D***ling border lights worrying astronomers Needs for darkness, security clash at Yuma

CLAUDINE LoMONACO
Tucson Citizen
07.02.2007

Photographs of glaring new stadium lights along the border near Yuma, taken when President Bush visited in April, sent shudders through astronomers across southern Arizona.

The 57-foot-high, thousand-watt lights, installed to illuminate the border and help U.S. Border Patrol agents see illegal crossers at night, send unshielded glare into the night sky for miles, greatly reducing the visibility of planets, stars and other celestial bodies.

Astronomers worry that more lights could diminish research at area observatories and harm one of Arizona's major industries.

"If we have those lights all across the border, you can kiss astronomy in southern Arizona goodbye," said retired Air Force Lt. Col. Bob Gent, an astronomer and president of the board of the International Dark-Sky Association. The organization was founded by Arizona astronomers in 1988 to educate the public about light pollution and reduce its effect on dark skies, wildlife and human health.

Dark skies and dry air make southern Arizona the most important astronomical site in North America and one of the most important in the world. It is home to three of the world's top observatories, dozens of commercial and private observatories and thousands of amateur astronomers, many of whom conduct professional-level research. The University of Arizona recently estimated the total value of investment in astronomy facilities and instruments in southern Arizona at $808 million, with another $588 million planned or under way.

The Yuma lights will eventually stretch for 9.1 miles around the San Luis Port of Entry. They are the result of a law Bush signed in October that authorized 700 miles of fencing, including a combination of lighting, sensors, cameras and barriers, along the Southwest border. The law, which was not fully funded, calls for the fence to cover all but five miles of the Arizona border and includes a 28-mile test "virtual fence" in the Sasabe area that was supposed to begin operation by June 13, but has been delayed by technical problems.

The Yuma lights have astronomers, who have worked with the Border Patrol, asking, "How did this happen?"

They also alerted them that they needed to get involved, said Gent, 59, who retired to Sierra Vista so he could conduct research on the brightness variability of stars from his backyard.

"We're trying to meet Border Patrol and say, 'Please, focus on infrared lights or explore other technologies, but don't destroy the night sky for us,'" Gent said.

The Border Patrol has not said whether it will install Yuma-style lights in other parts of Arizona.

"There are plans to add additional infrastructure," Border Patrol spokesman Xavier Rios said. "That includes additional lighting, all-weather patrol roads, fencing and so forth. Specifics, I don't have that right now."
Rios said the Yuma lights are based on lights in Naco that astronomers helped the Border Patrol retrofit five years ago with shields to cut glare, though he conceded the Yuma lights are not shielded.

Doug Snyder, an amateur astronomer in Palominas who made the first comet sighting in Cochise County and led the 2002 effort to shield the Naco lights, said the Yuma lights bear no resemblance to those in Naco, "unless they mean they both give off light." The Yuma lights "are much much higher and much brighter."

Richard Green, director of the Mount Graham Observatory, northeast of Tucson, said the lights in Yuma are "extraordinarily poorly designed." The lights waste energy and reduce nighttime visibility because they produce too much light, causing eyes to act as if it were daytime, he said.

"You can't see anything in the surrounding darkness. It lets people hide in the shadows," he said. "It was a major error in terms of accomplishing what (the Border Patrol) wanted to accomplish."

Several astronomers said they would like the Border Patrol to create a national standard based on the Naco lights to ensure all lighting along the border is more effective, less polluting and cheaper.

If more lights similar to those in Yuma are installed, Gent said, "Can you imagine what that's going to cost? And at taxpayers' expense. They could do much more with much less electricity if they did it right."

Environmentalists are less optimistic that good design could help wildlife negotiate border lights.

"For some transborder species, lights effectively act as a wall because they won't go near them," said Travis Longcore, an ecologist with The Urban Wildlands Group, a Los Angeles conservation organization. Lights keep animals such as the endangered ocelot from critical routes between habitats.

Lights can also disorient birds, disturb the habits of nocturnal creatures such as snakes and the animals they prey on and lure insects away from where birds depend on them, said Longcore, who recently co-edited the first booklength look at the topic, "Ecological Consequences of Artificial Night Lighting."

The impact on southern Arizona, home to one of the most biodiverse deserts in the world, could be devastating, he said.

"We don't realize how much activity goes on at night," he said. "This kind of thing is setting off a pollution bomb for these species."

Astronomers have been working for decades to protect Arizona's skies. In 1972, they helped Tucson develop one of the country's first comprehensive light control ordinances. It mandated that all streetlights be shielded so light would pour onto streets, not into the sky. Pima County quickly followed suit. The laws became the model for lighting ordinances around the country.

Astronomers say the Border Patrol has been sensitive to their concerns. In 2003, the International Dark-Sky Association gave then-Tucson sector chief David Aguilar, who now heads the entire agency, an award for his help fixing the Naco lights. And astronomers from Whipple Observatory on Mount Hopkins negotiated with the agency to move a planned radio repeater ****her down the mountain so it would not interfere with the observatory's radio telescopes.

Two weeks ago, Border Patrol Assistant Sector Chief John Fitzpatrick, who declined a request for an interview with the Tucson Citizen, met with Whipple astronomers to discuss the potential impact of the permanent checkpoint planned for Interstate 19 and other plans for border lights and radar.

"It went well," Dan Brocious of the observatory said. "We established communication. Now we're waiting for details."

More Tijuana news

Dwindling work force puts pressure on growers

By Leslie Berestein and Diane Lindquist
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITERS

June 27, 2007

CALEXICO – In the pre-dawn hours during the harvest season in the Imperial Valley, a parking lot abutting the border fence buzzes with activity.


LAURA EMBRY / Union-Tribune
Luiz Guzman of Mexicali (left) and other workers waited inside a converted school bus in Calexico headed for Imperial Valley farms.
Diesel exhaust and the hum of engines fill the air as hundreds of buses idle in the dark, surrounded by farm workers waiting to be hired by labor contractors. Many are legal border crossers who have commuted from neighboring Mexicali, some rising before 2 a.m.

Workers huddle outside the buses, sipping hot coffee to ward off the early-morning chill. Some of those already recruited stretch out on the seats, trying to catch a bit more sleep. By 5 a.m., the buses will start rumbling toward the fields, some as far away as Yuma and the Coachella Valley.

Although thousands show up to find work, some days it isn't enough. Some crews won't be full, especially at the harvest's peak in midwinter.

As on-and-off talk of a guest-worker program continues in Washington, this parking lot is the Southern California epicenter in the debate.

“We're short on people,” said José Moreno, a foreman with El Don Farm Labor Contracting, as he waited for enough workers to make up 10 lettuce and broccoli crews one morning at the end of lettuce season in the spring. “I used to say, 'I don't have work.' Now I say, 'Do you want to work?' ”

The agricultural industry continues to pressure legislators for a guest-worker plan to be included in any immigration overhaul.



LAURA EMBRY / Union-Tribune
José Moreno, a foreman with El Don Farm Labor Contracting, said workers often abandon farms after a season and find other work. "We're short on people," Moreno said.
Being considered is a proposal that would admit up to 200,000 guest workers per year to work two-year increments in nonspecific industries, which could include agriculture.

In addition, Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Larry Craig, R-Idaho, are promoting a bill known as AgJobs as part of the package, which would grant legal status to undocumented farm workers who have worked a required period of time.

The bill would also streamline the existing H-2A seasonal farm worker visa program to make it easier for growers to hire guest workers, although it would not increase their ranks.

With passage of a broader package uncertain, both senators have suggested they would pursue a separate agriculture bill if an agreement can't be reached.

“The intent of the agriculture industry is to hold them to that promise,” said Bob Vice, a longtime guest-worker advocate and Fallbrook avocado grower. “Without some kind of guest-worker program, perishable agriculture as it is known today is not going to survive in this country . . . people are not raising their children to be farm workers.”

However, others say, a persistent farm labor shortage is hard to define. The supply of farm workers is directly tied to what growers are willing to pay, said Philip Martin, a University of California Davis economist. In California, the average farm worker earns less than $10 an hour.

“We want to make workers available so that it's easy for employers to hire them, so we don't lose any economic output,” Martin said. “At the same time, we want high wages for U.S. workers. You have to decide to which one of those to give the higher priority.”


In the valley
In the Imperial Valley, where most of the nation's lettuce is grown, growers and labor contractors have for several years complained about a labor shortage. They say their work force is aging, with younger prospects eschewing the backbreaking work for jobs in construction, the valley's burgeoning service sector or Mexicali's maquiladoras.




Ken Peterson, president of Black Dog Farms, said he had to leave 20 acres of leaf lettuce to wither in the field in December because he couldn't get enough workers to pick it.
“This was the first time we've ever left product in the field in a high market,” he said. “You couldn't get crews. We lost about $70,000 on that field alone.”

Among the mix of workers waiting for their buses to leave the parking lot, including women, there is a preponderance of older men.

“The younger men with micas (border crossing cards), the ones who work in construction, they are crossing the border in their work trucks at 6 or 7 a.m.,” said Edmundo Vega, 62, a longtime farm worker from Mexicali who had been waiting in the lot since long before dawn.

During the past several years, less grueling job opportunities have opened up north and south of the border. There is a growing manufacturing base in Mexicali, and for those who can cross legally – including those who carry border-crossing cards but work without permits, a common practice – the Imperial Valley is rapidly developing.

“Most of these workers have been working for 10 years or more,” said Moreno, the foreman, as farm workers climbed onto his bus. “The new ones don't want this work. They stay just one season and I don't see them anymore. They take other jobs, in construction or in hotels.”

Aside from job competition, growers say, stepped-up immigration enforcement is a contributing factor. The Imperial Valley's farm industry is an anomaly in that, while there are exceptions, much of its work force is in the country legally.

According to the Pew Hispanic Center in Washington, D.C., only 4 percent of the nation's unauthorized workers are employed in agriculture, but they make up the vast majority of farm labor. It is estimated that as many as 90 percent of California's farm workers are foreign born, most of them here illegally.

The federal government has recently revived its focus on interior enforcement, including employers who hire illegally. For growers, this – along with tighter border security, which may deter some newcomers – is one incentive to secure guest workers.

For some migrant workers, it has meant finding another job, preferably one that pays well enough to offset the steep costs paid to smugglers, and one that lets them lie low in one place.


The Senate plan
Under the Senate's guest-worker proposal, employers could recruit foreign workers under a new “Y-1” visa program after advertising vacant jobs for 90 days, paying fees and meeting various conditions.
This new program would exist in addition to the current H-2 guest-worker programs for seasonal farm and nonfarm workers, and would entitle guest workers to the same wages and benefits as similar U.S. workers, including the ability to switch jobs. However, H-2 workers in seasonal jobs would continue to be tied to one employer, a restriction that has drawn criticism as an incentive for exploitation.

There are no numerical caps on the current H-2A program used for farm workers, but it is seldom used in the West. Growers complain about having too many administrative hoops to jump through and having to provide housing, which must meet certain standards. Under the more employer-friendly Senate plan, growers could simply provide a housing allowance.

Still, some question the need for a guest-worker program. With fewer new farm workers, wages would ultimately rise said Martin, an expert on immigration and labor issues. This could increase the supply of workers, drawing them out of other industries, he said, or more likely prompt farmers to take cost-cutting measures such as mechanizing or changing to less labor-intensive crops.

“I'm looking at a cabbage machine for $350,000,” said grower Jack Vessey, co-owner of Vessey & Co. Inc.


High unemployment rate
Despite the alternative job opportunities development has brought to the valley, Imperial County still has the highest unemployment rate in California, 16.2 percent for May. It's a problem that growers lobbying for guest workers have run into when making their argument.
“The conflict always was, well, if it is so hard to get workers and you have to import all these workers from Mexico, why is the unemployment rate so high?” said economist James Gerber, director of the Center for Latin American Studies at San Diego State University.

The cross-border nature of the work force is one reason. One study roughly estimates that as much as 40 percent of the county's overall work force commutes from Mexicali, said Gerry Schmae****, an economist at the Yuma campus of Northern Arizona University.

Anyone who works legally in the United States may apply for unemployment. However, workers who commute from Mexico don't show up in census data, skewing the statistics. Schmae**** estimates that because of this and other factors, the county's true unemployment rate could range five to nine percentage points below the state estimate.

Another problem is unemployment fraud, a widespread practice among farm workers that growers and labor contractors are well aware of. In 2006, there were an average of 12,100 farm jobs in the county, 21 percent of the job total for all industries countywide.

“These people have to make so much money to live on,” said Andrew Currier, a grower and co-owner of El Don. “We only want to pay them so much. They can't live on what we are paying. But if they can do it collecting unemployment on one or two Social Security cards, it is a government subsidy . . . if we paid them more, there would probably be less unemployment fraud.”

Farm work does dry up in Calexico when the winter harvest season ends. A few find work harvesting melons and other off-season crops, but there isn't enough for everybody.

That spring morning at the end of lettuce season, a few dozen workers who didn't get on a crew headed for the Frosty Donuts shop a few blocks from the border, where they socialized on the sidewalk outside before calling it quits.

Maria Rico of Calexico, 50, said things would be different if it were peak harvest time, when contractors scramble for workers.

“In the high season, there is lots of work,” she said. “In January, there isn't anyone left.”

The way to a real middle ground on immigration reform

UNION-TRIBUNE
June 27, 2007
Ruben Navarrette

As someone who often has found fault with proposed reforms to America's immigration laws, I am frequently asked by readers to spell out exactly what kind of changes I would support.

Glad to. Especially since this is make-or-break time. Senators will vote this week on amendments – some sensible, some dreadful – and then hold a vote on a compromise bill.

That bill is my idea of a good reform – provided senators are willing to make several significant changes:

Make the offering of legal status to illegal immigrants already in the United States contingent on the bill's enforcement “triggers,” those conditions that have to be met before other measures in the legislation take place.

Establish a cutoff. I like the idea proposed by Sen. James Webb, D-Va., offering legal status only to those illegal immigrants who have lived in the United States for at least four years. More recent arrivals could still be deported.

For those who get legal status but are not yet U.S. citizens, institute a ban on receiving welfare, Medicaid or food stamps yet let them continue to contribute into and eventually draw on Social Security.

Abandon the proposed point-based merit system for future waves of legal immigrants without returning to the way it is now – where family reunification is the guiding principle.

Instead, we should base the whole system on labor demand and let the market drive the immigration process so we always have jobs for those who come here.

Subject to a higher level of scrutiny, as called for in an amendment by Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., individuals who seek to enter the U.S. from countries designated as state sponsors of terrorism.

Create a tamper-proof biometric identification card for all U.S. workers – not just guest workers – that must be presented to employers every time someone applies for a job.

Some of those changes will likely meet with opposition from Democrats who have expressed concern that the bill slouches toward the right.

Sure, sure. And those on the right think the bill is too far to the left. That's how we know it's a good bill.

Kyl and the other architects deserve credit for being willing to make changes. With every refinement they embrace, it becomes harder for critics on the right to argue that this is an amnesty bill.

Still, I don't expect any of this to make a difference to the nativists who oppose almost any bill that grants legal status to illegal immigrants. For those who are convinced that the United States is being invaded by foreigners, and who fear that our society is turning into one in which our children will have to learn how to – gasp – speak Spanish, this bill remains a non-starter.

And one thing hasn't changed. All that the hard-liners continue to offer are three-word slogans that fit neatly on ***per stickers. Their favorite used to be: “Deport All Illegals.” Then it was: “Close the Border.” Now, a lot of them are parroting the line: “Enforce the Law.”

Here's what that's about: They insist that the federal government never got around to enforcing the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. What the critics don't mention is that IRCA was designed to fail because it lacked a secure identifier such as a national ID card and provided a giant loophole for employers who had to knowingly hire an illegal immigrant to risk paying a fine. Little wonder that, for more than 20 years, employers have played dumb and claimed that they didn't know they were hiring illegal immigrants.

Sometimes it's lawmakers who play dumb – or at least come up with dumb proposals. Consider the handiwork of Sens. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Max Baucus, D-Mont., who proposed an amendment that would free employers of the obligation to verify the legal status of each worker they hire, a requirement the sponsors consider “onerous and unnecessary.”

Kudos to Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff, who saw through this and urged the Senate to reject the amendment, warning that it “eliminates needed tools” without which authorities would find it difficult to enforce the law.

There's that ***per sticker again. The right-wingers insist that the law is never enforced. If they're paying attention, they now know why. It's because we spend so much time talking about how we're going to get tough on illegal immigrants, even as we devise new ways to go soft on those who employ them.

Navarrette can be reached via e-mail at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.

Houston day labor center saved from closure Although the city didn't renew its contract, private funds will keep it open another year

By JAMES PINKERTON
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle
July 3, 2007

The doors at a prominent Houston day labor center won't be closing any time soon after all.

The controversial day labor site, slated to close after a city contract expired last month, will operate for another year with $100,000 in private funding, officials confirmed on Monday. The center had been Houston's only city-funded day labor facility.

The East End Worker Development Center, at the corner of North Sampson and Commerce, was the focus of a bitter City Hall debate last spring after opponents said the city funding was fostering illegal immigration.

The city contract was eventually renewed, but it expired Friday after it was not included in a city funding package the council approved.

''The funding has been raised, and the center will stay open for at least this next year," said Marc Levinson, director of agency development for Neighborhood Centers Inc., the Houston nonprofit that has operated the facility since 2005. ''It's all private money. No tax dollars are being used."

Levinson credited the donations to a fundraising effort by Mayor Bill White, who last month pledged to find funding to operate the center after the contract expired. Levinson said the donors wish to remain anonymous.

In confirming the fundraising effort, White noted that Houston, and other cities, have long funded day labor centers. At one time, there were two such centers operating with city funds.

''It was only relatively recently it was cast as an issue that had to do with immigration," White said.

Supporters of day labor sites say they are safer and more sanitary than informal hiring centers on street corners, since workers don't wait in the streets or private property to find jobs and can use bathrooms facilities in the center.


Protecting immigrants
White said the centers also help ensure that immigrant workers are not exploited. "On occasion people have refused to pay them after a day of hard work," he said.

However, groups that favor tighter immigration control say the centers should be banned.

''I hope they would close it," Louise Whiteford, president of Texans for Immigration Reform, has said. "Having a day work center aids, abets and encourages more illegal immigration."

Councilwoman Carol Alvarado, whose district includes the East End, said the labor center is needed.

''Whether it's private or city funding, it's important to the community, and I'm glad they're going to be able to stay for another year," she said. ''I hope they are looking at future fundraising as well to enable them to stay open beyond one year."

At the center Monday afternoon, a dozen Hispanic men stood in a light rain on the corner outside the converted paint shop and waited for contractors.

Inside, center coordinator Francisco Deras-Soltis wrapped up the first day of operation under private funding. In all, about 20 laborers sought work and were served coffee and sweet bread in a neat, but unadorned room cooled by industrial fans.

The center does not broker jobs for workers, Deras-Soltis said, but provides a safe place for them to meet contractors. And, they refer workers with legal or health problems to other agencies.


Service appreciated
One center client is Mexico City native Francisco Reyes, 42, who said he comes to the facility daily looking for work.

''It offers a service that is real good," said Reyes, who has lived in Houston for nearly a decade. ''Here they give us coffee. We can watch television until a contractor comes here to hire us."

james.pinkerton@chron.com

Vol. 71/No. 26 July 2, 2007

Connecticut rally demands halt to 'la migra' raids

Militant/Dan Fein

NEW HAVEN, Connecticut, June 16—“I am here to fight to put an end to these raids and attacks on immigrants. The way to end them is to give all of us papers that allow us to live and work in this country in peace,” said María Pérez, who marched here today with three of her four children to demand an end to immigration raids in this city.

The action of about 800 included students and community, church, and political activists. Contingents of trade unionists from Yale University, UNITE HERE from Boston and New York, and Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1199, also marched (see above) for two miles in the pouring rain through the largely Latino community of Fair Haven to City Hall, where a rally was held. Protesters demanded freedom for the 34 immigrant workers arrested June 6 and June 11 by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

At least four immigrants grabbed by ICE were out on bond as of June 14; two others were expected to post bond that night. Most, however, are being held in federal custody in Boston and Greenfield, Massachusetts; Providence, Rhode Island; and Cumberland County, Maine.

Sponsors of the action included the Junta for Progressive Action, Unidad Latina en Acción, Association of Hispanic Evangelical Ministers of New Haven, UNITE HERE, SEIU Local 1199, SEIU 32BJ, Amistad Catholic Worker, and CT Center for a New Economy.

—OLGA RODRIGUEZ

Vol. 71/No. 26 July 2, 2007

Day laborers in N.Y. Town win hiring hall in Black church

Militant/Róger Calero

Day laborers in Mamaroneck, New York, learn English June 19 while waiting for jobs at Strait Gate Church, which has a majority Black congregation. The church now serves as hiring hall for day laborers, most of them Latino immigrants.

BY RÓGER CALERO
MAMARONECK, New York, June 19—The Village of Mamaroneck Board of Trustees ratified a settlement June 11 that prohibits “police misconduct and discriminatory behavior towards day laborers,” including banning routine police inquiry into the immigration status of these workers. The decision came on the heels of a victory in a lawsuit by day laborers against town officials and police for discriminating against them when they gather on street corners to look for work.
The settlement of the lawsuit includes payment of $550,000 for legal fees to the attorneys who represented the workers. After the agreement, the day laborers established a hiring hall at a local church in the Black community, a rare occurrence.

“The court upheld the fact that immigrants have protection from harassment and discrimination,” said Cesar Perales, president and general counsel of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund. The group filed the suit on behalf of six day laborers in April 2006.

Last November, federal judge Colleen McMahon ruled that town officials had “engaged in a campaign designed to drive out the Latino day laborers.” She ordered the two sides to settle.

“We are not under the anxiety of a cop or a neighbor harassing us,” Diego Durán, 60, originally from Venezuela, told the Militant. The settlement “can’t be seen as an isolated thing. It has to do with getting the federal government to give us papers.”

“This agreement should be made by other towns,” said Fabian Chimbo, 26, a carpenter from Ecuador.

Durán and Chimbo were waiting for work at the new hiring site for day laborers at the Strait Gate Church. The site opened the day after the settlement was ratified by the Board of Trustees. “Hire Workers,” reads a sign outside the church, inviting contractors and others to stop.

The church is one in a handful with a majority Black congregation associated with day laborer hiring sites, according to Pablo Alvarado, director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network.

“It is an unusual gesture, and it’s a beautiful one, particularly because we know there have been tensions between Afr