07/01/2006

By KRISTEN WYATT  / Associated Press

Crab processors say it's an easy decision — either hire Mexican workers to pick crabs or close up shop. The only thing they're unsure of is whether they'll be allowed to hire Mexican employees on seasonal work visas next year.

A two-year extension of the visa program that allows them to staff Eastern Shore crab houses with workers to pry lump meat out of crabs expires this year, and an additional extension is still pending in Congress. Some crab processors are getting more nervous by the day, fearing this may be their last season if Congress doesn't act.

"We would be closed if we didn't have these folks," said Jack Brooks, owner of The J.M. Clayton Co., on the banks of the Choptank River in Cambridge. "They'll bulldoze us and put up condos if this isn't saved."

Walking through his crab picking floor, where more than two dozen women from Mexico use small silver knives to crack open crabs and pile the meat into plastic tubs, Brooks said the guest worker visa program used by Maryland crab processors works well and should be continued.

"We need workers to sit down and do the tough job of picking the crabs," he said. "We don't want to hire illegals. This is a good, legal program that works."

The visas that crab processors use, called H2Bs, allow foreign nationals to work in the United States for a certain period and then return home. Increased demand for the national allotment of 66,000 H2Bs meant that they ran out last year before crab season began in April. Worried they'd have to close, crabbers lobbied for a two-year extension on the H2Bs. But that extension expires this fall, and unless Congress acts, the visas will be gone.

The uncertainty is gnawing on crab processors, who say they can't find enough American workers to pick crabs for $5.25 an hour, more depending on how much meat they pick. The work is seasonal and grueling, with no benefits. Without the foreign workers, virtually all of them from Mexico, crab processors said they couldn't survive.

"I'm out of business. It's that simple," said Terry Vincent, owner of Lindy's Seafood in Woolford. "You're not gonna get many people to pick crabs anymore."

The visas are the only thing keeping any sort of seafood industry alive along the Chesapeake Bay, he said.

"Without them, it's dead, it's gone," he said.

Down on Hoopers Island, where many of the few remaining crab processing plants are located, the crab pickers are all from other countries. In the picking room at Russell Hall Seafood in Fishing Creek, Latin American dance music called cumbia blares while about 20 women sit at long silver tables, prying apart crabs.

The workers here typically take buses in April from Mexico, then pay the crab processors weekly rent to stay in apartments during the season. When the season ends by November, the crab pickers head home.

At Russell Hall, 29-year-old Sarim Hernandez Trejo has been coming up for seven years from San Luis Potosi, Mexico. He hauls crabs to the pickers and distributes ice to keep the meat fresh, earning about $300 to $400 a week.

"It's better than at home," he said. "We come here for the visa, for the work."

The number of foreign crab pickers in Maryland is below 2,000, but they keep the crab houses in business, said Bill Sieling, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Seafood Industries Association.

"You can't substitute machines. There is no machine that picks crab meat and grades it," said Sieling, who said foreign crab pickers became the norm in Maryland about 15 years ago when an older generation of pickers retired and no one wanted to replace them.

"No one wants to do this kind of work anymore," he said.

To retain the visa program, watermen are again appealing to Maryland's congressional delegation. U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., introduced legislation in February to continue to exempt returning seasonal workers from the national H2B limit. Her proposal would continue the exemption for three years.

If Congress does nothing, the extension expires Sept. 30. That won't affect this year's crab pickers, but will make next season off-limits to foreign guest workers.

A spokeswoman for Mikulski, Melissa Schwartz, assured the crab processors the extension would go through.

"No matter what, Sen. Mikulski will keep fighting until she gets it," Schwartz said.

But amid increased national scrutiny of immigration laws, especially how American employers go about hiring foreign workers, not all crab processors are optimistic the extension will clear Congress.

"It's become such a hot-button issue in the political arena. Right now, we're just sitting on our hands waiting to see what happens next. It looks like comprehensive immigration reform keeps getting put off," Sieling said.

Also worried is Guadalupe Lopez, 22, who has traveled from Hidalgo, Mexico, to Cambridge every year since she was 18 to pick crabs. Without the H2Bs, she said she'd have to stay in Mexico for far lower wages.

"I come here for work and money," she said through an interpreter. "In Mexico, I'd make $10 a day for eight hours. Here, I can make $10 an hour for the same work."

Even if Congress approves a three-year extension, some in the industry say they don't see much future in domestic seafood processing. They fear all production will end up overseas.

"I don't know whether I should leave here," said 27-year-old Clay Brooks, who is plant manager for his dad's crab processing business. The J.M. Clayton plant has been in the family for several generations, but the younger Brooks isn't sure he'll be able to keep it going.

"It's something I think about at least once a week," said Clay Brooks, who has learned Spanish and translates for his father. "What would I do if I wasn't here? I don't know."