. "That's why we are seeing a lot more focus on it this year. It's one of those situations where a disaster has occurred, but something good can come of it." Evelyn Soto, who has worked in Redlands centers for 18 years, is the director of the new school. Soto once earned a living picking tomatoes, but now both of her children are attending college and she said she knows firsthand how much migrant parents worry about their children's futures. "They are very pleased because they know their kids are very secure, they have their meals, they are learning," Soto said. "There are a lot of families I deal with who don't know how to read or write, they just sign their name with an 'X.' They really want more for their children."
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