Posted on 03/10/2005 12:51:55 PM PST by madfly
Finishing lunch at Kuyaba, a restaurant on the beach in Negril, Jamaica, 2,000 miles away from the reality of work, freezing temperatures and a fresh snowfall, a waiter extended a pen to sign the bill.
Reality crept in: the insignia on the pen advertised The Chatham Wayside Inn, Main Street. Wondering if the pen was left from the previous day’s dinner, the question of its origin is posed to the waiter.
“No mon, that’s my pen,” responded Hopeton Lee.
For the past two summer seasons Lee has worked the bar and restaurant at the centerpiece Main Street inn, gaining access to the job through an H-2B visa he has enjoyed for the past five years. But Lee’s smile saddens as he relates a phone call from Shane Coughlin, manager of the inn, earlier in the month, explaining the visas have dried up.
There is no room at the inn for Hopeton Lee. Lee and many of his fellow Jamaicans who have worked in Chatham, Harwich and throughout the Cape will not return this year.
Wayside Inn owner David Oppenheim, who also owns Chris tian’s and the Bradford Inn in Chatham , will feel the pinch absent these workers. Oppenheim was on vacation and could not be reached for comment on the impact of the visa cap. Inn manager Shane Coughlin did not return several calls from The Chronicle this week.
But it was clear the early cutoff of foreign workers who have reaped benefits of seasonal employment on Cape Cod in recent years will have a major impact on local businesses.
The 66,000 H-2B visas-- seasonal permits for unskilled foreign workers-- annual quota was reached as of Jan. 3, more than two months earlier than the March 9 date in 2004. The U. S. Citizenship and Immigration Service is now rejecting all applications. Those businesses requiring help, but which had not filed by that date, will not have access to the seasonal foreign workforce.
Lee is not the only one who will suffer the loss of a good job and earning potential. Two weeks ago, Horace Dalley, Jamaican Minister of Labour and Social Security, held a press conference in the capital of Kingston , explaining if the H-2B visa cap does not change, 4,000 Jamaican jobs in the United States could disappear, resulting in a $46 million loss to the economy of his country.
After working for five years on an H-2B visa –two years in Newport , R.I. , one in North Conway , N.H. , and the last two in Chatham – Lee sees no hope of returning this year.
What it means is a loss of 70 percent of Lee’s annual income. And with a wife and four children living in the mountain town of Dias , above Lucea , Hanover Parish, that has major ramifications.
“It’s disappointing; we’re all looking to go back. It’s a great opportunity,” Lee said. “These years have made a great improvement in my family’s standard of living.”
There are certainly sacrifices made, Lee admitted of leaving the island for six months and not seeing his family during that period. But the financial benefits are worth it, he said.
“It’s tough, understandably, but it’s a sacrifice a lot of us have to make,” he said.
The waiter will continue to work the idyllic palm frond huts of Kuyaba restaurant until the winter tourism season slows. That means traveling for more than an hour in crowded taxis and JUTA mini-buses to get to work.
A typical day for Lee has the waiter finishing the dinner shift minutes before mid-night and commuting home, only to awake at 5 a.m. to catch transportation for the morning breakfast service on the beach.
Earning a living in Jamaica makes for a much more trying day than working the Main Street Chatham inn and walking a quarter mile back to his Snow Lane living quarters, admitted Lee.
The absence of a labor force along Main Street in Chatham and in most Cape towns during the summer season is a growing problem, agreed Wendy Norcross, executive director of the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce. She said the visa quota was filled earlier this year and will leave a number of businesses relying on foreign workers shorthanded this summer.
“The problem is more widespread,” Norcross said. “This year it’s going to be worse because more people have been shut out, denied requests because the cap was reached sooner. We paid a lot of overtime last year and a lot of innkeepers made their own beds.”
The H-2B visa program is “patently unfair,” according to Norcross, because it discriminates against the summer economy. She said the 66,000 visas are issued based on the federal fiscal year which begins on Oct.1. This allows states with winter and spring season economies to take advantage of these workers first.
U.S. Department of Labor statistics show in FY 2003 Texas enjoyed the benefit of the most H-2B workers at 14,690, followed by Colorado at 13,322 and Florida with 7,235. Massachusetts was ranked sixth with 5,808 workers. But there could be a sharp reduction in the Bay State this year.
The law prohibits employers from filing applications more than 120 days before the employment date for H-2B workers. Because the Cape’s economy is a summer one, Norcross said, most of those visas have already been designated by the time local businesses apply.
The chamber of commerce director said the group has been working with Congressman William Delahunt, D-Quincy, and Gov. Mitt Romney formed a task force last year, to address the issue. There is also a study underway, conducted by Suffolk University and the Commonwealth Corporation, to define the regional economic impact on the H-2B visa shortage.
Two weeks ago, Delahunt, working with a bipartisan, bicameral Congressional coalition, filed H.R. 793, known as the “Save Our Small and Seasonal Business Act of 2005,” a bill seeking to address the need for temporary work visas, which the congressman said is essential to the region’s seasonal economy.
The bill seeks to reserve 33,000 visas, half the annual allotment, for employers needing workers during the summer. To address the immediate shortage, as well as a potential backlog next year, the bill would also allow exemptions for workers who have participated successfully in the H-2B visa program during the past three years.
“Closing the door on H-2B visas creates enormous and urgent hardship for small businesses throughout the country,” Delahunt said. “Congress must act this year.”
“For the second year in a row, we have reached the H-2B visa cap before Massachusetts’s summer tourism industry is eligible to apply. This bill provides immediate solution to this problem,” Senator Edward Kennedy, D- Massachusetts, added.
Steve Schwadron, a senior aide in Delahunt’s Washington D. C. office, said on Monday it would require quick action to correct these conditions in time for this summer season. Schwadron said if the Republican leaders in Congress and the administration were interested it could be fixed administratively, without need for the legislation.
The biggest obstacle remains the many members of Congress opposed to any serious immigration reform. The White House --- responsible for the original Homeland Security Department decision --- has repeatedly refused to collaborate on any administrative redress for affected small businesses, Delahunt said.
There is support building for the legislation, according to Schwadron, who said as of Monday there were 25 co-sponsors. Delahunt and Congressman Wayne Gilchrest, R- Maryland, conducted a briefing on the legislation with Senators Barbara Mikulski, D- Maryland, and Judd Gregg, R- New Hampshire Monday.
“It could be effective this year, but it would require very prompt action,” Schwadron said. “We’re in this for the long haul.”
Lee said he realizes it is very unlikely he will be able to come to Chatham to work this summer, but he hopes government regulations can be changed to allow more foreign workers to come to Cape Cod in the future.
“I know a lot of employers up there will be affected because they depend on the seasonal help,” he said. “They can use my pen to sign the bill if it will help them out.”
3/10/05
Hey, he's just playing with OPM.
Yep - that's the dirty little secret about folks who talk "living wage" - they ain't the ones who will have to pay it...
And then they will wonder why things cost so much.
If they can't find Americans to work at their place of employment tough, they can close their doors and find another occupation. Why should I care if some restaurant won't pay decent enough wages to attract domestic workers? The free market in that case dictates that maybe we have too many restaurants.
No, I am the America citizen who is tired of his government stabbing him in the back. You import workers who will work for less this is lowering wages, and hurting Americans.
And I think you are being generous with money that is not yours to give. The local McDonald's or Olive Garden is NOT there to be YOUR private-sector jobs program for at-risk kids. Businesses are NOT there for your efforts in the area of social engineering at the expense of others.
If you want to engage in social engineering, pay for it yourself, don't demand others do so.
Last time I checked, businesses were not there to be a social engineering project for at-risk kids.
You want to do something about at-risk kids, pay for it yourself.
So when the Republicans cutoff this type of mass immigration for cheap labor purposes in 1924 they were "social engineering"? Wow that's news to me, I thought it was to end the loss of job opportunities for Americans and encourage assimilation.
I am not saying they are there to giv jobs, but I am saying that if jobs are to be had then they should first go to American citizens. And if that drives the price up so be it. When you factor out the immigrants, both legal and illegal the market will find an equalibrium on wages. This country is using immigration to surpress wages in lower and entry level jobs. It is having an adverse effect on its people.
My wife and I agree with TXBSAFH - and we DO have to make payroll.
Willingness to pay a living wage is the least we can do in exchange for the privilege of living in this great nation. And we STILL manage to do well.
I understand not everyone feels thus obligated.
Yeah... in essence, they privatize the costs of dealing with underachievers and people who lose out to others willing to do as good (or a better job) for less.
It is just another form of protectionism.
Are you sure you want to use this argument in defense of the H1B program?
You seemed to advocate it earlier (see post 21).
If I had a business, I'd look for the best deal - period. If it's guest workers, fine. It it's seasonal H-2Bs/H-1Bs/L-1s, no problem. If I have to offshore the production to get the best deal, I will do so.
If nobody can afford to hire employees, that sort of thing has an adverse effect on the American people, too. Think that part over before you start being generous with other people's money.
What's wrong with protectionism, it worked very well for this country in its first two hundred years. In fact it was in the GOP platform up until 1972 and was actually practiced through the Reagan administration.
Do you think it was open borders and free trade exclusively that made the USA the richest country in the world and gave the citizens such a high standard of living? If so you might want to do some reading up on its history.
That is what it is.
Ultimately, protectionists (be they folks who want tariffs or folks who want to reduce or eliminate H-1Bs/offshoring) are being generous with other people's money.
If I own a business, I do NOT owe anyone a job.
Nor does the US government owe you a living. Asking Congress to raise visa limits while sticking the taxpayers with the social costs is a form of corporate welfare. As a conservative I happen to think all welfare should come to an end.
Why don't YOU read up on economics?
It's you who doesn't understand the free market and the law of supply and demand. Importing low-wage workers is corporate welfare, plain and simple.
Gee, you took the words right out of my mouth!
But the government should make special laws to help you fatten your profit margin?
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