Labor Camp Is Making a Comeback in Piru Citrus Groves

The sweet smell of orange blossoms washes over the lime-green buildings nestled into the foothills. The air is clear, the graceful almond trees are budding and, for the first time in 17 years, the sounds of activity echo through what could be a fitting spot for a luxury hotel.

It’s not exactly the Ritz. The 10 or so buildings known as El Campo will reopen Friday as a labor camp capable of housing 150 men and feeding them three meals a day, including box lunches for the citrus groves in which they toil.

Although field workers in the area have for years scratched to find a place to live, the camp’s owner, the Fillmore-Piru Citrus Assn., was never enthusiastic about running it. It closed in 1971.

“We’re not in that kind of business,” said Lois Yates, a spokeswoman for the packers and shippers group. “We don’t run housing for people.”

But that kind of business was exactly what appealed to one of the camp’s former residents.

Housing Needs

Ignacio Guevara, 56, the lessee of the revitalized Piru camp, is acutely aware of the housing needs of field workers. After all, he was one of them in 1951, when at age 20 he immigrated to the United States from San Luis Potosi, Mexico.

He came with high aspirations, along with thousands of other Mexicans, as part of the United States’ bracero program. The federal plan was started in 1943 to recruit workers for the fields when American men were at war. It ended in 1965.

Guevara’s first job in this country was for the Fillmore-Piru Citrus Assn. His first home was at the company’s Piru labor camp--the one he is hoping to make into a profitable pursuit.

“I came from Mexico,” said the tan, gray-haired man as he plopped down on the same squeaky bed that he slept in during his stay in the early 1950s. “I thought I was going to be someone because I came to the United States. I was young. I thought I was going to make a lot of money.”

But for years Guevara’s dream went unrealized. He began working for the company as a cook in the camp’s mess hall and then as a maintenance worker at the company’s plant in Piru. He left the company for a couple of years to work in a factory making aluminum parts for airplanes.

Maintenance Man

But he returned to Fillmore-Piru Citrus, a maintenance man still seeking a way to run his own business. He and his wife, Mary, now hold a 5-year lease on the old labor camp. They’ve spent the last few months sprucing up the place, and will manage it together.

Operating labor camps--there are six to 36 in the county, depending on which agency is keeping score--may not be particularly lucrative but can offer unique personal gratification, says an Oxnard camp manager.

“I can pay the rent, keep my car on the road and clothes on my back,” said Raphael Ramos, manager of the Garden City Labor Camp, which houses more than 50 male farm workers. “It’s not anything you can get filthy rich on, but it can provide a decent living.

“It may sound corny,” Ramos said. “But it’s kind of rewarding to be able to put a roof over someone’s head and food in their stomachs. You get to know these guys. It’s almost like a family situation.”

Right now, the availability of housing in Piru for male farm workers is scarce enough, the Guevaras said, that their camp should be an attractive alternative for single men. El Campo will offer lodging in barracks-style rooms. Some rooms have three beds, others have six. All have electrical outlets and a dresser for clothes but little else.

“My brother thinks I’m crazy,” Ignacio Guevara said. “He tells me, ‘I don’t think you’re going to make any money.’ He says, ‘Everything’s so expensive.’ You know what? I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it or not. The little amount that I charge for, it’ll be hard to make it.”

Tenants will receive three meals a day of both Mexican and American edibles. Breakfast--field hands’ fare of bacon, eggs and pancakes--and dinner will be served on the bright yellow and green picnic tables in the mess hall. A bag lunch will be ready to take to the fields. The weekly tab is $58. Showers and toilets are in a separate facility.

Most men searching for a place to live know that the camp operates with strict rules. “I don’t want drugs here in the camp,” Ignacio Guevara warns. “And the lights are out by 10:30 p.m., because they have to go to work. This is like a labor camp. On weekends they can stay up late.”

“Compared to the conditions in town,” Mary Guevara said, “where they have 20 to 30 people living in the houses, or living in trailers or garages, you would think they’d like to live here. They can get off work, come eat, relax, take a shower.”

They also can finally be at ease while living in an organized camp.

In the past, such camps have been easy targets for Immigration and Naturalization Service officials on the prowl for undocumented workers. Whenever the INS came, workers would scatter in fear of deportation. But now that so many farm workers have registered for the federal amnesty program, they should be less apprehensive about clustering in camps, Ignacio Guevara said.

Registration Aide

As part of his job for Fillmore-Piru Citrus, he helped more than 500 employees through the cumbersome registration process last year. “Now that they’ve got their amnesty cards, they can be free and can live anywhere without being scared of being caught.”

Although the camp seems like one solution to housing difficulties in the area, the Guevaras have not been inundated by inquiries. In fact, only a few workers in town have heard that the camp is opening.

“It’s hard to say after so many years if the men would like to live over here,” Mary Guevara said. “We’ll have to wait and see.”

Others will be watching as well.

“The trend had been for labor camps to shut down,” said Karen Flock, project manager of the Cabrillo Economic Development Corporation, a nonprofit group that works to provide housing for farm workers.

“This is the only camp that has opened up recently. It’s certainly needed. There’s a tremendous shortage of housing that’s affordable to people,” she said. “Maybe now the economics are such that it is profitable to run a labor camp.”