Dozens Turn Out for H-2B Lobby Day on Capitol Hill

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Biting winds didn’t blow any attendees to Wednesday's H-2B Lobby Day off course. Nearly 100 visitors to Capitol Hill spent March 2 pounding the D.C. pavement as they visited congressional offices for scheduled – and unscheduled – meetings with their state representatives. Working hard to build the list of cosponsors for the new “Save Our Small & Seasonal Businesses” bill (S. 352 and H.R. 793), attendees made headway in garnering support for the legislation introduced last month, which would provide immediate relief to those affected by the H-2B visa cap crisis.

“On the industry end, there were strong numbers from a few states including Colorado, New Jersey, Wisconsin, New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, Illinois and Texas,” noted John Meredith, director of legislative relations for the American Nursery & Landscape Association (ANLA), Washignton, D.C. “ANLA itself had 55 meetings scheduled many of which were attended by Fly-In participants from other industries. I can personally account for 125 congressional meetings throughout the day, though the total number that our Coalition met with was higher than that.”

H-2B WORKFORCE COALITION. For his part, Meredith pulled double-duty during the day-long lobbying event, representing both ANLA and the newly formed H-2B Workforce Coalition, comprised of 41 national and regional associations in a number of industries; 44 state associations, mostly in the green industry, and 111 individual companies throughout the industries represented. Meredith explains that the ANLA’s relationship with the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition (EWIC) led to the formation of the Coalition, which represents users of the H-2B program that may or may not be EWIC members.

“Last year when the H-2B cap was hit, ANLA and the National Restaurant Association went to the EWIC group, brought the situation to their attention, and received permission to form a subcommittee specific to H-2B,” Meredith explains. “This was a group of H-2B employers that wanted to be involved in getting the cap raised. Then, early in 2005 when ANLA and the Professional Landcare Network (PLANET) were considering having a meeting on the issue, we once again took the opportunity to site down with the NRA and EWIC to see if they would be amenable to reaching out to non-EWIC members that were H-2B users.”

With a core group of EWIC members, and after the ANLA/PLANET meeting, Meredith says the groups began cooperating on the issue and simultaneously reached out to other industries that were experiencing the same problems. “Ultimately, we’ve created the H-2B Workforce Coalition from those partnerships with a core group of EWIC members, as well as a number of representatives from other stakeholding industries,” he says.

As the push for H-2B legislation continues, Meredith says this list of Coalition members continues to grow. “Since January of 2005 when the H-2B Workforce Coalition was officially formed, a few other industries have come along, as have individual and state affiliates and individual businesses and consultants who have gotten very active in the day-to-day lobbying on the H-2B issue,” Meredith explains. “Since Tuesday's meeting I’ve already heard from a number of other companies that are interested in learning more about what they can do to further the cause.”

MORNING BRIEFING. On Lobby Day morning, Coalition members gathered at 9 a.m. in a Senate office building ready to tackle the H-2B issue. Altogether, attendees represented numerous and varied industries including: lawn and landscape, restaurant, tourism, fishery, amusement park, horse training, stone quarrying and H-2B provider agencies. The Lobby Day began with a briefing on the H-2B issue and discussion of how best to approach congressional representatives with requests for their support.

“All of the people here today know the importance of this bill, but many people you’re meeting with may not,” explained a legislative assistant from Sen. Barbara Mikulski’s office. Mikulski, one of two democratic senators from Maryland is championing the bill. “One of the keys to educating Congress on this matter is to let them know that this is a temporary fix that needs to happen quickly, but one that won’t supplant the long-term immigration reform that Congress is working on.”

Additionally, a representative from the office of Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), cosponsor of the bill, outlined some arguments that attendees may face from detractors and how to explain the realities of the bill and the H-2B program in general. “There’s a lot of misinformation out there about H-2B, especially as it relates to the program’s effects on American workers,” he said. “Many people you’ll meet with may not be aware that the first opportunities for these jobs always go to American workers and that by not supporting this bill, they’re indirectly supporting companies who don’t play by the rules by filling jobs with illegal immigrants.

“Another argument you’ll hear is that supporting short-term fixes like this one takes effort and attention away from the comprehensive immigration reform efforts,” the representative continued. “Make sure your representatives know that we stand shoulder-to-shoulder on this temporary fix and on comprehensive reform.”

Finally, Don Mooers, an attorney specializing in immigration and nationality law at the Law Offices of Donald Mooers, Bethesda, Md., offered a pep talk before attendees broke for their first congressional meetings. “This bill has nothing to do with immigration – it’s all about small business,” he told the group. “The best way to have our message heard is to be direct and ask for members’ cosponsorhip. Explain to them that the reform is urgently needed and will have a great impact on the companies who use the H-2B program and the communities they service. We’re going to win or lose based on what we do as a group in the next several weeks, so lets go stay focused on H-2B and win the support we need for this bill.’

Mooers also told Lawn & Landscape that he was very happy with the turnout, as attendees were given short notice of the Fly-In event. “We wanted the Fly-In and Lobby Day to maintain its urgency, so the notice given to attendees was quick by design,” he explained. “H-2B is a large concept and something that will hold many industries’ attention over time, but in order to effect change right away, we want to keep participants from looking beyond themselves to future events. The announcements around Feb. 21 for a March 2 event helped make sure that attendees kept today’s meetings top-of-mind.”

MEETING WITH SUCCESS. Throughout the day, members of the H-2B Workforce Coalition met with senators and representatives from their congressional districts to inform them about the new H-2B legislation and urge their support. Maria Candler, vice president of James River Grounds Management, Glen Ellen, Va., and secretary/treasurer of the PLANET, met with Virginia representatives and said the day went well.

“We focused on members of the House of Representatives because both of our Virginia senators are already cosponsors of the bill, which we’re very thankful for,” Candler says. “All the groups and congressional aides we talked to said they had been inundated on that day and were aware of the H-2B issue and our legislation. That was good to hear because it meant the Lobby Day was really impactful and a lot of the members of the Coalition were getting involved.”

As part of the March 2 Lobby Day, PLANET and ANLA encouraged their members and those of other green industry associations to overrun congressional offices with phone calls, faxes and in-person meetings to discuss the H-2B issue. Associations from other industries did the same and representatives of all companies who are affected by H-2B are asked to continue such efforts as the Coalition works to push this legislation through Congress.

Candler said she “some yeses, some nos and some maybes,” from the representatives with whom she and a group of Virginia business owners met. Likewise, Meredith noted that meetings he attended were successful in getting Members of Congress on board with the bill, or did well to educate members about the H-2B program and how it helps small business.

“There were a number of meetings that resulted in some ‘from-the-horse’s-mouth’ confirmations of the Members’ cosponsorhips, though we still have to wait for an updated list for official confirmation of their support,” Meredith said. “A meeting with Senator Rick Santorum from Pennsylvania went well and was typical of a lot of the visits we had yesterday with lawmakers or their staffers. Many people were unaware of the many regulations that go along with the H-2B program, such as the need to advertise to American workers first and the four federal agencies that applicants must go through to be approved. Once they were educated, they showed a lot more promise in being able to support our bill, and I think that was the single biggest positive thing that came out of the Fly-In.”

Tony LoBello, vice president, Mariani Landscape, Lake Bluff, Ill., said his Capitol Hill meetings also went well, but expects that another similar push will be necessary in the near future. “We got to meet with aides from about eight congressional offices and also met in person with one Congresswoman, Judy Biggert, which was great opportunity,” LoBello says. “Overall most groups were fairly favorable and recognize that there is a problem, and we’re hopeful that those aides will relay good information back to the representatives.

“I think though that we’ll need another effort to keep things moving as fast as we need them to move in order to affect some change this season,” LoBello continued. “In Washington, things can move kind of slow, so we’ll need a second effort to follow up on this.”

LoBello noted that his company did not receive the 150 H-2B workers they had requested, which eliminates as many as 17 crews from the company’s landscape design, construction and management operation. He adds that another Chicago-area company that attended Wednesday's meetings had requested 500 H-2B workers, which they did not receive.

“We’re really looking hard at other sources of labor to fill these H-2B slots, but in the 120 days that we’ve been running employment ads, we’ve only had 8 responses,” LoBello says. “For us, this could be a loss of $7.5 million, so you can imagine a company that needed 500 workers could lose as much as $25 million. Other smaller companies in our area also added that they won’t be able to hire back some of their local foreman because there’s no crew for them to supervise. A nurseryman also came to our congressional meetings and pointed out that as landscape contractors, we’re his clients and if we don’t have crews to handle all the work, we won’t be able to buy as much material from him and he’ll end up losing money as well. It’s a trickle-down effect that’s going to end up affecting a lot more people than just the company’s that hire H-2B workers.”

At this point, Meredith notes that the next step for members of the Coalition and other supporters of H-2B reform will include a briefing of Capitol Hill staffers on Monday, March 7, followed by a meeting with representatives from Senators Mikulski and Gregg’s offices. That meeting, he says, will outline the best strategy to help the “Save our Small & Seasonal Businesses” bill be pushed through Congress for a vote. From there, more solid plans for another Fly-In or similar event will be easier to make.

“Our strategy meeting will probably be the genesis of the next big step we’ll be able to take as a group,” Meredith says. “Until then, we’re encouraging members everywhere to continue pressing lawmakers for cosponsorship of this bill. Despite the support we picked up yesterday, a critical mass of cosponsors hasn’t been hit, and we need to get a larger group backing our legislation in order to be successful. We’ll definitely have something coming up in the future, and we’ll make sure all of our members are informed on those details as they arise.”

For more information on how you can get involved in the push for H-2B reform and the H-2B Workforce Coalition, contact the American Nursery & Landscape Association at 202/789-2900 and on the Web at www.anla.org, or the Professional Landcare Network at 800/395-2522, www.landcarenetwork.org. Companies that participated in the H-2B Lobby Day or those who have made individual efforts to speak with their congressional representatives are encouraged to contact Lawn & Landscape Web Editor Lauren Spiers at lspiers@gie.net to share their experiences and gauge feedback from participants around the country.