Provision makes employers shoulder some costs
Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-Quitman, is leading an effort to block a new Department of Labor regulation the agency says will protect foreign guest workers but which Alexander and Louisiana businesses describe as cumbersome and expensive. Alexander's bill, which has 14 co-sponsors, including four from Louisiana, expresses congressional disapproval of the new regulation and would block its implementation, now scheduled for April 23.
U.S. Rep. Rodney Alexander, left, is leading an effort to block new guest worker regulations proposed by Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, right.Under the rule, employers would be required to pay a guest worker's transportation costs to the job site after the worker completes half of the contract period, as well as the trip home when the work ends or the worker is dismissed. It also would require employers to pay foreign workers for at least three-quarters of the contracted hours, even in instances when there's no work to be done.
Alexander said Monday that he's not necessarily opposed to some tightening of regulations for the guest worker program, which brings up to 66,000 temporary workers from abroad each year to work at U.S. fishery businesses, farms, forests, hotels and restaurants.
He said the problem is the new Labor Department rule could increase expenses so much that some businesses won't be able to continue operating and that would "cost many American jobs."
But Jacob Horwitz, lead organizer for the New Orleans-based Guestworker Alliance, said the new regulation gives American workers a fair shot at jobs, while protecting foreign workers from exploitation.
Horwitz said he's uncovered Baton Rouge guest workers who were being paid at a per-pound rate for processing crawfish that was set so low that even the most experienced and skilled workers couldn't earn minimum wage. Yet, he said, many guest workers went into debt to travel to the Untied States and feel they can't complain about labor violations for fear they'll be fired, leaving them unable to find legal work and without the money to return to their home country.
Alexander used his position on the House Appropriations Committee to add a provision to an omnibus spending bill that barred the Labor Department from implementing a 2011 regulation setting minimum wage requirements for guest workers through the end of the current fiscal year, Sept. 30.
Louisiana employers said the wages, though described by the Labor Department as reflecting prevailing wages for their communities, were much higher and would have added significantly to costs. Proponents said the wages were reasonable for the hard labor required for many of the jobs taken by foreign guest workers and would have made them more attractive to Americans.
Mike Voisin of Motivatit Seafood in Houma said the new requirement that workers be paid for at least three-quarters of their contracted hours isn't an issue for him because his guest workers generally work 50 to 60 hours a week. Even after the 2010 BP oil spill, Voisin said he was able to keep operations going.
But he said the vast majority of oyster-processing facilities suspended operations after the BP spill. "It's hard to pay people when no revenue is coming in," Voisin said.
In announcing the new rule Feb. 9, Labor Department officials pointed to a new certification process that ensures employers actually seek Americans for work before turning to foreign job sources.
"The H-2B program is designed to help businesses when there is a temporary shortage of U.S. workers," Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis said. The new rule, she said, ensures "that the program is used as intended by making these jobs more accessible to U.S. workers and providing stronger protections for every worker."
But Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, who joined Reps. Jeff Landry, R-New Iberia, Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge, and Charles Boustany, R-Lafayette, in co-sponsoring the Alexander bill, said the Labor Department went too far.
"The proposed rule by the Department of Labor is yet another attempt by the Obama administration to tell America's job creators how to run their businesses, and this latest wage mandate will increase costs on hard-working families every time they go to the store," Scalise said.
Bruce Alpert can be reached at balpert@timespicayune.com or 202.450.1406.