Oklahoma is already starting to suffer the consequences of it's tough new anti-migrant workers law [1] :
People are just picking up and leaving :
PARK HILL, Okla. — Autumn had arrived in eastern Oklahoma, and workers at the sprawling Greenleaf Nursery were prepping for deadly frosts. They needed to ship plants, erect greenhouses and bunch trees together to protect them against the cold.
But in late October, about 40 employees disappeared from the 600-acre nursery about an hour's drive from Tulsa. "Some went to Texas, some went to Arkansas," nursery President Randy Davis says. "They just left."
Why did the workers, all immigrants, flee? "Those states don't have 1804," Davis says.
Because most legal residents are children of undocumented parents:
Supporters of 1804 say the state will benefit from illegal immigrants leaving. "That's money in our pocket," says Carol Helm of Immigration Reform for Oklahoma Now.
Not all of those leaving Oklahoma are in the USA illegally. "I've lost two housekeepers out of a staff of 12," says Joe Geis, general manager of the Sleep Inn & Suites in Edmond. "They were here legally, (but) they have family" members who were not.
Immigrant activist Blanca Thames says she has helped more than 1,000 families prepare power-of-attorney papers to protect children in case parents are deported. Many illegal immigrants have U.S.-born children who are citizens.
The truth is migrant workers are a necessity for small agricultural and service businesses :
Lawmaker Terrill says he has little sympathy for businesses that hire illegal workers. He believes 1804 will create jobs for U.S. citizens.
"There is no job that an American citizen is unwilling to do," he says. "They're just not willing to do it at the wage rates that are being paid to illegal aliens."
But some employers say it's hard to hire citizens in their industries.
"We have extremely low unemployment. … The people in southwest Oklahoma who want to work are working," says Tom Buchanan, a cotton, cattle and wheat farmer in Jackson County.
Chris Ellison, manager of the Motley Gin cotton gin in Hollis, lost eight of 16 workers since Nov. 1. He says the loss sent his overtime costs soaring.
"I would love to hire 20 U.S. citizens here," Ellison says, but "local people are not going to quit a job to work three weeks during the year."
Both men say they obey U.S. laws and check workers' identity documents, but they acknowledge that some may have fake papers.
"We are not documents experts," Buchanan says.
Like farmers and landscapers, builders say they're struggling.
Earlier in 2007, Portillo Construction, which specializes in masonry and stone work in the Tulsa area, employed about 15 people, co-owner Natanael Portillo says. All were immigrants.
"On Nov. 1, not one employee showed up for work," he says.
He has since hired several laborers but lost a contract on a house, he says. "We're looking at between a $15,000 to $20,000 loss" for 2007, Portillo says.
Home builder Caleb McCaleb, who works in Oklahoma City and Edmond, says his framer lost 30 of his 80 workers, his painter lost 10 of 35 and his landscaper lost 15 of 40. That has put homes three or four weeks behind schedule.
"If we continue to lose workers, we are going to have to raise prices," he says.
Cocina De Mino has seen its Hispanic clientele decline, especially on Sundays, Wagner says.
"After church, usually at 2 or 3 in the afternoon, they (would) bring their family. It's usually groups of eight, 10 and 12," he says. "Those groups are not coming in."
At Plaza Santa Cecilia, a mall filled with Hispanic shops in Tulsa, Simon Navarro's customer base has evaporated. Navarro, owner of a money-wiring service, says 500 people would come in every day to send money to relatives in Mexico and Central America. "Now," he says, "I have 100."
So what do some Republicans [2] have to say [3]?
It's just an inconvenient glitch in the process [4] :
At least this shows that proper enforcement of employer sanctions might be enough to resolve most of the issues with illegal immigration, and the more onerous proposals may not be needed. It also shows how difficult the transition could be for the entire nation as the process of purging illegal immigrants from our economy slowly proceeds.
Whatever.
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