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June 1995 Volume 1 Number 4Cycles of Poverty in Rural Californian Towns -- Fred Krissmancomparing McFarland and Farmersville in the southern San Joaquin Valley." Presented at the Immigration and the Changing Face of Rural California conference. by, Fred Krissman, Researcher at Center for US-Mexican Studies, UC San Diego INTRODUCTION Labor-intensive crop industries together have comprised one of the most lucrative sectors within the US economy for more than a half century (Martin, 1985; Lloyd, 1953); however, the immigrant groups that historically have supplied most of the 2-3 million workers needed in the nation's agricultural sector are among the most impoverished of the `working poor' (Edid, 1994). The southern San Joaquin Valley, containing the most profitable farm sector in the world, is the example par excellance of such regional wealth disparities. Crop industries within its three top farm counties generate more than $7 billion in agricultural revenues annually; nevertheless, these same counties contain seven out of the ten poorest communities in California. Although all seven fit the definition of "farm worker enclaves" (Palerm, 1991:124-127), these predominately Mexican immigrant towns have per capita incomes of only about $5,000. What factors contribute to the unequal distribution of sectoral wealth in rural America? Can public policy promote changes in the pattern of unremitting poverty for each generation of farm workers? These questions have been asked before. Then, as now, the downward spiral in already substandard living and working conditions in rural areas have reached the attention of the public through media reports as well as the efforts of policy makers to cope with unending rural crises. Our current interest in studying the causes and consequences of the continuing impoverishment of California's rural towns is actually a return to a primary concern of economists, sociologists, and anthropologists in the first half of the century. A review of previous rural research can better inform our current efforts. GOLDSCHMIDT'S STUDIES OF CENTRAL VALLEY TOWNS In our investigation of both the causes and consequences of rural poverty, Walter Goldschmidt's As You Sow: three studies in the social consequences of agribusiness (1978[1947]) is invaluable. For the conference panel Central Valley Labor Camps and Cities, As You Sow is particularly significant since the research was all conducted within three Central Valley towns--Wasco and Arvin in Kern County and Dinuba in Tulare County. As You Sow is divided into three parts: the first two are separate ethnographic studies and the third an analytical essay relating the politically orchestrated uproar intended to undermine the second study or, failing that, to bury the anticipated results within government vaults. In Part I, Goldschmidt provided an ethnographic depiction of Wasco in 1940. The principal purpose was to document the social consequences of a new mode of farm production--industrialized agriculture--upon the inhabitants of a rural community. He found that the socioeconomic relations long imputed to rural America had been transformed in the case of Wasco as a result of the new production mode; rural relations had become much more like those characteristic of an urban metropolis, i.e., the types and levels of socioeconomic stratification typical of a highly differentiated modern urban economy. The Wasco data demonstrated that industrialized agriculture was already present in the rural California of 1940. Part II is a comparative study of the towns of Arvin and Dinuba. This study was designed to test the following hypothesis: the relative scale of farming in the hinterland has a major impact on the character of the rural community. In 1944, the differences in scale between the median sized Arvin and Dinuba farm, taking into account productivity and value of crops grown, were more than 3 to 1; median farm revenue was even more skewed: $18,096 for Arvin and $3,384 for Dinuba (p. 311). However, major social advantages accrued to small-farm town Dinuba, including: twice the local commerce; 20 percent higher median incomes; more than twice as much self-employment; more advanced community infrastructure; more and better schools; more than twice the number of civic organizations; and, more democratic local institutions (pp. 282-285). Goldschmidt demonstrated that the rapid growth in both industrialized farming and land concentration were the result of failed or misguided public policies that had not been adjusted to the realities of rural life (pp. xxxi-xxxix). Goldschmidt also provided public policy remedies to mitigate the negative effects of industrialized agriculture, as well as to slow the ongoing concentration of land holdings (pp. 262-273). His recommendations, based on ensuring renewed social equity in rural America, included: 1) the implementation of a real minimum wage that can support a farm worker family, as well as wage increases based upon improved productivity; 2) State support for farm worker unions and other collective organizations; and, 3) State programs to stabilize farm worker households within each community.(1) Finally, in Part III, Goldschmidt links the controversy aroused by his comparative study to the political and economic power of corporate agribusiness in the Central Valley. Even today we can see the continued power of agribusiness to defy both the courts and the government in an effort to maintain their illegal access to government-subsidized water (Times, 3-25-1995) and undocumented workers (Heppel and Amendola, 1992) Goldschmidt's work was prescient in a number of respects. If the data, conclusions, and recommendations contained within it continue to be ignored in the contemporary era, we will repeat much of his work or, worse yet, seek answers to our questions in the wrong places. Now, even more than then, the industrialization of agriculture and the scale of farming operations in the hinterland of rural Californian communities are the root causes of the endemic poverty gripping the non-metropolitan areas of the state. Finally, Goldschmidt recognized a fundamental relationship between the processes of industrialization/large-scale farming and the ongoing recruitment of a vast, disenfranchised farm labor force. Ongoing access to low cost labor had been capitalized into the value of Californian farm land, making it difficult for family farmers to buy into, and compete, in market-driven agribusiness production (p. 8). In order to maintain access to cheap labor, agribusiness had recruited continuous waves of new immigrant workers to come to the US since the 1860s (pp. 15-16), used racist arguments to justify the exploition of immigrant labor, and, when white US citizens from the mid-West became the primary source of labor in the 1930s, growers adapted their ideology in order to `racialize' this new labor force (pp. 20, 51). A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE CONTEMPORARY CENTRAL VALLEY In the post-World War II era regional, national, and global processes and events have further transformed Californian agriculture and the rural communities that are enmeshed in an agricultural economy. Whereas Goldschmidt predicted that the ultimate result of industrialized/large-scale farm production would be a highly stratified rural America, in which local representatives of corporate farming would wield total control of rural towns comprised almost entirely of marginalized farm workers (p. xlviii), unforeseen technological innovations have permitted agribusiness operatives to completely abandon rural America; the socioeconomic and political structures remaining in these rural communities bear more resemblance to farm labor camps than to the Wasco, Arvin, and Dinuba studied in the 1940s. The utter socioeconomic abandonment of rural American society by the multi-national corporations that extract its natural resources with a disenfranchised labor force has led to the wholesale impoverishment of rural America, the fundamental concern of this paper. This paper describes the contemporary situation in rural California, by providing a comparative community study within the same portion of the Central Valley--the San Joaquin Valley (referred to hereafter as the SJV)--studied a half century ago by Goldschmidt. The SJV is an appropriate region for a study of the transformation of rural California. It is the premier agricultural region in the nation (Map #1), it employs at least half of the state's 900,000 farm workers (Figure #1), it is home to the highest number of new immigrant (undocumented) farm workers (Taylor and Espenshade, 1987), and it contains seven of the ten poorest incorporated towns in California (Table #1). My data are derived from a comparative analysis of the evolution of two major bi-national networks. The immigrant farm worker networks studied here are from disparate regions in Mexico that have been integrated during successive historical periods into two different agricultural industries (and two rural communities) within California. As suggested by Carol Zabin et al. (1993), this approach can establish the relationship between the creation/recreation of rural poverty and ongoing immigrant flows into California. The Californian towns in which these immigrants reside are two of the state's ten poorest, while the Mexican communities of origin are so poor that each suffers chronic negative population rates. Thus the paper's focus is on the causes and consequences of endemic poverty among an important sector of the working poor, i.e., households in both rural California and Mexico that contain Californian farm workers. A bi-national approach is critical to undertaking a study of the poverty of California's farm workers. The rural towns that Juan Vicente Palerm has documented to be farm worker enclaves (Map #2; note that half of the state's total enclaves are contained in the SJV) experience seasonal population shifts of 30-50 percent because of highly seasonal farm work opportunities. These seasonal influxes greatly exacerbate major community problems such as inadequate and antiquated housing stock, underfunded community services, and deteriorating educational facilities. These migrant workers come primarily via bi-national migrant networks from specific rural Mexican towns; a great many stay in California with immigrant kin, and many find jobs through paisanos (fellow villagers). Furthermore, a large proportion of both immigrant and migrant Californian farm workers return to their Mexican communities of origin during the seasonal farm labor trough, to await the next work season or to enjoy a brief but critical cultural hiatus away from the US. Finally, a great deal of resources, including wage earnings, are funneled through the bi-national networks as well.(2) Wages earned in California are distributed within and beyond towns on both sides of the border, exacerbating the poverty endemic to the Californian communities while mitigating the even greater poverty endured in rural Mexican towns. However, these remittances help to ensure that life can be sustained in the rural homelands, permitting the reproduction of family units in Mexico which provide each generation of migrant farm workers to Californian agribusiness. This bi-national arrangement has permitted Californian growers to replenish its farm labor supply for more than fifty years (Palerm and Urquiola, 1992; Krissman, 1995a). Therefore, the full extent of rural poverty within the state's agricultural sector cannot be understood or remedied without taking into account the bi-national networks that agribusiness continues to tap as its principal source for workers. The remainder of this paper is divided into four parts: first, I will outline my fieldwork methods and data sources; second, I will sketch the demographic and economic data for two important SJV counties; third, I will provide a description of two farm worker enclaves within those SJV counties; and, fourth, I will suggest recommendations to slow the ever downward spiral in rural socioeconomic conditions. I. FIELDWORK METHODS/DATA SOURCES Fieldwork was conducted between 1988 and 1992.(3) In the southern San Joaquin Valley I studied major labor-intensive crop industries (table grapes and citrus) which are supplied with labor by different migrant networks. The detection of two disparate migratory networks within these two industries then determined the residential sites for the bi-national fieldwork, in both the rural Californian and Mexican towns. A principal network linked to the better paying table grape industry originates in the `traditional' migrant sending state of Zacatecas in central Mexico. This mestizo migrant network has a 70 year history of bi-national migration to the SJV, has become entrenched in the region's better paid table grape industry since the 1960s, and has a dense resettlement pattern in north Kern County. A major set of networks supplying labor to the less desirable citrus industry originates in the new migrant sending state of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. The indigenous migrant networks from the Mixteca of Oaxaca have only become well linked to the SJV since the late 1970s, have accepted agricultural jobs in a number of less desirable crop industries (such as citrus, raisins, and tomatoes), and have a relatively sparse resettlement pattern in Tulare County.(4) Nonetheless, the Mixtecs have become very important within California's farm labor market, constituting at least 5-10 percent of the total labor force (Runsten and Kearney, 1995). Therefore, the two networks represent archetypes for the ongoing immigration of Mexicans into California during the past few generations (Cornelius, 1987). Fieldwork methods were interdisciplinary, combining quantitative and qualitative data collection, as well as the collection of archival materials in three research sites. Field research included survey-style interviews and questionnaires, as well as informal, open-ended, in-depth interviews. Extended residence within all three regions permitted a great deal of participant observation and primary data collection. My ethnographic sample contains about 50 households from within each bi-national network. In this paper I provide general data about the two Californian towns and socioeconomic conditions of a representative household within each network. First, general county-level data provide a context within which the citrus and table grape production belts and their communities are situated. II. THE COUNTIES: TULARE AND KERN In this section I outline salient features that indicate the nature of the contemporary transformation of rural California. Principal processes include: the continued influx of new workers from Mexico; the changes in county demography and economy; and, the socioeconomic effects of labor oversupply (i.e., deteriorating working and living conditions). POST-WORLD WAR II REGIONAL DEVELOPMENTS The region's grape and citrus production belts comprise much of the hinterland around a score of rural communities in Fresno, Tulare, and Kern counties (Table #2)--seven of these towns are among the ten poorest incorporated cities in California.(5) As Goldschmidt demonstrated, these communities were regional service and trade centers in the 1940s that depended upon a clientele comprised primarily of family farms located in an adjacent hinterland. These communities had predominately white residential populations, although successive influxes of non-white immigrant farm workers between the 1860s and 1930s had led to the establishment of ethnic neighborhoods at the socioeconomic margins. During the post-World War II era these towns suffered increasing marginalization as a result of the continued rapid growth of corporate agribusiness. Agribusiness growth was fueled by the failure of the government to act on Goldschmidt's recommendations, as well as the application of war-related technologies to farm production, the arrival of limitless federally-subsidized irrigation water, and especially the State-institutionalization of the "war-time emergency" bracero program (Galarza, 1964). Between 1942 and 1964 at least 5 million Mexican `guest workers' (braceros) were contracted under federal auspices to perform farm labor in the US, permitting wage levels to remain stagnant throughout the post-war boom era. The program also re-instituted the bi-national links between specific Mexican and US communities which had been severed when the US forcibly deported 500,000 Mexicans during the depression era (Hoffman, 1974). When the bracero program was finally terminated in 1964, the State helped growers to settle thousands of former braceros and their Mexico-based families in California in order to maintain an immigrant labor force. These former braceros reinforced the links between their natal and adopted home communities. Ex-braceros also served as important first contacts for new immigrants from their home towns, providing short-term shelter, food, and job leads to them (Massey et al., 1987). The newly documented ex-braceros sought to improve their working conditions now that they had legal status. These new immigrants served as the backbone to the most powerful farm worker movement ever in rural America. By the mid-1970s, Cesar Chavez' United Farm Workers union (the UFW) organized hundreds of thousands of farm workers, obtained contracts for at least 110,000, and raised wages by at least 20 percent, while improving working conditions (Jenkins, 1984; Majka and Majka, 1982). The UFW also worked with the state government to enact the first law to protect farm labor rights in the US. However, growers responded with bad faith negotiations, intimidation, and violence to stymie the union. The most notorious battles were waged within the table grape industry. Finally, the growers unilaterally terminated UFW contracts. A principal industry strategy was to hire an entirely new work force, comprised in large part of new undocumented immigrant workers. Political pressures increased to curb undocumented immigration. After a decade of debate the federal government finally enacted employer sanctions to criminalize the use of undocumented workers (Bean et al., 1989). The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) gave documents to more than three million immigrants, largely at the behest of agribusiness, to regularize the current work force. However, growers evaded both union and government pressures by divesting themselves of their field work force. Many growers in the SJV restructured their operation in order to reduce or eliminate `in-house' direct employees during the past two decades, preferring to contract for field labor instead; meanwhile, new agricultural employers restricted the number of direct employees (Krissman, 1995b). The SJV crop industries came to rely upon farm labor contractors (FLCs) to secure field labor. Indeed, more than 50 percent of the SJV's work force is now hired through FLCs. The rise in FLC use coincided with pressures to reform the labor market between the 1970s and 1990 (Figure #2). Within the southern SJV there are at least 672 FLCs registered with the federal government; they employ an estimated 48,000 farm workers (Madeira, 1988). Furthermore, many experts (e.g., Rosenberg et al., 1992; Martin and Taylor, 1991) believe that there are significant number of unregistered FLCs as well. FLC management is almost entirely comprised of experienced farm workers, typically of Mexican origin. These firms have provided upward mobility to some immigrant workers in an economic sector, and in rural regions, which provide few other opportunities for upward mobility. The niches that immigrants to the US fill are largely determined by the needs left unmet by the larger society (Guarnizo, 1992). Agribusiness has determined that contract labor provides cost savings and convenience for their labor-intensive operations; thus, some immigrants found in this need an opportunity to obtain upward mobility. The FLC industry has few barriers to entry; most importantly, FLCs require little capital investment. The principal `commodity' is an abundant supply of tractable workers, easily obtained by tapping the management's own bi-national networks. However, the emphasis on bi-national recruitment has fueled a `revolving door' for the entry of new immigrants into the farm labor market (Martin and Taylor, 1991). In the process FLCs have exacerbated a host of rural community problems. Furthermore, the oversupply of workers stimulated by incessant recruitment has led to deteriorating wages and working conditions in the fields (Krissman, 1995b). As a result of continued immigration, by the 1980s scores of rural towns were transformed into farm labor enclaves. Today these communities have high proportions of Latino (Mexico-origin) inhabitants; however, due to the lack of mechanisms to permit adequate representation, most of these towns are still controlled by the residual local white elite. Furthermore, since the communities' inhabitants are heavily dependent upon farm sector activity for the bulk of annual household earnings, local and regional agribusiness is the principal special interest. I will now provide some additional basic data about the two southernmost SJV counties, before describing two towns within these counties. TULARE COUNTY California's seventh largest county (roughly the size of Connecticut), Tulare contains 4,935 square miles (3,112,230 acres, 25 percent arable). Tulare County contains eight incorporated cities (Map #3). Tulare County's total population was 311,921 in 1990. The county's demographics reflect the transformation occurring throughout the SJV. The county is both growing at a rapid clip, as well as changing in the composition of its overall population. According to the US census, in the 1980s the county experienced a growth rate of 27 percent; while in 1980 the county's racial composition was 65 percent white and about 30 percent `Hispanic', in 1990 whites had dropped to 54.6 percent and Latinos had increased to almost 39 percent (see Table 3)--the Latino rate of growth was about 65 percent during the decade. The actual percentage of Latinos (mainly from Mexico) must be considerably higher since the SJV has the highest numbers of migrant and undocumented farm workers in the state (Taylor and Espenshade, 1987:10). Tulare County contains about 1,800 square miles of the most intensive agricultural production within the US (EDD, 1993a:3). The agricultural sector provides the economic base for Tulare County. A surprising 25 percent of total county employment opportunities are found within agriculture (EDD, 1993a:8, 9), a higher proportion of the economically active population than even in adjacent farm-oriented counties. Furthermore, agricultural employment is expected to grow 7 percent during the next 2 years, more than an other sector. Tulare has been among the nation's top three agricultural counties, along with neighboring Fresno and Kern, for more than four decades. The county's farm revenues have consistently escalated since World War II, from $197 million in 1950, $334 million in 1960, $408 million in 1970, $1.3 billion in 1980, to $2.1 billion in 1990.(6) During the last two decades Tulare County's top agricultural commodities were: milk, citrus, grapes, cattle, cotton, plums, alfalfa, nectarines, peaches, and walnuts. The southern SJV's multi-million dollar citrus and table grape production belts are both centered within Tulare (Table 2). In contradistinction to neighboring counties, Tulare County farms historically have been held in smaller units of production. However, as Goldschmidt (1978:13) noted, even small operations in California have long since shifted from family farm to industrialized farm production. Furthermore, over the years Tulare has also undergone concentration of farming operations, as well as increasing vertical integration of production, through the consolidation of both farming and processing facilities into corporate (and `co-operative') control.(7) A principal measure of ongoing agricultural industrialization is the high seasonal demand for farm workers to perform agricultural tasks on Tulare farms. Agriculture provided at least 30,000 county jobs in 1992(8) (EDD, 1993a:9), principally to Latinos. Although Tulare County farms generate enormous agricultural wealth, the labor-intensive crop industries have relegated a large seasonal labor force to poverty.(9) The county's overall unemployment rate has averaged 12.7 percent during the past decade, while in 1992 its level was an elevated 15.3 (EDD, 1993a:49-52), more than double the state average. Whereas the white unemployment rate in Tulare averaged about 7.5 percent in 1992, the Latino unemployment average was an elevated 17 percent (EDD, 1993a:23). Other indices also point to entrenched poverty for Tulare's farm workers. The county has a relatively high ratio of persons to housing units--about 3 persons per unit. 50,287 people in the county (15 percent) collect Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC, the main welfare program), while 60,517 (18.3 percent) receive Food Stamp coupons. `Hispanics' have been the main recipients of county AFDC between 1989 and 1991 (EDD, 6-1992:41), comprising between 43 and 51 percent of the total. In fact, Hispanics comprise 60 percent of all county residents living below the poverty level (EDD, 1993a:26). Finally, Tulare County, along with its two neighboring SJV agricultural powerhouses, is among the counties with some of the poorest incorporated cities in California (Times, 7-6-1992). Farmersville is the seventh poorest town in the state, with a per capita income of only $5,858. Ethnographic data from Farmersville will be provided in part III. KERN COUNTY Kern County, covering over 8,000 square miles (5.2 million acres), is the state's third largest county, as well as the largest and southernmost in the SJV. Kern County also contains eight incorporated cities (Map #4). The 1993 population reached 603,000, making it the state's 14th most populous county. County population growth has been rapid, averaging around 3 percent during the past decade, and has changed composition of its population. Between 1980 and 1990 `Hispanics' increased by 75 percent (EDD, 1993b:35; Californian, 6-21-89). Whereas whites comprised almost 70 percent and Latinos 21.5 percent in 1980, in 1990 the ethnic population shifted to 56 and 28 percent respectively (see Table 4). The actual percentage of Latinos (mainly from Mexico) must be considerably higher since the SJV has the largest number of under-counted migrant and undocumented Hispanics in the state (Taylor and Espenshade, 1987:10). The principal reason for the large growth rates is a dynamic and expanding regional economy. Between 1980 and 1992, the total private sector work force in Kern County almost doubled, from about 146,000 persons to 265,800 persons. The relative importance of agriculture to the county economy, with its largely seasonal opportunities, helps to explain the large influx of Latinos. Despite dynamic absolute growth in a number of major sectors, agriculture remains among the top three in the county. Kern farm employment has grown by 12 percent in the past decade (EDD, 1993b:41, 43) and the agricultural sector has displaced Tulare County's several times in the past decade in a competition for the number two farm county (behind perennial leader Fresno County). Kern County has been a leading farm county for the past half century, and its farm revenues have risen from $186,455,000 in 1950, $247,000,000 in 1960, 346,000,000 in 1970, $1.27 billion in 1980, and $1.84 billion in 1990.(10) The top 10 crops in 1992, in order of gross sales value, were cotton, grapes, almonds, carrots, pistachios, citrus, milk, nursery, alfalfa, and apples. In 1982, the top ten crops were cotton, grapes, citrus, potatoes, almonds, cattle, alfalfa, nursery, pistachios, and milk. In terms of total crop value, labor-intensive fruit and nut, vegetable, and nursery industries as a whole comprise about 66 percent of total farm revenues (EDD, 1993b:15). Despite the high demand for farm labor to produce the county's farm wealth, the work force has languished in poverty.(11) Agriculture provided at least 34,300 seasonal county jobs in 1993(12) (EDD, 1994:41), principally to Latinos. Whereas the white unemployment rate in Kern County averaged only 7 percent in 1990, the Hispanic unemployment average was an elevated 17.9 percent (EDD, 1993b:39). Other indices of farm worker poverty can be inferred from county data. The county has a relatively high ratio of persons to housing units--2.73 persons per unit. 55,851 people in the county (9.8 percent) collect Aid for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC, the main welfare program), while 67,749 (11.5 percent) receive Food Stamp coupons. 8,480 county Hispanics received AFDC in 1992 (EDD, 1993:41), although Hispanics comprise less than 30 percent of the county's total population, they constitute about 40 percent of all county residents living below the poverty level (EDD, 1993b:42). Finally, Kern County contains McFarland, the ninth poorest town in the state, with a per capita income of $6,056 (Times, 7-6-1992). Ethnographic data from McFarland is provided in part III. III. THE COMMUNITIES: FARMERSVILLE AND McFARLAND In this section the most salient features of the contemporary transformation of rural California are underscored. The main patterns include: the ongoing entry of new immigrant farm workers from Mexico; demographic and economic changes in the rural Californian towns; and, the socioeconomic consequences of the oversupplied farm labor market (e.g., deteriorating working and living conditions for farm workers and their families). At the `micro-level' the enormous contradiction between increased agribusiness wealth and the continued endemic poverty of its farm workers is best revealed; also exposed is the ongoing demand for low cost farm labor production in rural California with a labor force that continues to be entirely reproduced in Mexico. McFarland in Kern County is the self-proclaimed "Heartbeat of Agriculture", while Farmersville in Tulare County is the self-described "Heart of the Garden Spot". As their slogans imply, the economic engine (`heart') for each of these towns is the agricultural sector. By the 1980s each had become representative examples of farm worker enclaves, with Latino (Mexico-origin) majority populations (Table 4). Each is also among the poorest ten incorporated cities in California. FARMERSVILLE Farmersville (Map #5) has a 1993 population of 6,750, with a relatively low average annual growth rate of about 2 percent.(13) Farmersville is one of Tulare County's three oldest towns (established in about 1856). The area was homesteaded by some of Tulare County's earliest settlers. These early settlers established land holdings of a maximum of 160 acres based upon the federal pre-emption and homestead laws. The early dense settlement of the area precluded the infamous land grabs that so concentrated land holdings throughout California in the 1870s-90s, especially in neighboring counties in the SJV (Liebman, 1983). 1. Contemporary economy "The Heart of the Garden Spot" is heavily dependent upon the agricultural sector. According to the 1990 census, field workers alone make up at least 30 percent of Farmersville's total work force, while packing house workers, food processors, and food haulers constitute at least 22 percent more. The self employed are measured in single digits. The community suffers from overcrowded conditions, with an average 3.6 persons per housing unit in 1990; a seasonal escalation in overcrowding of at least 30 percent occurs during the peak harvest season in summer/fall. Median household and family income figures both hover at $17,000, while the per capita income is only $5,858. 35.4 percent of all persons, 50.2 percent of all children, and a whopping 60.5 percent of all households headed by a female live in poverty. Perhaps most telling, 70.9 percent of all `nonfamily' households (typically unrelated migrants living together to pool income) earned less than $10,000. These data dovetail with Farmersville's lamentable status as one of California's ten poorest cities. The single most important source of jobs for Farmersville's farm worker population is with the region's FLCs. While only 4 federally registered FLCs reside in the community, nearby Exeter has 8 and Visalia has 29. Together, the 41 FLCs report using about 2,620. Also in Tulare County, 67 FLCs reside in Porterville and Lindsay, with a combined work force of almost 6,000. Earlimart, Woodlake, Orange Cove, Tulare and Pixley also have large numbers of FLCs and workers. In total, Tulare County contractors number almost 200 and report employing almost 9,000 workers (Madeira, 1988). However, FLCs pay the lowest wages of all agricultural enterprises (Rosenberg et al., 1992). A population of low paid seasonal farm workers cannot contribute much to a community's business climate. The local commercial sector generates extraordinarily low retail sales, and consequently low local sales tax revenue for the city. The town has boasted a Chamber of Commerce only intermittently, typically a one-person effort to boost the town's fortunes which is abandoned within a few years due to lack of funds. Reliance upon seasonal farm employment has resulted in an impoverished local economy; the town depends upon federal and state assistance to provide local services (see Table 6). Although incorporated in 1960 to improve community services, Farmersville has languished economically; thus recurrent efforts have also been made to `unincorporate' due to an insufficient tax base to support basic services.(14) The town is serviced by only 132 businesses.(15) Of these, only 4 are franchises of larger commercial operations: a gas station, a bank, a post office, and a Western Union office. The vast majority of local businesses are family enterprises, and as such are quite small in terms of sales and staff; very few hire employees. There are a few professional offices, providing business and health services; there are also automotive mechanics, carpenters, and plumbers. The most common types of enterprises are food outlets (especially convenience stores and fast food restaurants), churches, taverns, and sundry specialty stores (including small farm service outlets). Proximity to both Visalia and Exeter permits local residents to shop at larger chain stores located outside of Farmersville. Farmersville real estate boosters have sought to develop the locality by making proximity to Visalia a virtue. A City Profile (1986?) claims the community is "...virtually within the geographic center of the urbanized portion of Tulare County..." Farmersville is touted as an affordable suburban neighborhood for Visalia's expanding service sector work force (Herald, 7-17-1991), with a $20,000 differential in the price of comparable homes between the two cities (the median Farmersville home cost $50,000 in 1990). However, as revealed in regional newspapers (e.g., Exeter Sun, 4-25-1957; Fresno Bee, 4-28-1957), Farmersville has been regarded by those in neighboring towns as a rustic and disreputable crossroads; Visalia's menfolk might venture occasionally in order to have an adventurous evening in `tough' company, but this rural slum is not an acceptable community in which to raise decent families. One article (Visalia T-D, 12-8-1947) sniffed that "...there's a lot of work ahead of the men who want to erase some of the bad reputation which has been smeared on [Farmersville]." Essentially, the community is considered an ethnic farm worker community, comprised of residents on the lowest rung of Tulare County's social structure. As a result, population growth has been modest by county standards, with an average annual growth rate of only 2 percent during the last three decades. In recent decades Farmersville's average rate of growth has also been slowed due to lack of funds to provide basic infrastructure. After a mini construction boom of about 700 units in the 1970s the antiquated sewage system failed and raw sewage was discharged. A building moratorium was imposed by the county until improvements were put in place; as a result, only 223 new units were permitted during the 1980s. Since 1990 the city has approved a handful of single lot homes, as well as two subdivisions with a total of 110 homes. However, the city administrator admits that the current sewage system cannot service all of this planned growth; a new development plan seeks external government funding to modernize the system. 2. Immigration law and Farmersville(16) The Visalia Delta-Times devoted the front page for more than a week to a local protest turned to disorder, while the Fresno Bee, San Francisco Chronicle, and Los Angeles Times all picked up the story as well. The media generally played it as a mini Los Angeles-style ethnic riot. However, the history of relations between Farmersville's Latino `minority' (majority) population, regional agribusiness, and white government authorities at all levels provides a more accurate explanatory context within which the protest can be viewed. Rural towns and agribusiness enterprises have used the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to control farm labor and repatriate seasonally unemployed immigrants since at least the 1950s (Bustamante, 1984; Burawoy, 1981; Acuna, 1979; Galarza, 1964). However, as predominately white trade towns have been transformed into farm worker enclaves with large numbers of Latino residents, this strategy has become politically less palatable at the local level (Visalia D-T, 11-14/15-1992). That is the impetus for a principal sub-section in Proposition 187, which seeks to reverse local policies of non-cooperation with the INS. The historical legacy of labor coercion by government agencies has been increasingly acknowledged in communities comprised of the targets of those agencies. Nonetheless, Farmersville's all white local government was taken by surprise when a demonstration protesting the continuing use of the INS in the community resulted in a minor melee, formal demands for redress, and a series of political confrontations. Perhaps the foremost lesson of the entire episode is the risks of non-representative government. Farmersville's Latino residents have now made it clear that the local police and government, as well as the INS and other government agencies with which they typically have contact do not understand them, and certainly do not represent them. Many noted that new immigrant workers are always welcome during the peak harvest season; as one protestor noted, "The INS never raids Farmersville in the summer. The growers would scream." The white Farmersville police chief claims that the department had received citizen complaints about overcrowded conditions and unlawful activities in a neighborhood suspected to contain undocumented immigrants. Rather than investigate, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) were called; they asked for police co-operation in a raid of dwellings in the neighborhood and the chief had no qualms. November 5, 1992, beginning at dawn, six local officers assisted an unspecified number of INS agents, directing them to the neighborhood, knocking on doors, interrogating residents, and assisting in apprehensions. 32 suspected immigrants were detained by the INS and a flurry of complaints were made by legal residents, including forced entry, property damage, and verbal and physical abuse. The following evening a hastily arranged demonstration drew 300-500 Latinos to the main community intersection. The local police responded with a county-wide call for back-up. A total of 70 officers confronted the crowd, declared the assembly illegal, and launched a flying wedge into the front line of protesters. A dozen protestors were arrested, more beatings occurred, and the crowd responded with rocks, bottles, and minor vandalism. In the aftermath a series of news conferences and town meetings brought the US Department of Justice and several NGOs into the fray. A list of demands were drawn up and presented to the all white city council; they and the white mayor all declared their willingness to listen to complaints, but each noted at length that they felt "there was no problem". Investigations were launched at the local and federal levels; however, at last report, the only concrete outcome was the introduction of a cultural awareness training for the police. 3. An ethnographic case study of rural poverty Farmersville is home to a relatively new bi-national network of several hundred indigenous immigrants and migrants from the Mixteca in southern Mexico (Map #6). Mixtecs in Farmersville are from throughout the Mixteca; nonetheless, a core group is from a single district--Juxtlahuaca. Mixtecs in Farmersville work in the harvest of a number of crop industries: citrus, raisin and wine grapes, stone fruits, tomatoes, and olives. However, there appears to be a crop concentration emerging as a result of the upward mobility of two Juxtlahuacans within the citrus industry. Eight Mixtec women obtained better seasonal jobs inside a regional citrus packing house through a paisano who is the packing house floor foreman, while another Mixtec recruits from among his paisanos for a citrus FLC firm. The Mixtecs in my case study sample are relatively poor within the larger farm worker enclave. Based on life and work history data, the exacerbated poverty of the members of this new network can be gauged. The average household contained 10.6 people. Within the household, the dominance of farm work was clear: 6.3 adults worked in agriculture for every .2 that worked in a non-farm position. Mixtec workers averaged only $4,224 annually. Finally, Mixtecs had a high incidence of migrancy within the US, and between the US and Mexico during the typical year. Of the sample, almost three quarters worked outside the SJV, and over two thirds worked in Mexico during the average year. Keeping this overall data in mind, a household case study is now presented as representative of the Mixtec immigrants resettled in Farmersville. As will be seen this household represents the upper tier of Mixtecs in the community, with a lower rate of overcrowding, less wage dependence upon agriculture, higher average earnings, and less migrancy than the median. Case Study A: "Here my children can eat..." All case A members, save two minor children, were born in one of two adjacent ranchos within the district of Juxtlahuaca, Oaxaca. Principal informant B4 (`Refugio'), age 38 in 1989, worked as an internal Mexican migrant from age fourteen in urban Mexico City, as well as in rural Sinaloa and Baja California, before shifting to undocumented bi-national migration in 1978. In 1983 he became an immigrant in order to avoid continued costly, and sometimes perilous, border crossings; furthermore, in 1983 his mate, B6, joined him in the US. Refugio has worked in a variety of agricultural industries along the US west coast, but mainly in Valley orange, wine grape, olive, and stone fruit harvests. When there is a shortage of farm work in the Valley, case A workers trek further north in order to work in berry, apple, and other fruit harvests. Refugio's current household consists of nine individuals (see California genealogy #A-1). Based in Farmersville in Tulare County, the household has been renting a backyard cottage since 1984. The residence is one of two small units built behind a three bedroom home. All residences are occupied by Oaxacans. The unit rented by case A (less than 500 square feet) has a living room, kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom. The bedroom is where Refugio, B6, and their two children sleep on fold-away cots which take up the entire room when in use. The living room has a dilapidated sleeper couch for the use of B7 and 8. Also in the living room is a 19-inch color TV, several folding chairs, children's toys, auto parts, and boxes filled with clothing, papers, and other items. A religious calendar and the children's drawings are stuck to the walls. Between these main rooms are the kitchen and bathroom. Each are about 2x2 meters. The kitchen has a refrigerator, gas stove, and blender. Cabinets are bulging with staples and the counters are crowded with more of the same. The kitchen table and the floor also have piles of condiments, tortillas, and six-packs of soft drinks. The bathroom is in a similar condition of overcrowding, with a washing machine in the small space in front of the toilet and adjacent sink, preventing the bathroom door from opening entirely and narrowing entry to the shower. Perhaps due in part to the overcrowded conditions, the cottage is swarming with roaches, which wander at will throughout the day. B16, 17, and their baby, C22, newly attached to the household (discussed below), rent a room in the main house, which they share with a family of seven. However, B17 and C22 are in Refugio's home most of the time. B17 tends to C6 and 7 starting at 4:30 am, when Refugio, B6, and her brothers leave for work, until they return between 4 and 6 pm. B17 also prepares her family's meals in the cottage and stores her food there. Both families relax, socialize, and TV view together. Refugio is a forklift operator and raitero (crew transport driver) in the naval orange harvest from December through May each year. In exchange for his transport franchise, Refugio is expected to recruit new crew workers as needed. During the first 4 months, many hours and days are lost to foggy and rainy weather. Refugio's income from the orange industry in an average year is less than $6,000. B6 generally earns a bit more as a fast piece-rate worker. Her brothers, B7 and 8, average less than half her earnings at the same work. The brother's earnings of about $3,000 each for 5 months work is average for citrus workers employed by farm labor contractors. FLCs pay harvesters an average 12 percent less than the region's direct-hire orange packing houses. (B16, who prefers regular work at an hourly wage, works as a janitor in a local warehouse at the minimum wage of $4.25.) As the summer approaches, total harvest crews contract from a dozen to only three or four. The effects of crew shrinkage on the A household include: loss of the forklift position (Refugio is downgraded to an orange picker, where he works much harder and earns a little less); loss of worker riders that pay for transport to and from the fields; and, lower income earnings under deteriorating working conditions. The drop in income forces Refugio, his wife, and her brothers to seek new jobs each June. Typically they work in stone fruit harvests, or, if nothing else is available, they travel to Stockton for the cherry harvest. In August they work in the regional olive harvest, followed by a few weeks work in the wine and/or raisin grape harvests. The household usually can earn a few thousand dollars more in these sporadic summer season harvests. Finally, the household men are always on the lookout to buy a used car that needs labor-intensive repairs; during periods of underemployment they collaborate in fixing and reselling them.(17) Refugio reports that the past two years have been leaner than previously. The peak season number of workers has increased, shortening the total work season. In 1989, the per bucket piece rate for the olive harvest was cut to half that of the previous year. Refugio blames IRCA's amnesty programs for the increased labor supply. The amnesty programs gave several million workers legal documents, including the members of case A's household; however, new documents have altered this household's life, as well as work, patterns. In 1989, with their new residency cards in hand, Refugio's postponed the transition to summer season employment to visit Mexico for the first time since 1983. The trip to Oaxaca resulted in three changes in case A's household economy (see California household budget, below). First, during their visit Refugio, B6, 7, and 8 spent about $5,200 earned in California. Expenditures, listed in order of relative amounts: purchase of a Oaxaca house lot by B4 and 6 ($1,800(18)); a church wedding for Refugio and B6 ($1,000); transportation to, from, and within Mexico ($1,200); gifts for Mexico-based family members, including a pair of young oxen ($800); and, food and other necessities purchased in Mexico ($800). Case A -- Refugio's California Household Budget* in 1989 (US$) Revenues Expenditures Wages 22,100 Food 7,500 Worker's comp. 2,400 Transportation 5,000** Unemployment (UI) 2,500 Medical 2,500 Sale of car 2,000 Remittances/gifts 3,000*** Raitero fees 350 Rent 4,200 Utilities 480 Mortgage (house lot in Mexico) 550 Clothing 900 Entertainment 1,500** Personal miscellaneous 2,800** 28,350 28,430 * Estimated from informants Refugio, B6 and 8 ** Higher expenses incurred due to visit to Oaxaca in 1989 *** Remittances/gifts spread among a variety of relatives in the household's kindred ------------------------- Second, Refugio and company returned to the US border with sixteen year-old B18 and her year-old girl (C22). They are the wife and child of second cousin (B17), another Valley farm worker. B17 reunited with 18 in Tijuana and paid a border labor smuggler to get her into the US while Refugio carried the infant, C22, across the border in his van with his family. They are now part of Refugio's California household. Third, due to the extreme conditions of poverty that prevail in Oaxaca, as well as the success in bringing B18 and C22 into the US this year, Refugio has decided to bring his daughter from a previous marriage, C4, back to California on his next visit to Oaxaca. He says that he would like to bring the rest of his Mexico-based family as well, but he says that his mother "is determined to die in her own home." The conditions prevailing in their rancho are illuminating in explaining continued undocumented migration to California, including ongoing unauthorized family re-unification such as is occurring in case A. Refugio's remaining domestic unit in Mexico consists of his mother, his half brother, and his daughter from his first marriage (Mexico genealogy #A-1). The household of three lives in a rural area along an unimproved dirt lane that connects several hamlets to the regional highway six kilometers to the east. Aside from the government-sponsored construction of several concrete and steel culvert bypasses, responsibility for maintaining the route lie with the local workers drafted from in tequio crews from the hamlets themselves. The road is all but impassible during the summer rainy season, and deeply rutted and pock-marked in the best of times. Modified pick-up trucks serve as transit vehicles for the bulk of the area's inhabitants, charging a premium to serve this area in order to pay the high costs of wear-and-tear to their vehicles.(19) Many of the Mixteca's rural municipal hamlets hardly qualify as communities. For example, the rancho within which A3, B3, and C4 resides is a dispersed settlement in rugged terrain in which the nearest neighbors are on an adjacent hilltop ten minutes walk away. The ranch center is a cluster of buildings thirty minutes walk from A3's home, and consists of a one-room primary school, a chapel, and several homes, and a small government-supported CONASUPO store. The store offers primarily staples such as grains, canned goods, and survival goods such as candles, matches, and rope, as well as a few locally grown surplus products. To purchase any perishables, as well as most consumer goods, local inhabitants must travel to the nearest regional market, which is in the district seat at Juxtlahuaca. The household lives in a small hut located on the edge of the privately owned farm parcel that A3 inherited from her father. The parcel is about two thirds of a hectare, basically covering the top and east slope of a small hill. The hilltop is relatively level and almost rock-free, but the soil is of poor quality and low fertility.(20) The family has neither sufficient animal wastes or financial resources to fertilize the land with regularity. Run-off is a problem due to steep southern and eastern slopes. There is no possibility of irrigating, so the household only gets one rainy season crop of corn, beans, and squash. If rains are adequate, A3's household of three obtains enough subsistence corn for the year, beans for 3 or 4 months, and squashes for a month or so. All other food must be purchased. Furthermore, timely and adequate rains are a rarity; in the past twenty years sufficient rains to produce an un-stunted crop have failed to materialize two thirds of the time. A3's home (about 3x4 meters) is a classic regional variation of the ubiquitous jacale, a one room shack made almost entirely of local raw materials. The frame is built of crude branches and sticks tied into place, with weed bramble clumped together to form walls, and topped with a clay tile roof above a lattice of wood. The entrance is a gap in the west wall about 1 meter square; entry is via an unsecured gate framed by branches and covered over by a patchwork of wood fragments. The interior floor is of hard-packed dirt, the ceiling, at about 5 feet, is a lattice of wood supports and the underside of the clay tiles. The monetary value of the shack is nil. The contents of the shack are also low in monetary value. Serapes, plastic, and blankets are stretched between walls to provide a modicum of privacy within the hut. Furniture consists of one mattress and hand-fashioned wooden benches and miniature chairs. The only table is about half a meter square; it serves primarily as the household altar, with several small pictures of saints surrounded by dried wild plants and a few pieces of fruit. The cookery and utensils are local artisan products made of pottery and wood. There is little in the way of manufactured items save a battery-powered cassette deck and some plastic containers and buckets. Several cases of soft drinks sit by the gate in case a passer-by may want to purchase a drink. Adjoining the shack are the remains of a small wood and palm lean-to. It has areas for grinding corn with a steel hand mill fastened to a wood branch, a metate and cooking fire. The lean-to, although weather weary, provides some shade and a buffer against winds. In wet weather, cooking activities usually performed in the lean-to are moved into the hut's interior, filling the low ceiling with smoke. There is no electricity, gas lamp, nor stove. Nor is there a bathroom, or even piped water. The typical day is comprised of basic survival tasks. Refugio's daughter, C4, spends half of each day fetching water in a gallon plastic bucket from a narrow canyon 40 meters below the house. In the dry season the water source is a tiny trickle running over a mildewed rock and mud surface. She is also responsible for pasturing the new oxen, grinding corn for tortillas (the household can not afford the daily cost of using the rancho's electric mill--ten cents US), and is engaged in other chores assisting her grandmother in food preparation, cleaning, and running errands. She is attending her final year of primary school each week day afternoon (at Refugio's insistence); there is no local secondary school for her to attend next year. A3 has similar tasks, and also spends about half of every other day gathering wood fuel from the nearby hills, carrying the resulting ten kilo bundle home on her back with the aid of a tumpline (the family has no mule). Refugio's older half-brother, B3, is frail, walks in a halting manner, and at age forty has never lived away from his mother's home. Nevertheless, B3 works as a construction laborer at $2 US per day plus a noon meal for about two months per year. He also fulfills the family's community work commitment as a day laborer one day each month, and sells home-made charcoal made from wood that he and his mother collect together. A3 says that he spends most of his wages on liquor. Case A -- Refugio's Mexico Household Budget* in 1989 (US$) Revenues Expenditures Remittances $1,000 Food** $900 Day labor 150 Transport 130 Charcoal sales 80 Medical 100 Fodder sales 30 School books and supplies 40 Soft drinks sales 20 Oxen rental 30 Food sales 0 Liquor 80 1,280 1,280 * Estimated from informants A3, B4, 6, and C4 (converted from pesos) ** Food supplemental to subsistence crop production --------------------------------------------------- The budget for A3, B3, and C4 illustrates the suffering of many in rural Mexico. Cash remittances, low as they are, constitute almost three quarters of the household's total income; dependence on US farm worker members for non-subsistence support is very high. The opportunities to supplement remittances are both few and low in value. Total non-remittance household earnings are only $280 US. Their only important asset, the plot on which the household lives and works provides the bulk of the family's very basic annual subsistence diet only if farming conditions are optimal; when crop production is lower, the household suffers. Nothing produced on the land is ever left over for sale, although fodder is frequently traded to a yuntero for his services plowing the plot before planting. Labor and commodity sales, though important when revenue totals are so low, are quite marginal. For example, a full day's work provides only enough cash to transport the three to the nearest market (about forty cents US each way per person) once a week. The household is generally on an economic precipice, praying that a giro (money-gram) arrives before the next expense is encountered. The household has no savings; they also cannot afford to get a loan in an emergency. Those that have money to lend demand 20-30 percent per month in interest. Living as this household does, from hand to mouth, in almost utter isolation, it is little wonder that the Mixteca has become a major labor-sending region to California's farm labor market. Case A summary Case A is comprised of two nuclear families and additional unmarried kin that live and work together as a unit. The household contains nine members, including six adults, which share 3 rooms (in two houses), for a high degree of overcrowding. Together the workers earn only about $28,000, and remits about 20 percent to desperately poor relatives in Oaxaca. In order to earn this total income, the members must engage in a variety of low wage, short-term jobs, that span much of the Central Valley or even beyond (adding to living and transport costs). Finally, with all adult members working sporadic, but arduous jobs in the fields, conditions within the household are poor. Unfortunately this household is representative of Mixtec migrant/immigrant households in Farmersville. Due to the relatively short history of bi-national migration, members of the Mixtec networks suffer substandard living and working conditions in rural California. The underdeveloped network contacts force these farm workers to adopt a high degree of migrancy, working in short-term temporary and poorly paid jobs, with low annual earnings and high living costs, under conditions of overcrowding in order to make ends meet. While case A's living and working conditions in the Valley leave much to be desired by US standards, the contrast between Farmersville and their rancho in Oaxaca cannot be more stark. B6 presented the main reason for continuing undocumented immigration clearly when she said, "Here my children can eat everything--meat, eggs, fruit, vegetables, something sweet. There they would only eat tortillas and some beans." The sight of the family matriarch, A3, toiling up a hillside with a load of firewood on her back, and her granddaughter, C4, trudging down the canyon slope to their only source of water trickling through the mud, brought B6's words to life. The core of the California household had resided in the US for five years without documents, remaining north of the border year-round since the immigration and resettlement of one woman. However, kin in Oaxaca continued to receive remittances from the immigrants throughout the past decade. As a result of one of IRCA's amnesty programs, crossing the international border is no longer a problem for this group, permitting return visits to their natal homeland. During their first return visit they purchased of a lot for a future home, as well as making other substantial economic and cultural investments. A long delayed church wedding, gift giving, and the purchase of a pair of oxen all emphasize the continued ties that this household maintains with their larger families and place of origin. The household also violated the main aim of IRCA by transporting undocumented Oaxacans back to and across the border, in order to reunite a young family divided by the international boundary. Although the immigrants say that they would like to go home forever, they can only remit some of their wages and keep working. When they did make an overdue visit, they returned to the international border with more Mixtecs--the next generation of Mexican parents that want to feed their children better too. McFARLAND McFarland (Map #6) has a 1993 population of 7,575, with an average annual growth rate of only about 2 percent.(21) A small portion of the area to become McFarland's hinterland was homesteaded in the 1860s. However, most of the area was grabbed by the region's single largest property owner--the Kern County Land Company--before 1873 (Liebman, 1983:23), inhibiting further development until after the turn of the century. In 1908 two speculators bought title to the region, with the aim to begin a farming colony.(22) The new colony was officially named after one of the land speculators the following year. 1. Contemporary economy `The Heartbeat of Agriculture' is heavily dependent on the farming sector. The predominance of the farming industries on the region is verified by both statistics and local observers. While less than 20 percent of Kern County's total work force is relegated to the agricultural labor sector, in McFarland the proportion is about 50 percent.(23) In fact, the percentage of the local labor force dependent on farm work has risen almost 10 percent over the past two decades. Only about 5 percent are self employed. Various strata within McFarland acknowledge the strong link between the agricultural sector and the community's economy. Community residents, merchants, and officials all note the relationship between the town's poverty and its dependence on agriculture (Californian, 8-6-1979). One resident noted that "McFarland is an incorporated labor camp. ...most of the people who live here are farm workers." The manager of the bank stated that McFarland is composed of "many transient workers and lower economic families. It is primarily an agricultural economy." The mayor admitted that the town "always will be closely related to agriculture." Left unstated is the contradiction between the flourishing regional farm economy and McFarland's continued poverty. McFarland has been slow at attracting settlers and housing during the past 4 decades. McFarland's population has seesawed, from almost 6,000 in 1956, 3,910 in 1960, 4,359 in 1970, 5,910 in 1980, and 7,005 in 1990. Before 1950, new units built equaled only about 10 percent of total housing stock, while between 1950 and 1970 construction went up to 19 percent; in the 1970s, new construction rose 22 percent (Colvin, 1988:125), the result of the development of a farm worker housing subdivision. However, the spurt of government-supported construction was aborted in 1985 due to a building moratorium declared when the state confirmed a "cancer cluster" in McFarland (Californian, 11-1-1986, 1-29-1988).(24) Six of the thirteen children resided in the farm worker housing, built atop the old city dump and surrounded by agricultural cotton, grape, and citrus operations to the north, east, and south. As the population has increased and housing has aged, conditions of overcrowding have more than tripled to 25 percent; more than 47 percent of housing has more than five persons per unit (Colvin, 1988:26, 130, 133). In 1990 there were 1,747 housing units, or more than four persons per unit. Furthermore, additional seasonal overcrowding occurs when the town's population increases by at least 30 percent during the region's summer/fall harvests. Income earnings also reveal the community's poverty. Median household and family income figures both hover at about $20,000 while per capita income is only $6,056. 27.7 percent of all persons, 34.1 percent of all children, and 53.2 percent of all households headed by a female live in poverty. 42.4 perce June 1995 Volume 1 Number 4June 1995 Volume 1 Number 4<< back |
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