NAPA VALLEY (California) REGISTER

June 22, 2009

Business slows at farm camps

Overall economy affects county facilities

By MIKE TRELEVEN
Register Staff Writer

The rough economy is taking a modest toll on Napa County’s three farmworker labor camps, and occupancy is expected to drop this year.

As grape growers tighten their belts, they are not keeping farmworkers employed as consistently as in past years, Nancy Johnson, Housing and Community Development Coordinator, told the Napa County Board of Supervisors Tuesday morning.

Johnson said the county’s three farmworker centers — Calistoga, Mondavi and River Ranch — which collectively can house 180 workers, are at 75 percent occupancy right now. In past years, they would be between 80 percent to 85 percent at the start of summer.

“Workers are getting less hours due to the economy,” Johnson said. “They are not making as much money as they hoped.”

Pat Garvey, vice chair of Napa County Housing Commission, said growers are not as likely to keep workers during slow times this growing season.Johnson said it appears some workers are rooming with others in apartments to save money. A night at the camps, including meals, is $12.

Another factor that may be hindering occupancy is that the state requires the tenants at the farm centers to read and sign several documents regarding the rules, regulations and lodging. “It tends to scare people off,” Larry Florin, community and intergovernmental affairs manager, said.

Johnson added, “For a lot of them it seems like a lot of paperwork. It’s overwhelming to them. And some of them might not know what they are signing.”

Johnson said the county will approach state regulators and ask for a rule change that allows the county to merely post the rules on wall at the farm centers.

Johnson said the best strategies for increasing the occupancy of the center “has been by word of mouth among the workers themselves.”

Workers pay $12 per day to stay at one of the centers and they receive three meals a day, except Sundays when only a continental breakfast is served. “That (price) appears to be the limit under current economic conditions,” Johnson said.

Occupancy at the camps has increased each year since the county took over supervision of the camps three years ago. Johnson said she believes the continued overall rise in occupancy has happened in part because at least one center is open year-round, whereas in the past, facilities closed in the winter.

The camps are funded in part by local grapegrowers, the county, and the cities of Calistoga, St. Helena, Yountville and American Canyon. They are run by the California Human Development Corp.