BY AMELIA POSSANZA

In print | Published February 12, 2009

The Swarthmore Labor Action Project (SLAP) is bringing four local mushroom farm workers from Kennett Square to campus this Thursday to speak about their labor experiences in a panel and discussion session. Kennett Square farmers produce 60 perdent of the mushrooms grown in the U.S., and immigrants much of the labor.

“We just want to educate the campus about this issue because it’s close,” said Ruth Schultz ’09, a member of SLAP. Farm workers are subject to poorly enforced labor condition standards and receive wages that keep them below the poverty line. SLAP’s desire to educate fits in with its larger goal, which is to help local groups engaged in struggles for better labor conditions and fair wages.

In the long-term, SLAP hopes to do more than just educate the community about the problems that the farm workers face. “I think [the panel is the] first step towards a union between SLAP and the organization CATA,” said Alfredo Chuquihuara ’10, another member of SLAP. CATA is a Spanish acronym that translates to Farm Workers Support Committee. It is one of two groups that give the mushroom farm workers a collective voice to raise their concerns. The other, the Kaolin Workers Union, is an independent union that was formed in 1994.

A union between CATA and SLAP could help CATA in its efforts to purchase a community meeting space. “CATA is focusing on building a home, a space for [the workers] to have to unite as an organization, a space for solidarity,” Chuquihuara said. A year ago the group was kicked out of its offices and has been running out of worker owned houses and cars ever since. Purchasing a house or renting an apartment in Kennett Square is an important goal for the workers because in addition to giving them a meeting space it would also give them a footing in an area whose properties are mainly controlled by mushroom factory owners and their families.

SLAP is helping CATA in its efforts to raise the money necessary for making such a large investment. The group has invited the college faculty to the panel and has sent them letters asking for donations. They are also creating a documentary to raise awareness about the difficulties workers face in pursuing unionization and translating CATA’s Spanish campaign literature into English.

But this relationship isn’t entirely new. Professor Aurora Camacho de Schmidt will be introducing the panel this Thursday. Part of her introduction will focus on the plight of the farm worker and the way in which low farm wages are used as a strategy to keep food prices low. But her introduction will also draw on of her connections to the Kennett Square community. In the early ’90’s, members of the Swarthmore faculty and student body marched with farm workers asking for the right to unionize. In addition, they aided the cause of the farm workers by spreading the word to others in the community, painting banners and acting as translators for the immigrants.

“There was a great deal of solidarity between the students and the faculty members and the workers,” Camacho de Schmidt said. Although the connection has not been as strong in recent years, Camacho de Schmidt has kept contacts and passed them along to SLAP.

SLAP members spent last semester, the group’s first, using these contacts to build the foundations for a strong collaboration with CATA. They met with workers in Kennett Square and got to know the farm workers’ labor organizations.

The group hopes to host more events on campus this semester to raise awareness and involve more of the student body. But they have already succeeded in constructing a relationship between the farm workers and the members of SLAP. “It’s a good relationship because there’s a lot of communication. It’s not us doing something for them, and it’s not them doing something for us, but us collaborating on this project,” Schultz said.

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