The U.S. Department of Labor prohibits Kennewick contractor from providing contacted farmworkers

The U.S. Department of Labor is prohibiting a Kennewick company from providing contracted workers to farms and orchards of Eastern Washington.

The company, Harvest Plus LLC, is barred from participating in the H-2A temporary agricultural workers program for three years, according to a news release. The federal agency also fined Harvest Plus $252,000.

The regulatory actions follows an investigation by the department’s wage and hour division, which found the employer was putting workers in unsafe conditions.

This includes transporting workers in unsafe vehicles driven by people without licenses or proper permits. The Labor investigation also determined Harvest Plus withheld wages and made illegal pay deductions from workers’ paychecks, denied U.S. workers access to jobs, told workers to falsify documents to mask violations of federal regulations and housed the contracted workers brought into the country in motel rooms with mold contamination.

“This was a situation where there were such egregious violations that we had no choice but to recommend debarment from the H-2A program, because we want to make sure that workers are protected,” said Thomas Silva, the wage and hour division’s district director.

Harvest Plus co-owner Erica Cisneros agreed that her firm had some responsibility, but disputed the penalties related to housing.

“ Some of these vans were not safe on that transportation, so some of it, I do agree. I understand. We’re paying for it. We’re taking the fall for that,” Cisneros said.

“I do not agree with the housing. The (Department of Labor) approved the housing before we can even bring H-2A workers – to be honest, none of my workers ever complained about molding,” Cisneros said.

Cisneros also claims that a Kennewick-based consulting company that helped them fill out the H-2A paperwork, “screwed them over.”

“When Harvest Plus started the H-2A program back in 2022, we hired a third party to do all, all of our H-2A processing,” Cisneros said. “At the end of the day, we got screwed because of her, and we’re paying for all of that because of that person that guided us wrong.”

The Spokesman-Review reached out to the consulting company but did not receive an immediate response back Friday afternoon.