Daily fee doubles for day laborers
Day laborers who gather at a specially designated site to solicit jobs will pay $2 apiece to keep the spot on Laguna Canyon Road operating, said David Peck, president of the South County Cross-Cultural Council, a nonprofit that manages the site.
The economic slowdown has meant fewer construction jobs, and fewer $5 donations from contractors who pick up workers at the site, Peck said. Before workers decided to increase their voluntary contributions, they paid $1 a day to gather, but got a refund if they were not hired.
The city of Laguna Beach paid for about half of the site’s $50,000 annual operating costs, which include an employee to manage the workers. About 50 to 100 people gather daily at the roughly decade-old site.
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-- Susannah Rosenblatt
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