Tensions hot during farmworker strike

Nearly 2,000 farmworkers recently walked out of Wonderful Company fields, a Delano fruit grower, in protest over what they called unfair labor practices.

Brawley resident Eric Reyes was there in support of the farmworkers and to document the strike.

“They were making 53 dollars per large bin that they produce. On an average day they do one to two. The company unilaterally cut them five dollars that they make. They just felt it was unjust what had happened to them without them even knowing from one day to the next. They were already in the harvest season, and here they’re being told they’re going to be making that much less per day,” Reyes said.

Strike organizer Armando Elenes, United Farm Workers, said, “They reduced the bin price from fifty three dollars to forty-eight. That’s basically a two-dollar reduction per hour. That’s a lot!”

Reyes said tensions were high and workers wanted to stop strikebreakers from working but security was tight.

“The security presence seemed more ominous than the police to us. They seemed ready to get into a physical confrontation. They were well equipped and they looked like they were seasoned veterans of such type of operations. So, i don’t think they were just regular security in my estimation,” Reyes said.

He said it reminds him of past Imperial Valley strikes in which a farmworker was killed, allegedly by someone part of security.

“It brought the same issues to the forefront of justice. Of workers asking to be treated with dignity and respect and to be paid a fair wage for very difficult and hard labor,” Reyes said.

After several days of strikes, Wonderful Company went back to the wages the workers were getting paid prior to the strike and agreed to negotiate with the farmworker union.