Ripe for immigration reform

The Wenatchee Valley is a picture of anticipation.

Orchards stretching from the highway into the hills are lush green. Cherries are ripening, and pears and apples are starting to grow. Orchardists fended off overnight frosts with wind turbines, and little rain has angled to split the cherries.

So far, so good. But growers are mapping out contingency plans for what they fear most — a serious shortage of men and women willing to work in the orchards and fields or even to risk coming to Washington because of crackdowns on illegal immigrants.

Last week, while farmworkers thinned apple and pear buds in the Wenatchee Valley and cut asparagus in the Columbia Basin, U.S. senators toiled over the best hope for an overdue solution to failed U.S. immigration policy. Sens. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., reached across a hefty ideological divide to agree on an immigration bill. President Bush gave a little, too, as well as his blessing.

Then, unfortunately, others in the Senate set to picking at it like crows on cherries.

Congress has recessed for Memorial Day and will return in June, but the worry doesn't go away for agricultural businesses. That another harvest begins without a solution is particularly disappointing since this industry — producers and labor — showed leadership in striking a deal four years ago, a bill called the Agriculture Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits and Security Act. Sponsors Kennedy and Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, had rounded up support from 48 other Senate colleagues.

The bill failed to pass, but it's embedded in the more-comprehensive Senate bill now under consideration.

That's a good thing. Though immigration challenges are not limited to agriculture — the Pew Hispanic Center estimates one in 20 workers do not have legal status — agriculture's especially heavy reliance on immigrant workers makes it a bellwether.

Kennedy's and Kyl's bill provides employers and workers with more certainty than the current system, which has fostered an illegal underground work force. The economy needs it.

Under the bill, workers here illegally would be able to pay fines to gain temporary and renewable legal status and eventually could apply for permanent status and citizenship. It also provides for more guest workers, similar to an existing program.

The proposed immigration solution is not perfect — it tinkers unnecessarily with legal immigration policy. But it gets closer to taking employers, workers and whole industries out of limbo.

A peak-harvest work force of 60,000 10 years ago has since fallen to about 45,000, according to Dan Fazio of the Washington Farm Bureau. Between 50,000 and 60,000 workers is optimal to ensure crops are harvested at their peak. Timing is everything under the hot sun.

"We've been able to compete globally because we have such good quality," Fazio said. "Our apples cost more (than international competitors) because of the quality. If the quality drops, it's going to be harder to compete."

With another harvest looming with no solution, the state departments of Agriculture, Employment Security, and Labor and Industries are marketing farm jobs out of state and trying to match workers in-state to jobs. They also have set up a one-stop Web site for prospective workers (www.wa.gov/esd/farmworkers). State workers likely will repeat last year's efforts of driving around, finding workers and directing them to jobs.

"Government can only do so much," said Agriculture Director Valoria Loveland, underscoring why bringing people out of the shadows of illegal status is so important. "We can't manufacture people."

Jim Koempel, a Cashmere-based grower preparing for his 39th harvest, has never been more nervous. He's being innovative, even trying to market jobs to high-school students. He pays a minimum of $8.50 an hour plus housing. Many harvesters make $12 an hour. Still, he's worried he won't be able to expand to the full 150 workers he needs to harvest his 300 acres of tree fruit.

"We are making plans about what crops we may not pick," he said. "I'm pretty certain we'll get the cherries picked and the apricots. But once we get into pears, from there on, it's new territory."

Don't forget Washington's largest and most iconic crop, apples, comes after that.

I hope federal lawmakers share some of Koempel's prickling unease. They must not let another harvest come and go without the reasonable solution at hand.

Kate Riley's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. Her e-mail address is kriley@seattletimes.com