KMPH Fox 26 Central San Joaquin Valley News Source in Fresno, California Entertainment, News, Sports and Weather | Valley Farmworkers Fighting for Better Pay are Let Go Again

Valley Farmworkers Fighting for Better Pay are Let Go Again

By Norma Yuriar

Fresno, County Calif.  (KMPH News) — A group of Fresno County farmworkers are banning together, fighting to get their jobs back after they say they were fired, rehired and then laid–off for complaining about too little pay.

An attorney for the workers say some employees were paid less than $2.00 per hour for tying and pruning grapevines at H&R Gunlund Ranches Inc. in Caruthers.

"We had people making as little as $80 for 50 hours of work, there were people making more than that — but everyone was well below the minimum wage of $8.00 an hour and those were the checks they got last week," CRLA Attorney Silas Shawver said.

Andres Ramirez, a 45–year old farmworker says he was paid $106 for about 36 hours of work, which breaks down to less than $3.00 per hour.

California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA) filed a complaint with the State Agricultural Labor Relations Board (ALRB) on behalf of Ramirez and more than 50 other farmworkers.

"Legally they can't be terminated for getting together and seeking an improvement in their working conditions which is what they did," Shawver said.

The group claims H&R Gunlund Ranches Inc. fired them on November 23rd for complaining about a decrease in pay.

The workers had been getting paid 26–cents for every grapevine they pruned and tied.  The piece rate was cut to 20–cents per vine, workers said.

In a surprise move the grower rehired Ramirez and the rest of the workers this week with the promise of more money.  H&R Gunlund Ranches Inc. issued lays offs two days later.

"I don't know what happened," Ramirez said.  "I think they are laughing at us.  We didn't do a bad job and then they said that was it for us.  I think it would have been better if they didn't give us our job back because they are just humiliating us."

The ALRB is reviewing charges of retaliation and termination for requesting a wage increase.

"There a lot of workers who end up working for less than minimum wage based on these piece rates, what's less common is for people to actually decide to stop working and do something about it," Shawver said.

The ALRB has the authority to order the company to rehire the workers – but only if they find the Caruthers based grower was in violation, that's still under investigation.

KMPH News has made repeated attempts to contact H&R Gunlund Ranches Inc., our calls have not been returned.