State Investigates Apparent Violation of Minimum Wage Law at Fresno Farm

The state labor commissioner is investigating apparent violations of the new state minimum wage law at a Fresno chili pepper farm reported in The Times on Thursday, state officials said.

Instead of the new legal minimum wage of $4.25 an hour, the workers were receiving a piece rate that netted some of them as little as $1.35 an hour. None of the more than 50 workers interviewed was averaging more than $2.70 an hour.

Assemblyman Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica), chairman of the Assembly Labor and Employment Committee, called for a full investigation by the labor commissioner into the apparent violations, as well as the use of child labor in the field, said Pat Henning, chief consultant to the committee.

Simon Reyes, assistant chief of the labor commissioner’s office, said Thursday that an investigation was under way.

Reyes also said he believes that the commissioner has enough staff in Fresno to enforce state labor laws. Two regional officials had told a reporter Wednesday that they felt that staffing was inadequate to cover the six-county region.