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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Immigration crackdown could hurt Idaho industries

By Katie Short Moscow-Pullman Daily News

Idaho’s food and agribusiness industry brought in $1.51 billion in 2011, according to the Idaho Department of Commerce.

And according to Christy Dearien, a researcher at the University of Idaho’s McClure Center for Public Policy Research, 27 percent of all agricultural workers are undocumented immigrants.

“They make up a significant role in that industry,” Dearien said Tuesday during a seminar titled “Immigration Policy and Idaho: Playing Out in Real Time” held at UI campuses in Moscow and Boise. The talk was part of the Malcolm M. Renfrew Interdisciplinary Colloquium.

Dearien said Idaho had approximately 100,000 immigrants, 56,000 of whom were Hispanic, in 2016, and 35 percent of Hispanic workers in Idaho are employed in the agricultural field, which includes dairy farming.

Priscilla Salant, who retired from UI in March, joined the conversation from Boise and spoke of a study she conducted during 2008 and 2009 and then again in 2016. The goal was to better understand how much of an effect the dairy workforce and industry has on the communities in which the workers live and work. On the low end of the spectrum, she said, dairy farmers pay on average $12 to $15 per hour and the work is steady. This encourages people to spend their money at local businesses and deposit in banks, creating a stable economy, Salant explained.

A crackdown by the federal government on immigration could have major consequences for the industry and Idaho.

“In terms of the economy, the findings are pretty clear that the workers in the dairy industry have a positive impact on the economy,” Salant said.

Although the economy in southern Idaho has benefited, schools there have suffered. Salant said the Hispanic population is growing at such a high rate districts don’t have the resources and funding to keep up with the growth.

Juan Saldana, a member of the Idaho Commission on Hispanic Affairs, said the lack of resources was partially due to the fact there are not enough bilingual teachers in southern Idaho.

Saldana also addressed threats of investigation by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in southern Idaho. Saldana said the Jerome County Sheriff’s Department is working on a contract with ICE, and that is causing fear in many residents. If the crackdown continues, the housing market in southern Idaho would also suffer because many immigrants would move out of state for fear of deportation, he said.

“Businesses are already showing decline,” he said.

While southern Idaho is home to 90 percent of the state’s immigrant population, areas like Lewiston and Coeur d’Alene have pockets of Hispanic and immigrant communities, Saldana said. On the UI campus, Hispanics make up the largest minority group at 8 percent, Dearien said.