CANOGA PARK : Group Targets Those Hiring Day Laborers

A group of business owners in Canoga Park has embarked on a new strategy to deter people who employ day laborers who congregate near their properties.

The 65 members of the Deering Business Watch have begun to track license plates of vehicles that stop to pick up laborers and report them to the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, said Robert Bartels, chairman and founder of the business group.

Bartels said he hopes that the INS will use the information to reinstate a program occasionally implemented in Los Angeles under which the agency identifies potential employers of day laborers and sends them warning notices. Hiring day laborers is legal only if the workers provide proper documentation and the employer has filled out a federal employment eligibility form, said Rico Cabrera, spokesman for the Los Angeles District Office of the INS.

INS officials in Los Angeles said that although agents are accepting the information and may use license plate numbers to guide enforcement efforts, the agency is in no rush to routinely mail warnings to vehicle owners.

“We’ve done it before with limited success. But it’s not out of the question that it could be reinstated,” Cabrera said.

INS Assistant District Director John Brechtel said in recent years the agency’s practice of sending notices to owners of cars spotted picking up workers in areas frequented by undocumented day laborers “created more problems than it actually solved.”

The notices, which informed vehicle owners of their responsibility to check employees’ documentation, sometimes went to the wrong people, he said.

Bartels said the business owners plan to persist in reporting license plates. The owners allege that day laborers congregating on Vanowen Street between De Soto Avenue and Owensmouth Avenue litter, drink and harass passersby. The INS has conducted raids in the area, but the owners also want employers targeted, he said.

“We just want them to know someone is watching,” Bartels said. “We want to quietly do this without getting anyone upset but at the same time clean up the area.”