Farmworkers Gather In Olympia To Rally Against Ag Overtime

Farmworkers from across Washington gathered in Olympia on Tuesday February 4th, to speak about the harm the state’s new overtime law has caused.  Linda Vargas was one of those who participated in last week’s rally.  She said, while ag overtime may have been well intentioned, it has hurt many of the people and families supporters thought they were helping.  Vargas said under the new law, her husband, who is a supervisor at a central Washington orchard, does get some overtime during the summer months, but it’s not enough.

“The workers are not getting a lot of hours at all," she said.  "We've definitely seen a decrease in my husband's income as well. I mean this year he's made more than $12,000 less than in previous years. It's definitely affecting us economically.”

Vargas said many farmers and managers are trying to work around the overtime limit by hiring additional workers, but those laborers can be hard to find.  She added ag overtime has resulted in fruit being left to waste because farmers are capped at how many hours they can give workers.

“I think now there there's a little more tension between the farmers and the workers because people want more hours and they are asking the farmers for more hours and they just can't a lot for it. I know a lot of my husband's workers right now they are very frustrated, especially now with the wintertime, some of them are only getting five hours a week. Which is in this economy unsurvivable.”

Vargas added many outside of the farming industry don’t appreciate that in the past workers used overtime pay during harvest to help make ends meet during the quieter winter months.

Currently, legislation has been proposed allowing farmers a window, most likely during harvest, to increase the number of hours per week before overtime kicks in to 50.

Vargas added this year’s rally was smaller than the 2024 event because many workers were concerned if they showed up in Olympia, they may have been picked up in a federal immigration crack down.  Last week’s rally was organized by Save Family Farming as well as the Center for Latino Leadership.

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