Place for contractors seeking laborers aimed at increasing safety, reducing traffic woes
The City of Gretna on Monday starts on a new approach to the issue of day laborers who cluster in one part of the city hoping to find work.
Day laborers and officials with the city of Gretna, the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the Congress of Day Laborers gather Saturday for a ribbon cutting for a tented area under the West Bank Expressway where day laborers and contractors who are looking for workers can meet up. A designated area for day laborers and contractors looking to hire them opens Monday on Chilo Street and the West Bank Expressway, a few blocks away from a Home Depot store that has been ground zero in the controversy.
Ever since Hurricane Katrina, day laborers have clustered near the Home Depot, 62 West Bank Expressway, looking to be hired by contractors who might need them. First, they were in the store's parking lot until the company asked them to move. Then they waited under the elevated expressway across the street from the store.
But that arrangement brought new problems because the workers would dash across three lanes of cars to hustle work from contractors who pulled into the Home Depot lot, presenting a danger to the themselves and snarling traffic in the process.
The designated area was a joint effort of the city and the Congress of Day Laborers.
Gretna, in cooperation with the State of Louisiana and Jefferson Parish, has installed a tent, bike racks, portable toilets and trash cans in a parking area under the elevated expressway. The day laborers constructed tables and benches from materials donated by the Home Depot.
"Our decision to invest in a designated area came out of recognition that we are one community," Gretna Mayor Ronnie Harris said.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new area was held Saturday, and included Harris and representatives of Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the Congress of Day Laborers. Both sides hope it's the solution to a long-standing problem.
The city had tried had ticketing those who ran across lanes of moving traffic, but that didn't seem to do much to help the problem.
"They're so desperate for work that if you cite them, they'll be out there again, '' Councilman Vincent Cox said of the laborers in May.
"I wish everybody in America wanted to work as bad as these people want to work," he said.
Cox had proposed ticketing contractors as well if they blocked or impeded traffic while trying to hire laborers, saying that targeting contractors also would serve as a deterrent for the laborers.
Instead, the city started exploring the option of creating a safe designated area for the laborers.
Jacinta Gonzalez, organizer with the Congress of Day Laborers, said that all over the country, designated day-laborer areas have proven to be successful.
"Gretna is a model city, showing that a strong economy and safe streets are based on inclusion," Harris said in a press release last week. "Our concern for public safety and our understanding the needs of the day laborers has resulted in this improvement for our community. "
Gonzalez called the new arrangeent "a long-term collaboration that will allow day laborers to strengthen Gretna."