In the Media

RALEIGH

Statewide and local organizations gathered in downtown Raleigh Thursday night to repeat calls to state officials to mandate rigorous protections for workers in the meat processing and produce agriculture industries in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The North Carolina Farmworker Advocacy Network, a coalition of groups calling for Gov. Roy Cooper’s office and the North Carolina Department of Labor to protect workers, also held a vigil for the largely Latino immigrant essential workers who died due to COVID-19 contracted while on the job.

The coronavirus spread rapidly throughout the spring and summer in various meatpacking plants and the housing facilities of seasonal immigrant farmworkers, both places where workers are in close quarters and where COVID-19 safety recommendations were in place, but not mandatory laws.

Large skeleton figurines and a giant puppet representing the sun loomed over the crowd at the event at Bicentennial Plaza, which featured a Day of the Dead-style altar with candles and images of laborers who died from COVID-19 related causes.

“Since March, essential workers, especially farmworkers and processing [plant] workers, have risked their lives at work,” said Lariza Garzón, executive director of the Episcopal Farmworker Ministry in Harnett County. “North Carolina’s food system and the profitability of farms and meat processing plants have been maintained at the expense of these workers’ health and safety.” 

Cooper told the labor advocacy groups of NCFAN in the summer that he would issue an executive order for sweeping protections for farm and plant laborers, but he backed down from issuing the order after pushback from state labor and agriculture officials, The News & Observer previously reported.

COVID-19’S TOLL ON WORKERS

Since April, the state Department of Health and Human Services reports, at least 19 deaths were related to virus clusters at meatpacking plants. It attributes 3,859 cases to them in a new weekly report on clusters.

Another DHHS report attributes 3,799 cases and 17 deaths to the category of congregate living facilities, which includes immigrant farmworker housing. The exact number of affected farmworkers is unknown.

Johnston County farmworkers recently featured in a series of stories on climate change by McClatchy had a virus outbreak at their housing, workers and advocacy groups told The N&O.

Several farm and poultry plant workers spoke at the event in Spanish through a translator, denouncing a lack of protections at their jobs, such as paid time off, sick leave, or enough access to personal protective equipment. They also spoke about being required to show up to work while feeling sick and not being allowed paid time off to recover from the virus.

Out of economic need, many immigrant workers continued to work as coronavirus outbreaks struck workplaces, such as in meatpacking plants — where state health officials have refused to disclose virus data by facility, as was done for nursing home facilities.

“Us farmworkers, we are not disposable workers, we are people that deserve respect and we deserve a dignified life,” said Alicia Soriano, a tobacco farmworker, in Spanish. “We provide food to your tables and we ask the governor to take action for all of us.”

A poultry plant worker from a Burke County facility in Morganton said that she wasn’t allowed time off from work when she felt sick until she tested positive for COVID-19. 

“It makes me angry because we’re the ones who get sick, and the [companies] don’t,” said Evelin, who declined to give her last name out of fear of losing employment.

“We ask [state labor officials] to put regulations into place not only in the poultry plants but for all the workers who are out there,” she said.

PETITION TO THE STATE LABOR DEPARTMENT

The event comes a week before the state Department of Labor has to legally respond to a petition from advocacy groups that are part of the NCFAN coalition.

The Petition for Rule Making that was filed in October is a formal document that lays out demands for sweeping mandatory coronavirus protections for agricultural workers. State labor officials are given a month to respond under state law, Clermont Ripley, an N.C. Justice Center attorney, told The N&O.

The petition notes that the Department of Labor closed nearly 1,000 workplace health and safety complaints related to COVID-19 and only responded to six cases with investigations since September, according to COVID-19 data published by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Labor officials can choose to respond to the petition or reject it and advocacy groups may choose to either take the case to court or wait to petition the incoming labor commissioner after the official 2020 election results are in.

Weeks after a public commitment to issue a new executive order with sweeping labor protections for vulnerable agricultural workers in the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Roy Cooper’s office said they couldn’t follow through, citing pushback from state officials.

The decision was communicated to the N.C. Farmworker Advocacy Network, a coalition of organizations, which has demanded worker safety measures since the start of the pandemic and had been in conversation with state health officials and the governor’s office. It was first reported by Spanish language outlets Enlace Latino NC and Qué Pasa.

“We are told the governor has rescinded his commitment, largely based on pushback from the Department or Labor and (the Department of) Agriculture, which has claimed it is not interested in enforcing these kinds of safety regulations,” said a news release from the coalition. “…The Department of Health and Human Services (said) that such an order would impede progress made between the agencies and companies to ensure cooperation.”

NCFAN denounced these reasons as not being “true or valid,” while Cooper’s office told The News & Observer in an email that disagreement with stakeholders kept the governor from issuing the order.

“Protecting agriculture and meat processing workers is a high priority,” said Dory MacMillan, a spokesperson. “While the governor and public health officials have had success on increasing some safety protocols and outbreak reporting, there remains significant disagreement among growers, state labor officials and workers about overall solutions.”

“These entities must cooperate to protect our workers and their families,” MacMillan said. “The governor and his administration are pushing growers and companies to protect workers and they are still working on the most effective solutions make sure that happens.”

As the coronavirus pandemic dealt a blow to the largely Latino immigrant agricultural workforce in North Carolina’s fields and meat processing plants, organizations sounded alarms for months and urged the state to respond, culminating in a virtual August town hall where the executive order was discussed.

Cooper and Attorney General Josh Stein promised cooperation on these concerns and others ahead of November elections. Hundreds of people from Latino and immigrant labor rights organizations attended the town hall.

“We saw this coming and we were speaking out about it. We did a press conference in April about how this was going to affect farmworkers and meat processing workers,” said Joanna Welborn, communication arts director for Student Action with Farmworkers. “We have always known that the conditions they live and work in are just ripe for potential abuse.”

According to Welborn, members of the Farmworker Advocacy Network have been meeting with Cooper’s staff members biweekly and the governor promised to issue an executive order giving farmworkers access to health care and protections against retaliation. But after three weeks of planning, the governor changed his mind and no order will be issued.

The protections are needed because one of the biggest obstacles to getting farmworkers in North Carolina screened is their concern about their undocumented status, said Benjamin William, a staff attorney for NC Legal Aid who works with H-2A workers.

RALEIGH — Advocates for farm and meat-processing plant workers called on North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper on Friday to require additional COVID-19 virus protections for plant employees.

The N.C. Farmworker Advocacy Network, N.C. AFL-CIO and other groups want at least two weeks of paid sick leave for workers who have tested positive for the virus or are in quarantine; staggered bathroom and lunch breaks to lower the risk of contamination; and time-and-a-half pay for taking on increased risks.

At a video news conference Friday, they also asked that workers be part of the ongoing conversation about plant safety, including being told when someone tests positive.

Advocates for migrant farmworkers in North Carolina are urging state and federal agencies to protect those workers amid the new coronavirus pandemic.

The Rudd Strawberry Farm in Guilford County has temporarily closed after eight of its workers tested positive for COVID-19, state health officials said earlier this week. The spread of the virus was related to the on-site housing for its farmworkers.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services has listed the farm as Guilford County’s fourth “congregate living facility” with an ongoing outbreak of COVID-19, according to the agency’s website.

The first positive case of the coronavirus in a seasonal agricultural worker was confirmed earlier this month by a health clinic in Harnett County, according to a news report.

The clinic, CommWell Health in Dunn, didn’t identify the worker, citing federal medical-privacy laws. The worker, who lives in North Carolina, was quarantined during his or her illness, the clinic said.

A farmer in Forsyth County said he has taken measures to protect his workers from the virus.

The Farmworker Advocacy Network sent a letter on March 31 to Gov. Roy Cooper, urging him to enact five of its recommendations to protect the farmworkers who provide food and agricultural products that state residents and North Carolina’s economy need.

On April 7, Tyson Foods announced it was closing an Iowa pork processing plant due to at least 25 of its employees falling victim to novel coronavirus COVID-19. A week earlier, multinational meatpacker JBS cut back production at its meatpacking facility in Pennsylvania for the same reason, joining Empire Kosher and Olymel, who have closed chicken and pig facilities respectively because too many workers have become sick.

Smithfield Foods closed down a pork processing plant in South Dakota this week, and announced Covid-19 has been diagnosed at its North Carolina facility in the town of Tarheel in Bladen County. The county cited privacy issues in its decision not to reveal how many persons have been affected. One employee decided the risk was too great for her to bring the virus home to her asthmatic child. “We are directly on top of each other coming down the line,” she said, under condition of anonymity, to a local ABC television affiliate.

On Tuesday, April 21, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper confirmed that five food processing plants in the state, located in Bladen, Chatham, Duplin, Lee and Robeson counties, have been stricken with coronavirus outbreaks. Workers at chicken processors Mountaire Farms in Siler City and Pilgrim’s Pride in Sanford have been complaining for over a week about the contagion, lack of worker protections and workplace pressures such as threatened termination if they call out sick. Many Latinx employees work for subcontractors at the chicken processing plants, at lower rates of pay and with no paid leave.

The Farmworker Advocacy Network (FAN) and the Episcopal Farmworker Ministry (EFWM) in Dunn, North Carolina gathered agricultural workers and advocates virtually via Zoom to give voice to the workers and broadcast the extent of the problem.

An advocacy group sent Gov. Roy Cooper a letter last week highlighting the need to protect a vulnerable segment of the state’s population ­— farmworkers.

A coalition made up of members of the Farmworker Advocacy Network, their partner organizations, and other individuals penned the letter to Cooper in an effort to improve health and safety standards for farm and poultry workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The group held an online press conference Tuesday night to address concerns that not enough is being done to protect non-immigrant workers despite them being deemed “essential.”

“We all agree that they are essential to our economy and to our lives, but they are not being provided with essential protections,” Clermont Fraser Ripley with the N.C. Justice Center said. “The work they do is dangerous and it’s low pay. There is already one confirmed case of COVID-19 in the state among farm workers and five poultry plants have confirmed cases so it is beyond time for these steps to be taken.”

Farmworkers often live in rural housing provided by their employers. The group cited circumstances where workers lacked access to proper hygiene, are unable to practice social-distancing and aren’t provided personal protective equipment. The letter to Cooper detailed steps the group feels need to be taken in order to protect the people who work in such an important industry.

“Farmworkers are not just essential workers; they are essential parts of our community,” said Dr. Lior Vered, a policy advocate at Toxic Free NC. “They provide us with nourishment, and they deserve essential rights and protections to ensure they are not put at risk as a result of their work. We urge Gov. Cooper to take action and protect the people that bring food to our tables. The agricultural community is one that is often overlooked and excluded from protections, so making sure their needs are considered in our state’s emergency planning is critical.”

WAKE COUNTY, N.C. (WCTI) – Members of the Farmworker Advocacy Network and others are calling on North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper to take action in support of agricultural workers amid the coronavirus pandemic.

They say the first confirmed and suspected farmworker cases of COVID-19 have already appeared in the state, making it urgent that the governor act quickly.

The coalition will present testimony from workers; faith leaders, including Bishop Anne Hodges-Copple of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina; and advocates in a Zoom press conference on Tuesday at 6:00 p.m.

They’re expected to address concerns for the health and safety of agricultural workers amid the pandemic and say North Carolina’s field and food processing workers face many barriers to accessing essential services, especially during times of emergency.

Agricultural workers are particularly vulnerable during this pandemic, advocates say, because language barriers, a lack of transportation, and a lack of connection to services in the community leaves them isolated from resources. Because migrant agricultural workers live in group housing, usually travel to and from work in shared transportation like buses, and work closely next to each other in the fields, the group adds, “social distancing” is not something they can choose to do, leaving them at constant risk of exposure to the coronavirus.

There is a bright orange mural that members of the Farmworker Advocacy Network carry around. It depicts field hands laboring at their grueling work. In the lower left corner, dark-skinned arms, chained at the wrist, reach upward.

Nadeen Bir-Zaslow, a member of the group that handles communications for the North Carolina activists, says, “We have a legacy in this country of people not being paid for their work or being treated as less than human. We’re still working on that.”

They have their work cut out for them. North Carolina is considered among the most unfriendly states for workers in the United States. Farm and poultry laborers might be the most unappreciated and vulnerable.

The Farmworker Advocacy Network, based in Durham, is a coalition of 19 groups, from Bir-Zaslow’s Student Action With Farmworkers (SAF) to Legal Aid of N.C., the N.C. Farmworkers’ Project, the N.C. Justice Center’s Immigrants Legal Assistance Project and many more.

“The reality is we don’t have enough resources,” says Melinda Wiggins, SAF’s executive director and a network member. “But when we work together, we can get more done. We can be more effective about strategizing.”