Jeremy Redmon wrote in the AJC 26 May 2011,

Farmers tie labor shortage to state’s new immigration law, ask for help

Migrant farmworkers are bypassing Georgia because of the state’s tough
new immigration enforcement law, creating a severe labor shortage among
fruit and vegetable growers here and potentially putting hundreds of
millions of dollars in crops in jeopardy, agricultural industry leaders
said this week.

Who could have predicted such a thing?

Anyway, how is it going?

Charles Hall, executive director of the Georgia Fruit and Vegetable
Growers Association, said he has been in close contact with Labor
Commissioner Mark Butler and Agricultural Commissioner Gary Black
about the shortage, calling it the most severe he has seen. Hall said
it’s possible state officials could hold job fairs to steer some of
Georgia’s unemployed workers to these farm jobs, which pay $12.50 an
hour on average. The state’s unemployment rate is now at 9.9 percent.

Farmers, however, say they often have little luck recruiting Georgia
residents to work in their fields because it is temporary, hot and
physically demanding. To recruit more workers, some farmers are offering
signing bonuses, Hall said.

The law doesn’t take effect until July 1 but is already making migrant
Hispanic farmworkers skittish, said Dick Minor, a partner with Minor
Brothers Farm in Leslie in southwest Georgia who says he is missing
about 50 of his workers now, threatening as much as a third of his crops.

What, us worry?

The author of Georgia’s HB 87 — Republican Rep. Matt Ramsey of
Peachtree City — repeated Thursday that the law is not set to take
effect until July 1.

“And there is nothing in House Bill 87 that anybody that is in our
country legally has to worry about,” he said.

Unless you happen to be Hispanic or have a Spanish surname or
got a deep tan from the sun….

Then you get an opportunity to be considered for a vacation in ICE’s
prison in Georgia, which is run by CCA.
The same company that wants to build a private prison in Lowndes County.
Spend that tax money on education instead.

-jsq