Solutions for Day Laborers

Even at the bottom rungs of the economic ladder, life in these days of unprecedented expansion is good--at least relatively speaking. Across the San Fernando Valley, day laborers congregate on street corners looking for a few hours’ work and a few bucks for rent and food, with something left over for the family back home. Almost always, there is a back home: Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala. On good days, these men can earn as much as $16 an hour, all of it in cash.

So no wonder many of them are wary of a hiring center that has operated for a year near the Woodland Hills Home Depot warehouse store. The concept is admirable: Offer workers a place where they can gather without being harassed and where they know the wages are guaranteed. The center, which was required by Los Angeles City Councilwoman Laura Chick during Home Depot’s permit approval process, seeks to address the concerns of neighbors and business owners who feared that the construction supply store would attract dozens of workers who might cause trouble.

But many day laborers are not so sure. Labor Ready, the outfit that leases space from Home Depot, charges contractors $11.95 an hour and residents $12.95 an hour. But workers take home only about $6 per hour after Labor Ready claims its percentage and deducts the cost of benefits such as health insurance and workers’ compensation coverage. And some workers don’t qualify to work for Labor Ready because they lack documentation. Finally, many of the Latino workers were put off by the fact that it took several months for Labor Ready to hire a Spanish-speaking employee. Even so, about 30 to 60 workers get placed every day by Labor Ready, mostly workers who have been laid off and are seeking regular jobs in the construction industry.

So while there are no crowds of day laborers milling about the Woodland Hills Home Depot--as there are outside so many others--the men simply congregate somewhere else. In the southwest Valley, that somewhere else is outside a convenience store at the corner of Fallbrook Avenue and Ventura Boulevard. For the past decade, as many as 75 men gather each day looking for jobs that range from a few hours to a few days. An informal agreement with Los Angeles police and local shopkeepers allows them to stay as long as the workers are on public property and don’t make a mess. Some workers say they prefer that arrangement to a formal process like the one at Labor Ready because the contractors know where to find them and can hire without much hassle. The downside: Workers can get cheated by unscrupulous employers.

What to do about day laborers has plagued municipal governments large and small across Southern California. The fears of those who say day laborers attract trouble must be balanced against the rights of workers to gather as they please. Turning street corners into hiring bazaars is the labor market in its purest form. But that brutal purity has a social cost. Outfits like Labor Ready offer a potential solution. But clearly it is not perfect.

Another approach has operated successfully in North Hollywood since 1990. Operated by the Coalition for Human Rights of Los Angeles, or CHIRLA, the hiring center provides workers with job and language training as well as a safe place to wait for work. CHIRLA funds the center through government grants and workers pay nothing. Neither do they compete for jobs since assignments are handed out by lottery. About 100 men a day register for work. About half find it.

There will probably never be a day when men in the Valley don’t seek work on the streets. The goal, though, is to connect as many of them as possible with organized groups that watch out for workers’ welfare and offer value to employers. Until they do, nothing will change.