Big Ohio tomato grower shuts down for this year

From The Toledo Blade:

Photo: The packaging barn for Charles Jones Produce, LLC lies empty near unplanted fields outside Oak Harbor. The immigrant workers who usually staff the farm were hard to find as a result of tightening immigration regulation in the United States. THE BLADE/KATIE RAUSCH

Northwest Ohio’s largest fresh-market tomato producer is shutting operations this summer, a move that will cost him millions of dollars, because he can’t attract enough migrant workers to pick his crops.

Charles Jones, 70, owner of Charles Jones Produce LLC in Oak Harbor recently informed the Toledo-founded Farm Labor Organizing Committee of his decision, union President Baldemar Velasquez said.

The farm labor organization represents 500 farm workers who are usually employed by the tomato grower.

Mr. Jones, who is in South Carolina, where he owns other agricultural operations, did not return phone calls for comment.

The grower's dilemma is not unique. Other fruit and vegetable growers across America have also decided to shut down their operations this summer, said Chuck Conner, president and CEO of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives. These crop losses could cost farmers and the American public hundreds of millions of dollars and force the United States to import more food and vegetables, he said.

"Seventy percent of the agricultural work force, including the milk industry, is performed by an undocumented work force,” Mr. Conner said. “It’s a problem. Our work force is at risk.”

Mr. Conner, whose organization is in Washington, was in Toledo on Monday to lobby local and state officials to support proposed immigration-reform legislation.

That legislation includes a proposal to provide legal working status for immigrants who aren’t in the country legally. He also spoke to The Blade’s editorial board on Tuesday.

Mr. Velasquez said he wasn’t surprised by Mr. Jones’ decision. In recent years many farm workers and even Latinos who aren’t farm workers in northwest Ohio have expressed concerns about being racially profiled and frequently harassed by immigration border patrol agents and some local law enforcement officers, who don’t have authority to enforce federal immigration laws, but try to, he said.

“There’s a big chill over northern Ohio,” Mr. Velasquez said. “Nobody wants to be harassed or having to constantly be looking over their shoulder.”

Mr. Velasquez, who worked with Mr. Conner on the agricultural portion of the proposal, said immigration reform could alleviate a lot of problems for farmers and immigrants. “Immigration reform is having an immediate impact on northwest Ohio now,” Mr. Velasquez said. “Our immigration system has been broken for a long time.

“The significance of what’s happened in Oak Harbor needs to be understood; it’s affecting more than just the Latino population."

Those 500 migrant farm workers usually employed by Charles Jones earn a combined annual payroll of about $2.6 million, Mr. Velasquez said. A significant portion of that income is spent locally on food, clothing, gas, and big ticket items like new vehicles. Restaurants, grocery stores, laundry facilities, gas stations will all lose business, he said.

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