BY FRANNY WHITE
Partly hidden behind a half-open screen door, 14-year-old Ramiero Vasquez shyly explained the virtues of his family's seasonal home at Sakuma Bros. Farm's migrant camp. "They're good homes," Vasquez said in Spanish one afternoon last month, taking a break from the strawberry harvest. "They have all that we need." Vasquez, his two brothers and his brothers' wives, are living in a new, $1.2 million, six-building, 32-unit migrant camp built this spring near Sakuma Farms processing plant on Cook Road in rural Burlington. Sakuma Farms also operates two other migrant camps on Benson Road that have been used for decades and are being maintained per state law. The new housing on Cook Road is insulated, allowing workers to remain warm when temperatures dip at the season's end in early fall. Solid concrete floors replace the wooden ones of the old Sakuma cabins. And fluorescent light fixtures replace the single-bulb lighting of the old facilities. Each unit also features a compact stainless steel kitchen area, featuring a stovetop, oven, small refrigerator, sink and exhaust hood. Before, most units offered tabletop camping stoves and separate, full-size refrigerators. It was a heavy investment for the Sakumas, but one that was necessary to keep attracting seasonal workers for the successful family farm. "Without this, we have no labor force," said Ryan Sakuma, who oversees the camp as the farm support director. "So if we have to pour money in, we will." Vasquez and his family have traveled the migratory farm circuit for years, living in a number of different camps along the way. The new Sakuma camp was good, he said, but others elsewhere haven't been. "The others aren't good; they were already old," Vasquez said of some camps. Until this spring, on the freshly graveled grounds where the new camp now stands, the Sakuma farm had used the same, plywood-sided wooden cabins to house migrant farmworkers since the 1950s, Sakuma said. The state Commission on Hispanic Affairs received a complaint about the conditions of migrant housing at Sakuma Farms and throughout the Skagit County in the fall of 2005, putting the state of local camps into question. Overriding the Skagit County Health Department's local camp permitting authority, the state Department of Health inspected every Skagit migrant camp during the summer of 2006. Of the 18 sites, 10 were found to have severe violations of state regulations. Debra Fisher, manager of the state agency's migrant farmworker housing division, said that with walls so thin the daylight could shine through, mold growing in cabins and rodent droppings scattered on floors, Skagit's migrant housing ranked among the worst she'd seen in the state. But that was last year. The state has since taken over the county's duties to inspect and permit local migrant camps. The state, however, still contracts with the county Health Department for assistance. Together, the state and county have worked with local farmers to clarify what state codes require of their camps. As a result, all 14 Skagit sites that the state has examined so far this season have passed inspection, allowing them to again offer free or reduced-rent housing to their temporary laborers. "Skagit farm camps have really done a tremendous amount of work," Fisher said. "They certainly went above and beyond to make the repairs." The completely new construction at Sakuma Farms is perhaps the extreme example, while most other farms have repaired existing facilities. "We're doing a much better job," said Michelle Hughes, who manages the five homes that Hughes Farms of Fir Island offers to its migrant workers. In 2005, Hughes Farms was found to be operating farmworker housing without required permits. Inspections found the homes had failing sewage, holes in floors, broken windows and electrical problems. But Hughes said Tuesday that her farm simply didn't realize how the state migrant housing regulations applied to them. Because Hughes Farm offers individual homes and not the typically larger, unit-based type of camp, Hughes said the farm didn't know to what degree it had to comply with migrant housing regulations. "Nobody was trying to do anything wrong," she said, adding the Hughes family cares about the families who have been helping with their farm's broccoli harvests for three generations. As a result of the inspections, Hughes Farms abandoned two of its homes. And Hughes said both the state and county have helped her family's business bring their other migrant homes up to code. During preoccupancy inspections of Hughes Farms migrant homes this spring, the state found no deficiencies in three of their five homes. No other Skagit farms camps were found to be void of violations this year. Although all 14 Skagit sites passed inspection, most were found to have some violations that had to be fixed before workers could reside there. The worst of those was a report of rodent droppings, while others varied from torn mattresses to leaky sinks and uncovered light switches, inspection reports indicate. Sakuma Farms said it planned to build a new camp before the state began investigating Skagit migrant housing last year. But Ryan Sakuma said the $1.2 million project was still a large feat. The state Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development helped by giving a no interest loan for $446,171. If the new camp continues to be used for migrant housing in 15 years, the state can forgive the loan. But the Sakuma family still paid for most of the construction costs with private loans. It was pricey, but Sakuma said the project is a necessary investment for Sakuma Farms, which employs about 425 migrant laborers, most of whom depend on farmer-provided housing while working here. In addition, he estimated that camp maintenance costs the farms about $80,000 annually in labor and materials. But Sakuma knows such a large-scale investment may not be practical for smaller farms. "It's not easy for us," Sakuma said. "But it is very difficult for a guy who needs to be able to fill out the grants and paperwork. We're fortunate because we have the staffing." Hughes echoes his sentiments. Though she considers migrant housing important for the success of Hughes Farms harvest, the upkeep can get expensive. "We'll try to continue to do it as long as it's feasible," she said. "We do our best" Though farmworker advocate Jose Ortiz said he appreciates the new camp at Sakuma Farms, he notes more work needs to be done throughout the county. "We're very pleased with the work they've done and hope other farmers will follow," said Ortiz, who works for the Catholic Church's Archdiocese of Seattle to lead the Youth Migrant Project, which invites Western Washington youths to work with Skagit Valley migrant families every summer. For the project, he spends a lot of time at several Skagit camps. "They've done a little bit of improvement, repairing doors or windows," Ortiz said of local camps in general. "But other than that, they're still the same besides a new coat of paint." Ortiz contends that migrant farmworkers wouldn't depend on farmer-provided housing if they were paid a decent wage for their labor. The issue of farmworker housing is complex, acknowledges Ruben Baca of the state Commission on Hispanic Affairs. Beyond the necessity of safe housing, there's also the economic importance of agriculture and farmers' increasingly tight budgets. And though Baca wants good housing for migrant laborers, he knows closing below-code camps can create a larger problem by leaving farmworkers homeless. He applauded farmers who built new or repaired existing camps like those in Skagit. But Baca cautioned that such actions don't solve the states overall lack of affordable housing for low-income farmworkers. He pointed to helping farmworkers achieve home ownership as a need. And while the issue is statewide, Baca also noted that concerns and circumstances can be unique to each area. "The overriding thing we need to take from this is that (a new camp) does not mean we've solved the problem and adequately addressed the issue as a state," Baca said. Back at Sakuma Farms on Cook Road, longtime berry harvest employee Jorge Morado was content to be sitting at a picnic bench beside one of the camp's six new buildings. Morado, who has traveled with his family from Mercedes, Texas, every spring for 17 years to work at Sakuma Farms, extolled his enthusiastic appreciation for the clean, new facilities. "These are great. Thanks for these cabins," he said, nodding toward Ryan Sakuma at the corner of the table. |