Many Florida businesses face difficult circumstances while trying to understand the state’s new immigration laws. WMFE’s Talia Blake continues our Central Florida Seen and Heard: Immigration Divide series with a look at the costs for businesses and undocumented workers.
For this story, we’ll use only the first name of the undocumented immigrant we spoke to. Her name is Mary.
Maria’s quest for security
Maria and her husband fled their home in Tamaulipas, Mexico in 2016 because of violent crimes and drugs.
Seven years later, she now works on a fruit and vegetable farm in Apopka. For Maria everything is different here.
“I finished my psychology degree. I worked with a group of women for a while,” she said. “I really enjoyed my job, but I was afraid of the crime in the city.”
Maria came to the USA with a tourist
She got a visa to visit her siblings and never left the country.
She says she’s been working her way through the naturalization process since arriving here.
She says it’s cost her $4,000 so far and she needs to spend at least $3,000 more to complete it.
Maria said that while she makes more than minimum wage, that kind of money isn’t easy to come by without sacrifice.
“Currently I make $14 an hour. But everything else has gone up. So it is very difficult to live here.”
When not at work, Maria volunteers at Hope Community Center and Esperanza Behavioral Health and Services.
She said she enjoys volunteering, but finds it emotionally destabilizing when it comes to recent Florida immigration law changes.
“It’s not just myself and other undocumented people who are at risk, but entrepreneurs are also at risk of suffering economically.”
Pay and keep
According to ZipRecruiter, an online job board, the $14 an hour Maria makes is on par with the average for migrant workers here in Florida.
Samuel Vilchez Santiago, Florida director of the American Business Immigration Coalition, said it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly how much undocumented migrants are being paid because it’s done in secret.
However, he said there was no doubt that they earn less.
“The main reason these companies employ undocumented labor is because there simply aren’t enough documented workers willing to do the job, especially in agriculture and construction,” Vilchez Santiago said.
But with Florida’s new immigration laws, companies may not be willing to take the risk of hiring undocumented workers.
The owners have also expressed concern that their target audience will be put off by Florida’s new immigration laws.
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Maria separates the plant and places it in a bowl of soil.
Proponents of the law, like attorney John Quinones, say it’s a good thing. “Yes, we have to use E-Verify. We have to make sure the people who are here are working legally.”
Changes to Florida’s immigration law have expanded use of E-Verify, the state’s online system that employers use to confirm whether potential employees are eligible to work in the United States
All businesses in the state with 25 or more employees are now required to use E-Verify for all new hires.
Vilchez-Santiago said some farm owners are nervous about the next growing season in October, as some undocumented farm workers are temporary workers.
“They come for six months and go somewhere else for the next six months. The problem is that they have to reset them every time they come back. So the people who were hired this last farming season, technically if they are. Because they are undocumented, the new law means they can’t be rehired until the next farming season.”
He said when Georgia passed a similar law expanding E-Verify in 2013, the agricultural sector suffered a significant loss in revenue.
“The undocumented workers who work their fields ended up not coming back to the city. There was a certain farmer, they told his story and how hundreds of his undocumented workers didn’t come back. And that ended up causing a $250,000 loss to his farm just a year after Georgia implemented that law.”
H2A Visa Program
Many agribusinesses use the H2A visa program to fill gaps in their workforce.
It is a temporary nonimmigrant visa program for farm workers.
Jamie Fussell of the Florida Fruits and Vegetables Association says businesses here were already struggling to find enough migrant workers before SB1718. “In 2010 there was the H2A program, but Florida certified around 4,400 workers. Last year Florida certified over 50,000 workers.”
However, Vilchez-Santiago said the program could be costly. “Financing a work visa costs about $4,000, but it can go as high as $8,000 to $9,000 depending on the company and its size.”
Vilchez-Santiago said that as companies pay more workers, the costs would start to affect food and housing prices for everyone.
“As companies here have to increase their administrative costs to attract new workers from abroad, many of them through the Visa program, the reality is that every single consumer will pay the price.”
However, according to Jamie Fussell, the H2A visa program comes with its own problems. “Sometimes housing becomes an issue because an employer has to be ready at least a month in advance to hire these workers.”
Affordable housing is already an issue for many in the Sunshine State as the population continues to grow, a problem unique to Florida.
Fussell said all other issues must be addressed at the federal level.
“And that’s really about access to the program and wage stability. By wage stability we just mean that wages are rule based, they are rule based. And in Florida last year, for example, there was a 15% increase in its regulated pay from 2022 to 2023. Just a way to stabilize those jumps so there aren’t big spikes from year to year. Growers in Florida were already in the middle of their season, which means they will already have deals in place with their buyers about where they are going to grow. Therefore, it is much more difficult to absorb the higher labor costs.”
He adds that it can be difficult for Florida growers to gain access to the program, as applications for a season longer than 10 months are likely to be rejected.
“Florida is a state that, for the most part, can grow crops all year round. We consider summer a minor month because it is much hotter and the weather is much more volatile, but we have crops that can reach 10 or even 11 months.” . If you apply for an 11-month H2A contract, you’ll be turned down because agencies assume you have year-round needs. When you have a year-round need, your need is no longer temporary or seasonal.”
According to Fussell, there is still time to apply for the program for companies looking to replace their workforce before the next growth.
“The process is actually an accelerated application process, although it is very cumbersome. We can submit applications as early as 75 days after the employer’s requirement date when they start harvesting work, up to 60 days before. So you really have two to three months before your start date to go through the entire application process.”
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Plants begin the growth process on the farm where Maria works.
He said employers using the program for the first time can shorten this process to 45 days.
But if that’s not an option, Samuel Vilchez Santiago said there are efforts on the ground to help undocumented workers.
For our part, the American Business Immigration Coalition is proposing that the Biden administration use its probation program and the probation powers provided by the country’s laws to create a new probation program that will allow illegal immigrants into the United States who have contributed to our economy will be able for a long time, 20 to 30 years, to obtain a work permit that will allow them to work and circumvent many of the guidelines of this state law.”
Although Maria is not eligible for the H2A visa, she said her employer is looking at ways to help its undocumented workers.
“Our bosses say they would like to help and get permission so we can continue working here.”
She said she plans to remain in Florida “until either the ship goes down or we find a solution.”
Once fully documented, Maria would like to get back into psychology.
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