New Outlook in the Fields : Amnesty Stirring Move to Unionize

Just a year ago, the group of farm workers agreed, they never would have even considered becoming involved in a union drive. The fear of U.S. immigration authorities was just too dominant a factor in their lives.

“You can’t get involved in something like this when you know at any minute la migra would take you away,” said Lucio Rojas, a longtime field hand in both Mexico and the United States.

“Now,” added Virgilio Herrera, “now, we have a certain amount of security about our lives.”

Effort Is Small

The two, both newly legalized under the amnesty law, are among the supporters of an incipient union-organizing effort on the grounds of an Oceanside ranch, The Green House/Herb Farms, which grows mint, oregano, rosemary and other herbs in the fertile and scenic valley of the San Luis Rey River.

Though the union effort is small--the grower employs only about 40 people--it has raised some eyebrows in the area and beyond because it is the first organizing drive in some time among the more than 15,000 field hands of northern San Diego County. Living and working conditions for farm workers here are considered among the nation’s most primitive, and union organization in the fields has long been a difficult task under any circumstances.

Two unions recently announced plans to set up shop in North County.

The independent group doing the organizing in Oceanside, known as the Union de Trabajadores Agricolas Fronterizas (Union of Border Agricultural

Workers), now based in Coachella, says it plans to open an office shortly in Vista and, possibly, organize other area workers. And, recently the United Farm Workers of America, the largest field-hand union nationwide, disclosed plans to set up a center in Encinitas.

The question raised by these developments is this: Does the amnesty law, which is likely to result in permanent legal status for almost 1 million farm laborers nationwide, the great majority in California, presage greater union-organization activity among field hands? In San Diego, as in many areas of the state, agriculture has long been dependent on undocumented, non-union labor. Because of the area’s proximity to the border, there has been an even greater dependence on undocumented workers in San Diego.

No Rush Is Seen

Experts from both the management and labor sides are divided on the question of what difference amnesty will make. It seems clear, however, that there is not likely to be any rush to organize in the fields--certainly no imminent return to the late-1970s, when organization drives were blossoming throughout the state after passage of California’s Agriculture Labor Relations Act in 1975.

The debate says much about the state of farm-worker organization in the late 1980s, when only a small percentage of agricultural laborers enjoy the protection of a union contract.

Some observers, including those on both sides of the union-organizing effort at the San Luis Rey herb farm, say that amnesty clearly makes the coming years a propitious period for organizing.

“I think the situation has changed substantially, and the employees are in a much better position to assert their rights, whether those are wage complaints or the right to unionize or whatever,” said Scott A. Wilson, a San Diego attorney who represents employers and is an expert in labor law. Wilson represents the Oceanside herb farm targeted in the drive here.

That sentiment was echoed by Ventura Gutierrez, secretary of the United Packinghouse Workers in Coachella, who has helped create the new border unit that is spearheading the union movement in Oceanside. “They’re no longer afraid of la migra; that’s a major factor,” Gutierrez said recently as he stood outside a fence on the grounds of the farm. “Two years ago, when they were going through the initial phases of amnesty, no one wanted to talk to you about organizing. Now it’s different.”

Notes of Caution

However, more cautionary notes were sounded by officials of the United Farm Workers. UFW officials, who have concentrated considerable recent efforts on a grape boycott and effort to publicize pesticide damage, say no period during the administration of Gov. George Deukmejian is a good one for union activities.

The problem is not workers’ desire to organize, said Dolores Huerta, the UFW’s co-founder and first vice president, but rather the refusal of growers to bargain in good faith. The union maintains that the Deukmejian Administration has gutted the effectiveness of the Agricultural Labor Relations Board, which was created in 1975. The board’s role is critical, as it has jurisdiction over field union election petitions and unfair labor-practice charges, among other areas.

“We have union elections, and we win and what happens? Nothing,” said the UFW’s Huerta. “The growers know they don’t have to do anything. And the workers get disappointed.”

The UFW, she said, represents about 200,000 workers in California, but has been only able to negotiate contracts for about one-tenth of that number.

Officials and farm representatives deny that the board is anti-union, but they maintain it was clearly pro-labor before Deukmejian’s arrival. “The presence of the law and the board allow the farm workers to make their choice fairly,” said Michael Henry, a spokesman in Sacramento for the California Farm Bureau Federation, the largest industry group.

‘Basic Human Needs’

Whatever the reality, the UFW’s decision to open an office in Encinitas in coming weeks is intended to answer “basic human needs,” and is not an effort to launch large-scale union organizing, said David Arizmendi, a labor research consultant and former agricultural labor board worker who is now working with the UFW. The office is an outgrowth of a visit here last month by Cesar Chavez, UFW president.

“Before you have the luxury of being free to select a union, you’ve got to have the basic needs,” said Arizmendi, who has spent considerable time dealing with farmworker issues in San Diego. “San Diego is so far behind the rest of the country, we’ll basically be dealing with food, clothing and shelter.”

In San Diego, thousands of field hands have long lived in crude shacks in the brush, lacking decent housing. Most workers in San Diego earn the legal minium wage, now $4.25 an hour. Activists say abuses--failure to pay minimum wage, not allowing sufficient rest or meal breaks, insufficient bathroom facilities--are frequent here.

The UFW’s attitude would seem to rule out large-scale organizing in the area. The newly created border union, affiliated with the United Packinghouse Workers in Coachella, doesn’t have nearly the resources of Chavez’s organization, and resources count in the often-bitter union drives.

“Organizing employees is a time-consuming and expensive process,” noted Wilson, the labor law expert. “You need a union with international organization and finances to do it.”

There is also a fear among farmworker activists that union-organizing activity at this time could leave workers vulnerable to retribution by management, such as firing. The agricultural labor board is in charge of judging allegations of illegal retribution, and UFW officials say they have no faith in the board’s activity to protect employees. Consequently, there is a fear that rash organizing efforts could backfire, souring workers to future campaigns during more sympathetic administrations.

A Serious Effort

“You’re dealing with people’s lives, and you just can’t go off half-cocked,” said the UFW’s Arizmendi. “This is not about just stirring things up. It’s about going in and doing something right.”

Ventura Gutierrez, the union leader who is heading the effort in the San Luis Rey Valley, says his push is a serious one, and he plans to proceed until a union vote can be arranged at the herb farm. (Observers could name only one large area agricultural concern, Robert R. Hall Inc., an Encinitas flower grower, that has a union contract--with the UFW.)

“Even if we don’t get a collective-bargaining agreement here, our No. 1 priority is establishing a base in San Diego County,” said Gutierrez. “And, if there are any ramifications of that, we will be there to represent them.”

The union has already filed two unfair-labor practice charges with the labor board, alleging that management of The Green House interfered with organizing activity and granted benefits to union opponents while denying them to supporters. Wilson, the attorney representing the herb farm, denied the charges, which are being contested.

Even though the union movement is thus far limited, word has spread throughout San Diego County, which has a $500-million-a-year agricultural industry. “No business wants to have a union as their third party,” said Bob Echter, an Encinitas flower grower who helped organize a recent seminar on labor law for area growers.

At the Green House, workers said the initiative for the union movement began in January, when management dismissed two laborers over a dispute on working weekend hours. The workers staged a one-day work stoppage, and were successful in getting the two men reinstated, according to union supporters.

“I think we all realized that we needed greater protection,” said Rojas, the veteran field hand who is among the leaders of the organizing effort at The Green House. “We felt we all could get fired at any moment.”

Rojas’ presence and activist history accounts somewhat for the effort. A Mixtec Indian from rural Oaxaca state in southern Mexico, he was involved in the organization of thousands of Mixtec farm laborers who work in the San Quintin region of Baja California. His brother, Maclovio, was a well-known union activist who was killed two years ago in Baja in an incident that authorities say was an accident but others contend was murder.

A believer in the need for representation, Rojas, 35, eventually contacted Gutierrez’s union, which had assisted amnesty applicants in Baja last year. Thus the union effort was born.

Support Not Unanimous

But support is not unanimous, and Rojas concedes that a majority of workers are probably not with the movement yet. He blames divisive tactics by management, which, he alleges, has sought to isolate the natives of Mexico’s Oaxaca state, mostly union supporters, from other workers at the farm.

But Candelario Silvestre Diaz, a native of Guatemala who works at the herb farm, said he mistrusts unions and has no intention of signing up. “I like things here as they are,” said Silvestre, who stopped to talk recently while walking near the oregano fields.

Such sentiments, however, do not deter Rojas and the other organizers, most of whom are of Mixtec Indian extraction. “The people here need to know that, with a union, they have some protection,” Rojas said recently, taking a break in the shade of a willow tree. “Now, we can get fired anytime, we have no rights at all.”