Small-business owners who rely on international workers to peel crawfish in Louisiana, pick crabs in Maryland and plant trees in Ohio say a cap on foreign visas is threatening their livelihood.
Without help from Congress, some say they may be forced to lay off their full-time employees, shut down or move to Mexico.
“Our business is in serious jeopardy of being crippled or going out of business,” said Judy Barnes, who helps manage NatureScape, a landscaping company in Chagrin Falls near Cleveland.
Jobs at seasonal businesses such as hotels and restaurants in tourist towns are going unfilled after all 66,000 visas for foreign workers under the government’s H2B program were snatched up at the beginning of the year.
That’s because more businesses are vying to hire the unskilled workers in nonagricultural jobs who under the program can come to the United States to work for up to a year.
NatureScape was unable to hire 12 workers from Mexico – half of its summer work force – to plant shrubs and grass.
“We have all this stock, but nobody to do the work,” Barnes said.
In Maine, the limit was reached well before many tourism-related businesses, such as motels and restaurants, that rely on foreign workers even had the chance to apply.
Two years ago, about 3,000 H2B workers came to Maine. In 2004, the number dropped to about 1,000, most of them employed in the tourism industry. This year, some people were predicting that the overall number may be 500 or fewer.
Nationwide, business owners say local workers don’t want the jobs, which often are backbreaking or monotonous. Low jobless rates in some regions and the availability of more skilled jobs complicate the employee search.
“It’s jobs nobody wants,” said Kelly Couch, who helps Louisiana businesses find foreign workers. Many are temporary and have little room for advancement, she said.
Congressional members from states where businesses have been affected the most are hoping for a temporary solution.
The Senate on April 19 overwhelmingly voted to allow workers who had H2B visas in previous years to be exempt from the quota this year and next. House and Senate negotiators hope to finalize the plan by early May.
Workers from Central America and South America rely on the steady income. While many make the minimum wage of $5.15 an hour in the U.S., some earn double that at certain jobs, based on how much they produce.
Mexicans can earn in an hour or two what they would in a day at home.
Many return to the same job year after year, said Becky Bills, who works with Alliance Abroad Group, an Austin, Texas, a company that connects foreign workers with jobs in the U.S.
“They come over here to save money and send it home,” she said. “It’s not only for them, but it’s also for their families.”
Tony Hebert, who runs Royal Fiberglass Pools in Breaux Bridge, La., said he’s prepared to move his production center to Mexico if he can’t get help from international workers.
“They’re directly responsible for us growing our business and employing more people,” he said.
Their absence also hurts the area’s economy, he said, because the workers also have been employed in shrimp and crawfish processing plants and sugar cane factories.
Seafood processors in Maryland that pick and package crabs also have been idled. Just four out of 17 processors in the state were able to get workers this season.
They’ve sought replacement workers at job fairs, detention centers and job placement agencies without much luck.
Inns and restaurants in New Hampshire are struggling to find cleaning workers and servers. “If people come and they don’t have an excellent experience they may decide to go somewhere else next time,” said Paul Hartgen, president of the state’s Lodging & Restaurant Association.
Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, said bringing in foreign workers hurts Americans who can’t get higher wages and benefits.
“There’s always a pool of people willing to do this work, just not at Third World wages,” said Krikorian, whose group advocates for less immigration and tougher enforcement of immigration laws.
He said a worker shortage a year ago didn’t cause any economic harm and that employers will make do.
Business owners say many of them didn’t find out until a few months before their peak season that they couldn’t get workers.
Employers can’t apply for the employees until 120 days before they are needed. Ski resorts and other businesses scooped up all the workers starting last October, before spring and summer businesses could apply.
By Jan. 3, all the spots had been filled. A year ago, the cap wasn’t met until March.
Some seasonal businesses, such as amusement parks, use a student worker visa to hire international workers. But the students are limited to four months working in the U.S. and they aren’t required to stay at the same job.
Morton’s Landscape Development Co., based in Columbia Station near Cleveland, secured 14 H2B workers for this summer because it applied earlier than normal after being shut out a year ago.
“It was a killer not having them,” said Melinda Morton, the company’s human resources director.
Costs for training and recruiting workers soared, she said.
“Our employee turnover was ridiculous. We’d always have problems,” she said. “We had employees who didn’t want to work or who wouldn’t show up after a week.”
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