LI employers to weigh guest-worker raise

Long Island business owners who rely on the federal H2B guest worker program to fill out their staffs every summer will meet Wednesday night in Bridgehampton to discuss proposed federal changes that would greatly increase the cost of hiring those workers.

The changes, which were to go into effect Friday, have been put off for 60 days because of protests, conflicting court rulings and a pending federal lawsuit in Louisiana that seeks to stop the changes.

"These proposed regulations make it almost impossible to sponsor someone under the program," said Melinda Rubin, the Hampton Bays immigration attorney sponsoring the meeting. "You will have to pay anywhere from $6 to $12 an hour more, and if you have any American workers you have to pay them the same wage . . . you would be paying pool cleaners $20 an hour."

The meeting is at 6 p.m. in the community room of the Bridgehampton National Bank at 2200 Montauk Hwy.

The proposed H2B changes have already resulted in a federal lawsuit -- filed by five industry groups that include the Louisiana Forestry Association and the American Hotel and Lodging Association -- in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana claiming that the U.S. Department of Labor made substantial errors in its wage calculations, and seeking to block the changes on both technical and constitutional grounds.

On Long Island, H2B workers are typically found working in resorts, on docks, in landscape crews, doing pool maintenance work, and in commercial kitchens. A related program exists for farm workers but is not affected by the proposed changes.

The lawsuit claims that Louisiana wages for tree planters would go from the current $9.60 to $16.31 an hour, and overtime wages would go from $14.40 to $24.47.

One big user of the H2B program on Long Island, Gurney's Inn in Montauk, said it no longer uses program workers because of the threatened wage increases and the uncertainty of being able to hire the people it needs.

Until the past few years, about 1,000 H2B workers came to Long Island each year, and employers nationwide would compete for the 66,000 workers permitted annually into the United States -- a cap set by Congress. Now, officials say, the demand for such workers is down because of the nation's economic problems.

Under existing regulations, employers who want to hire H2B workers must first advertise for local workers, certify they are paying wages that reflect local rates, and must pay American employees at least as much as their H2B workers.

U.S. Labor Department officials say the changes are an attempt to make sure that H2B workers are paid fairly. Under federal regulations, H2B workers cannot be paid less than local workers earn and must have working conditions similar to those of U.S. workers.

Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton) said the changes started with the belief that H2B workers were being taken advantage of. But, he said, "That is simply not the case. The minimum-wage rates being proposed by the Department of Labor are simply unrealistically high."

Bishop is part of a group of nearly 50 members of Congress working to block the changes.