Front Street Weekly; 812

[music] Tonight on Front Street weekly bitter harvest a new immigration law controls the supply of migrant workers to the state. But critics say it will only cause new problems. We'll look at the new law and its impact on farmers and migrant workers. Gwyneth Gamble Booth looks at a local arts and crafts school with a national reputation that's getting a head for business. And we'll meet Rob Frederick, a Northwest painter inspired by the beauty of Oregon. Good evening and welcome to this edition of Front Street Weekly. Our first story tonight is about

a big concern facing growers all over Oregon. Crops like these Christmas trees and dozens of others bring in millions of dollars each year to the state's economy. But for a long time we haven't paid much attention to the people who harvest these crops. Well that's all changed in the past couple of years and lately we've been seeing lots of stories in the media about homeless migrants who got stuck here during the winter. Many people say the situation really began back in 1986 when Congress passed a new immigration bill. It was a controversial law, and critics of the measure say that the situation we're seeing now is really just the beginning of a much more serious and complicated problem. The people at the center of this controversy are not used to getting a lot of attention, but farm workers are a key link in America's food chain. And right now many people are worried that the supply of farm labor is in jeopardy. It's part of the ongoing debate over a 1986 law called the Immigration Reform and Control Act. It's going to have a dramatic effect. In the 25 years that I've been at this company I've never been

faced with the problem of labor shortage as we do right now. It's no secret that for years many of the workers in our fields and orchards were illegal aliens. At times the supply of this migrant labor seemed almost unlimited. Many workers were smuggled into this country by labor brokers called coyotes. The new immigration law is an attempt to crack down on the illegal practices once and for all. From now on employers will have to be much more careful about each person who gets hired. Employer sanctions is a major cornerstone of this legislation that for the first time places full responsibility upon the employers of this nation to screen job applicants to make sure that those that they choose to hire have a lawful claim to those jobs. And in order to have a lawful claim on field work, illegal aliens could apply for new status as Special Agricultural Workers. To qualify for the SAW program, workers had to prove they did farm labor in the US for 90 days between May of

1985 and May of '86. The final deadline for applying to the SAW program was last November 30th, and there was a huge last minute rush. The INS office in Portland was jammed. Immigration officials say more than 30,000 people applied to the SAW program in Oregon. With that many farm workers, why should anyone be concerned about a labor shortage in the fields? I think that you will definitely see some of them moving out of agriculture because there are other jobs that are better than agriculture. Dick Ginsburg is an immigration lawyer who's been watching the farm labor system for many years. Until now, illegal workers didn't have many options in their lives. The fear of being caught and deported kept them from looking for other jobs. But with the new law in effect, workers may set their sights on a better future. Well these people are no different from any of us. They want to better their situation, they want to provide for their families, for their children. So, certainly they want the best

job that they can get, the most economic security that they can get. In the past, we've looked at migrant labor as a group, not as individuals. No one has ever taken an exact count of how many workers are in Oregon during the peak of the harvest season. Right now, a lot of growers are wondering what kind of labor situation they can count on when spring arrives. I feel relatively confident that in our operation we'll have enough people coming back that we'll be able to harvest our crops. But I do have this feeling gnawing at me that there's going to be a shortage of workers. Narrator: During spring and summer, Doug Cramer will need more than 300 workers for the berry harvest at Loydeen Farms in Cornelius. Cramer does not use labor brokers or coyotes to get his workers. For years, many of them have come from a single community in Mexico. The relationship has helped him create a stable workforce,

but Cramer thinks he may have trouble with other growers. Cramer: Any time you get a shortage of workers, my greatest fear is that other growers will come and try and take the workers from us that have been coming and working for us. Cramer doesn't like the idea that all his years of building up a reliable workforce may end up benefiting other growers. Part of the intent behind the new immigration law was to encourage competition for labor, with the idea that growers might start hiring more U.S. citizens. But growers say it's not realistic to think that unemployed Americans have the desire or the skills to do this kind of work. Cramer: We feel that our workers are as skilled at doing what they're doing, which is harvesting our soft fruits. as anybody that works in other sectors of the economy. I don't believe we'll ever be able to depend on a domestic labor force.

Here's a different kind of agricultural work we seldom think about. It goes on every day at hundreds of nurseries around Oregon, and a lot of these operations are also noticing a change in the workforce. For one month we looked for 15 positions and we only got one. That's basically what I'm saying. And, you know, we're running the ads again through the month of January. And I know we're not the only nursery out there looking for workers either. I feel there is a shortage. For Terry Dillard, this is not a seasonal problem. She says her company needs about 30 full-time workers who are willing to learn about horticulture and work year-round. Filling those jobs has been a frustrating experience. We really feel it takes 30 to 45 days to train someone here just to know where everything is and to become a productive employee. And when you have turnover at the rate we have where people are coming in and working a couple weeks and on their way, we feel that we're just getting no productive employment. Terry Dillard is also frustrated by all the paperwork of the new law. From now

on, everyone who gets hired for a job has to fill out this I-9 form and show documents that prove he or she is eligible to work. Many immigrant workers now have driver's licenses, Social Security cards, and other forms of identification. But employers have to be careful that all documents are genuine and that makes the hiring process much more complicated. I consider myself a little smarter than a fence post at least. And when I see these documents come in, I truly don't know which are which are correct and which are not. I find myself in here many a day spending for five hours going over the files and being sure everything is in order and at the same time my workload is still sitting out there on my desk, and confirmations are ready to be sent back, and they're late and this has just added a tremendous amount of paperwork and appear mentally worry. The Immigration Service has tried to convince growers to stop worrying.

And the new immigration law does have a system for handling labor shortages in the years ahead. It's called the Replacement Agricultural Workers Program and it begins on October 1st. Under the RAW program, a limited number of new workers will be allowed into the U.S. to maintain the supply of farm labor. But as of now, the exact procedures for the program haven't been worked out. We have no final regulations. The procedure, however, will involve not just the Immigration Service but the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Labor. The latter two organizations who will be responsible for periodically surveying the agricultural industry. And based upon that survey, it will establish a statistical floor, so to speak, upon which we can make projections on the number of RAW workers to be admitted to the United States following. 10/1/89. My feelings on that are the same as many people, and that is until there is actually crop loss in more than one commodity, that we're

not going to see the Department of Labor, the Immigration Service and the Department of Agriculture agree on how many people they'll let into the country. Right now, there's no way of telling how many farm workers may decide to leave the fields and find other jobs. And some people say the fear of a worker shortage is being exaggerated. If you start looking at their experiences, you know where they're coming from, where they come from, they come from the ranches. They're not going to go into the city. They're not going to go into restaurants or hotels and construction. Uh-uh. They're going to stay out on the farm. They're farm workers. Right? Cipriano Ferrel is president of Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United. As a union organizer, he's been waging an uphill battle in Oregon for several years. So far, none of the growers in Oregon have signed a union contract with their workers. But that situation could change now that the number of workers is limited by the new

immigration law. It's going to stabilize the workforce. And, you know, we're going to be able to work a lot better, we're going to be more effective because we're going to have more time with these people. We don't see a need for any more people, especially if they bring up the wages and start treating people a little better. You'll have plenty of people to pick up the crops. One thing everyone agrees on is that Oregon did have plenty of workers to pick the crops last season, and many of them ended up staying here during the winter. People who have been working with the migrants say this situation didn't happen by accident. The great majority of those people did not just show up; they were brought here by labor contractors who specifically recruited these people with promises of all sorts of things. And I think a combination of that, plus people thinking that this is a real opportunity now for me to come up and apply, brought a tremendous number of people here. In the past few months we've seen plenty of headlines about the problems of

homeless migrants around the state. This group of several families has been getting help from a church in Canby and many of these people have a common goal. They want to work and they want to improve their lives. Okay then, he says that he doesn't want to cause - that his main thing is to work, establish yourself in this society, to be part of the community, and to help the kids to grow up to be somebody. For these people, being out of work is a frustrating experience, and that frustration has been felt all over the state. In Washington County, many farm workers have been getting help at Centro Cultural, a local community outreach group. These people come with the decision to do work even no matter what type of work. How heavy how hard it is. They are here to do that type of work; they want to work. They don't want to receive handouts.

Once the harvest season begins and workers are able to find jobs, the situation may improve but it won't just take care of itself. Many social service agencies are worried that next winter we'll be seeing the same problems all over again. And it shouldn't be surprising that many farm workers don't want to go back to their homelands even for a few months. In Mexico, the economy is just wasted. And so people have to come up. They have to come up. They either have to leave, or see their families starve, right? What Cypriano Farrel is talking about could be the most controversial aspect of the new immigration law. With so many people out of work in Mexico and other Latin American countries, can the U.S. really stop the flow of illegal aliens by making it harder for them to get jobs in this country? The Immigration Service says yes. And by removing the magnet of employability, and for entitlement benefits, we're hoping that they'll see the light in terms of returning to their homes. Because

it's a very magnet that's brought us here brought them here has been removed and to that extent it should make both the employer's job and our job a bit easier. Well, you know, there's no way that they're going to seal off the border. You know, I think that's just - you know they're dreaming if they think they're going to do that. A lot of people will be paying very close attention to what happens in the fields and orchards during the next few years. If the new law does not lead to a stable, dependable workforce, the big fear is that some of the crops Oregon is famous for will simply be phased out. New plantings of these types of fruits and berries are not happening at this point. And when we see that instead of buying berries at 29-39 cents a pound, we'll have to buy them maybe at $2. Then our pockets are going to hurt and then we're going to say, "What happened to that cheap labor that we used to have?" Because that's what

makes American people speak out loud and clear, you know, when our pockets are hurting. Then we say "Hey, this is wrong." Our next story is about an art institution in Portland with a national reputation. Here at the Oregon School of Arts and Crafts, students learn to hone their artistic skills. And now, executive director John Lottes says students will be taught to hone their business and marketing skills as well. It's a new approach for this, the oldest arts and crafts school in the country. On these wooded acres west of Portland sits one of Oregon's best kept secrets. In fact, like some other institutions in the state, Reed College for example, it enjoys a fine national reputation. While many Oregonians would be hard pressed to tell you what it is. Now, however, with its new director and

strong direction from its board. The school is poised to make Oregonians sit up and take notice. John Lottes has set his sights on giving the school's students a business-like approach to the actual marketing of their arts and crafts. We're going to concentrate the program totally in three areas. In the studio work itself, the historical basis of that work. And then the third component I think is the most exciting and that's. the business of being an artist. How do you open a business? How do you set up a studio? How do you set up a set of books? When do you need an accountant and not need an accountant? Should you get ahold of a lawyer right away? How do you deal with taxes? And then most importantly, how do you deal with The marketing and sales and the gallery world where your work. will be sold? And that makes it different than any program I know of in the country. Often at schools like OSAC or Cranbrook in the East, students would graduate with a

fine education but no learning of the pragmatic approach to selling their art. Paul Bennett is a case in point. Now a successful artist whose work is featured at the Gango Gallery in Portland, Bennett still feels a little angry at what his art school did not teach him. When I went to art school, when I get these letters from art school about how did you like the school, and you know 10 years later. And so...I thought the school was great, except I never learned a thing about how to market my work. And I really kind of resented that, I held that against them for a long time, you know. And it was very much the feeling of being kicked out of the nest, you know, now you're on your own, kid. See what you can do. And I just felt like they could have done a lot more for me in terms of just giving me some idea about the business. It was all a mystery to me just all this business end, you know, and it would take up a tremendous amount of time trying to figure out taxes, for example. And. It just seemed like a lot of times I was just going

through a dark hallway trying to figure this out and every now and then I would come to a window of light, and oh this is what it's all about, and then it would be back walking down the dark hallway again trying to figure out what does it mean to be an artist. So, I think a lot more can be taught to the artist about the business end of making a living off of your work, and a good living. So enthusiastic is Lottes about OSAC training artists to be businessmen, that he welcomed Jack Lenor Larsen to the school for a day of meetings with corporate heads and influential business leaders. Based in New York, with offices all over the world, Artist Jack Lenor Larson is a success story whose company does millions of dollars of business annually. In a sense, he's important in the same way we're trying to put together this multi-level program. First of all, and central to everything, Jack is an artist. I mean he's just a consummate great artist. He has done for the. Textile industry and the art

of textiles probably more than any living person today. and Then his work in marketing. I mean he's just a genius. at marketing. He can, based on his personal experience, stand there and talk eye to eye with a businessman and say the arts aren't only good business but the arts are business. Coming out of art school, "commerce" is a dirty word. I think teaching marketing and even the simplest bookkeeping and the difference between a debit and a credit and so forth. It's amazing that schools don't, including universities that are training lawyers and dentists and people that will also become small businessmen. And they come out without knowing business. And those close to the arts need it the most. And I don't know that the students will welcome it. But I think as soon as they

get out into the adult world, they'll be grateful for not being totally ignorant. You'll be meeting with some of the community leaders. What will you tell them about the Oregon School of Arts and Crafts? I'm going to make a pitch for trusting those who work with their hands. They are problem solvers. They are sensitive and sensible. And the school must have wider support. But it's in such good shape, it's now poised to take its role as a national leader. John Notta says that a good school should not only teach the artist to market his work, but should teach the business community that it is good business to support the arts. The arts make so much good sense for business. And business is starting to realize that it's incumbent now, upon arts and crafts as an example, to show the businessman, the business community, and the business as an institution. A way in which making a gift here can not only make

them feel like good citizens but can have some direct positive benefit to their business. While teaching artists they can sell their products without compromising their artistic integrity, the Oregon School of Arts and Crafts will continue its tradition of offering classes to those who may not want art careers, but want instruction just for the joy of learning a craft. Any day at the school, students can be found in jewelry classes, weaving, pottery making, And others. The very finest faculty in the world can come here and visiting artists. And we can build a permanent faculty of top-level people. Who will serve not only the relatively small number of students in the professional programs but I think even More openly welcome and invite the part time student That has been the source of this institution's strengths. For the 86 years or 82

years we've been around. Will such a new thrust for career artists work? The jury is out of course. But one thing is clear. The Oregon School of Arts and Crafts intends to make Oregonians more aware of its existence and its national reputation. Rod Frederick is a native Oregonian and an accomplished painter. As far back as he can remember he says the beauty of the Northwest has been his inspiration. One of things I like to do in my...that I'm hoping to accomplish in my painting is to show people my world.

The type of things that I see and I experience. Frederick has painted since childhood, an artistic bent encouraged by his parents. In college he was an art major, and his love of nature led him to minor in biology. Frederick: One of the things I really like about painting wildlife is that there's a challenge, a constant challenge, to try to come up with a creative idea. But hopefully have it so that it's also accurate. When choosing subject matter for a painting, I don't want to restrict myself too much. There is kind of a thin line that you can use when when painting realism in that you do want to be artistic still. But you don't really want to break the rules too much to where it would be an impossible situation. A lot of times abstract shapes in a painting are what pull the viewer closer. And I want my painting to be noticeable from across the room usually. I want to have something that's going to draw people a little bit closer to it. And then when they get closer

to it, hopefully, they'll want to keep getting closer yet. You know, that is where the detail comes in. By attempting to put a lot of mood into a painting, I think that one is drawing something from...from the Impressionists. Even though a lot of people don't think that impressionism and realism go together at all, I think they can. And that's one of things I'm trying to do. Frederick's inspiration comes from the out of doors. As an artist he struggles to put on canvas what few others have seen. One of the things that I try to do is to make it a point to paint things that I do know very well. I think that the most important thing about wildlife painting is actually being out into the wild to see the things. If you don't actually experience it, it's hard to really, hopefully, convey that to somebody else. Frederick photographs many animals and uses the pictures for detail in his paintings. But the most important thing is his imagination. There's something, just something, that isn't shown in a photograph. And that isn't shown in your sketches. That it just comes from inside the head. From the emotions, I guess, that you felt when you were out there. The

actual painting may not have been something that I saw, but something that I maybe was hoping to see. And hopefully the feel is there too. This is the result of Frederick's search through nature, strikingly realistic paintings. This painting is called Misty Morning Sentinel, and it shows a red tail hawk which is a very common bird of prey found throughout North America. People that have never seen a duck in a tree find it hard to believe that ducks would do that. But that's one of the...it's a pretty common sight here in Oregon. The first eagles I saw were a group of them. So, I thought that would be a nice painting to do. It is pretty magnificent to see just one eagle by itself. But to see a group of them like that, it is just really something else. I want to strive for perfection as much as I can. And that's what being successful is all about. Next time on Front Street weekly, satellite technology links up with the sport of kings. Soon Oregonians from around the state can wager on their favorite

ponies simulcast live from Portland Meadows. Is off track betting a favorite or a long shot for the racing industry and the state of Oregon? Reporter Rod Mynah visits a Buddhist monastery that lies just outside Ashland. And we'll see the side of home remodeling they can't show you on This Old House, when Steve Amen takes us on a tour of Hell House. That's Front Street weekly Monday at 8:30 p.m. [Music plays.]