Accidental Blogger

On any given day in Texas (and many other states), at intersections of busy downtown streets, outside local Home Depots and other strategic corners wait throngs of day laborers hoping to find small jobs. They are hired by businesses and home owners looking for someone to do odd jobs on the cheap. The men congregate in the open, exposed to the elements and at the end of  the day, are not assured of a job. Many are undocumented workers or "illegal aliens." Public attitude towards them for the most part is indifference. People notice them only when they need them. The basic human needs of the laborers  themselves are of little concern to most. Labor organizers and some cities and towns have extended help in the form of providing shelters where the workers can wait in the shade with access to a toilet.  Some also provide other rudimentary services with regards to job training and job seeking. But even this minimal assistance is frowned upon by those who interpret this measure as an official nod to illegal immigration. Recently the Houston city council voted to not renew the $100,000 needed to maintain the only city run facility for day laborers in Houston.

Houston’s only city-funded day labor center is set to close at the end of the month after city officials decided not to renew a $100,000 contract to run the hiring hall popular with illegal workers.

The East End Worker Development Center, at 2 N. Sampson, stirred a storm of controversy in spring 2006 after it became embroiled in a City Hall debate about whether it encouraged illegal immigration.

Frank Michel, spokesman for Mayor Bill White, confirmed that the city did not allocate funding for the center from this year’s federal Community Development Block Grant program.

Michel said the city’s funding of the facility became an issue last spring after then-Councilwoman Shelley Sekula-Gibbs — who was seeking the Republican nomination to succeed U.S. Rep. Tom Delay — and others said the center promoted illegal immigration. "There are many in the community who say we shouldn’t be spending taxpayer money on it, because it encourages illegal immigration," Michel said.

Day labor centers across the country have become focal points in the immigration-policy debate, as communities struggle to fund, or even allow, facilities where day laborers can gather.

Mixed reactions

The East End hall’s pending closure disappointed community activists but was hailed by a Houston group favoring tighter immigration control.

”I hope they would close it. Having a day work center aids, abets and encourages more illegal immigration," said Louise Whiteford, president of Texans for Immigration Reform. ”We already have an underclass here … roaming the streets looking for work, and it’s only going to get worse."

Nelson Reyes, director of the Central American Refugee Center in Houston, said closing the center was troubling in light of Houston’s welcoming attitude toward immigrants.

”We haven’t harassed them as in other places," said Reyes, adding that closing the facility is like telling immigrants, ”We need your cheap labor, but disappear when we don’t need you."

Reyes called on city, religious and business leaders to continue operating the hiring hall — and to expand services for day workers.

Update: Houston Mayor Bill White has pledged to find private funding to help keep the East End shelter open.

I am not at all surprised. A city like Houston with its large immigrant population, many of whom are here illegally, benefits enormously from the cheap labor of undocumented workers. (Home prices in Houston remain at a nationwide low compared to other metropolitan areas of similar size due solely to the undocumented immigrant labor employed by the construction companies who don’t have to abide by any laws governing wages, benefits or workers’ protection.) Citizens benefit from the low prices that come at the cost of exploitation of the laborers who add substantially to the local economy. Yet any city funded effort to accommodate the workers’ needs is opposed by many as an unacceptable expenditure. Rather than acknowledge their presence and contributions, most consumers would prefer that this invisible work force continues to toil below the radar.

A related story in the New York Times was brought to my attention by a friend of my daughter.  Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia wants to put in place a heartless amendment to benefit Atlanta-based Home Depot while denying day laborers access to a simple shelter.

Squatting beside the bulk of the Senate immigration bill — a once-in-a-generation attempt to change millions of lives and the direction of the nation — you will find a squalid little amendment. It was placed there by Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia to benefit an Atlanta-based corporate constituent, Home Depot.

The amendment would prohibit state and local laws that required big home-improvement stores to provide rudimentary shelter for day laborers. There aren’t any such laws yet, but the City Council in Los Angeles, where Home Depot wants to open 13 stores, is considering one. Mr. Isakson’s pre-emptive strike would be an extraordinary intrusion of federal power into a local land-use matter.

Home Depot is a magnet for day laborers. Small contractors and homeowners load up on lumber, drywall and buckets of screws, and then grab a crew. Communities have struggled to deal with these often-untidy labor bazaars where looking for work can be hard to distinguish from loitering.

The combative approach, with anti-loitering laws and police harassment, seldom works and has been overturned repeatedly in the courts. The Los Angeles City Council is considering something more constructive, an ordinance that would charge big retail chains that attract day laborers — Home Depot, essentially — about $200,000 per store to provide a bare-bones space with shade, benches and toilets, to bring some order, cleanliness and safety to the daily mixing of men and trucks.