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UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR FRANCES PERKINS, Secretary WOMEN’S BUREAU MARY ANDERSON, Director EMPLOYMENT AND HOUSING PROBLEMS OF MIGRATORY WORKERS IN NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY CANNING INDUSTRIES, 1943 Bulletin of the Women's Bureau, No. 198 / UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WASHINGTON : 1M4 For sals by tile Superintendent of Documents. Washington 25, D. C. Price 10 gents LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL United States Department of Labor, Women’s Bureau, Washington, December 15, 1943. Madam: I have the honor to transmit a report on problems arising from the wartime necessity of employing migratory work ers in New York and New Jersey canneries. The report is not statistical; instead, the chief emphasis in the survey was on the problems of the firms in the employment and housing of migrant labor. Workers had been brought from several southern States, and even the West Indies, in numbers greater than ever before; in addition, the use of school children, college students, and teachers was general, as was the employment of holiday workers. Practically all the canneries visited were processing food for some branch of the armed forces or for Lend-Lease. The survey was conducted and most of the report was written by Helen Bryan Sater. The sections on employment, hours, and wages were written by Caroline Manning. Respectfully submitted. Mary Anderson, Director. Hon. Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labor. . CONTENTS Page Introduction and scope 1 2 Source of labor supply and its recruitment- 2 Employment________ 6 Seasonality of product_______________________________ 5 Length of season ___ 5 Occupations new to women _________________________ 7 Hours of work 7 Cannery wages, 10 Working conditions_____________________________________________ ___ 12 General plant conditions__________________ 13 Seating 14 Sanitary and service facilities :____________________________________ 14 Washing facilities ______ 15 Toilets -----------------------------------------------------15 Cloak rooms ___________________ 16 Rest rooms and lunch rooms 16 Uniforms_____________________ -___ _____ _ 16 Medical facilities . 17 Problems of migratory labor__ ____ 17 Housing and living conditions for migratory workers _ - 19 New Jersey___ __ __ __ _____ 1_____ ____ ___ ______ 19 New York 25 Company charges for lodging_______________________ 29 Transportation 29 Standards for housing of migratory workers_________________ 29 Type of construction 30 Location and lay-out 31 Water supply_______________________________________ 31 Sleeping quarters - 31 Cooking and eating quarters_____________________________________ 31 Garbage and refuse disposal 32 Toilets ~ 32 Bathing facilities 32 Laundry________________________________________~ 32 Sanitation and health_______________________ 32 Child care1_______________ ______________ 33 Recreation 33 Registration33 Supervision-~~ 33 Summary of migrant problems____________~ 34 Products____ Employment and Housing Problems of Migratory Workers in New York and New Jersey Canning Industries, 1943 INTRODUCTION AND SCOPE Because of the large numbers of women involved, facts surround ing the employment of women in canning and food-processing in dustries have been of continuing interest to the Women’s Bureau of the United States Department of Labor. Its studies of these industries, or its State surveys that have given considerable at tention to these industries, range from one on fruit-growing, can ning, and preserving in the State of Washington in 1923 to the most thorough survey ever made of the canning and preserving of fruits and vegetables, which extended to 16 States and was made public in 1940. After the entry of the United States into the present war it was considered important by the Women’s Bureau to know what changes were taking place in an industry employing so large a percentage of women and one that is so vital to the war effort. Since women have been and probably will continue to be the largest source of labor supply for canneries, it would be especially un fortunate to accept for an emergency period an unnecessary lower ing of standards, particularly inasmuch as canneries, as a whole, are regarded as having standards lower than those obtaining in many other industries. The war should not be used as a pretext for lowering standards when the situation does not warrant it. Canners are in a better position financially than ever before to improve working conditions within the plant and living conditions for migratory workers. The Office of Price Administration has made generous allowance for the increase in labor costs to can neries, and in spite of ceiling prices canners’ incomes are greatly augmented by large Government orders. As a preliminary, studies were made during the summer and fall of 1943 of canneries in New Jersey and New York. Data were gathered covering kinds of foods processed; number of weeks of cannery operation; wages, hours, and working conditions. Em phasis was put on obtaining information with regard to the extent and percentage of woman employment; sources of labor supply and methods of its recruitment; and the problems surrounding the use of migratory labor. The information was secured through visits to plants and to migrant-housing locations, and from interviews with representa tives of plant management and of canners’ associations, officials of Federal and State agencies, representatives of private agencies, union officials, and individual workers. The facts gathered were not intended for a statistical report. Some plant records were studied but no pay rolls were copied. A total of 57 canneries were visited. Twenty-one of these were in New Jersey and thirty-six were in New York. 1 2 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY PRODUCTS The products of the canneries visited in New Jersey included seasonal, nonseasonal, dehydrated, and frozen foods; New York canneries included, in addition to these, two apple-drying plants. New Jersey. At first glance the canning industry in New Jersey appears to be a tomato-canning industry. No other product approaches the tomato in number of canneries reporting; the vegetables ranking second and third, asparagus and green beans, were reported by 5 and 4 plants, respectively, while 19 of the 21 plants canned tomatoes or tomato products. Eight products—peas, lima beans, corn, squash, spinach, turnips, sweet potatoes, and peppers—were canned in 1 plant each. Other products of the plants surveyed cover a wide variety, ranging from soups, chowders, and the ubiquitous baked bean, through such things as hash, stews, army rations (meat and vege tables combined), condiments of every description, to wines, olives and olive oil, honey. Two plants dehydrated potatoes; one froze vegetables. Few fruits appeared among the products reported. Practically all plants processed more than one product; one listed 12 products, and another 19. New York. The 36 plants visited in New York also had a great variety of products. Tomatoes or tomato products, though outranking all others (being reported by almost two-thirds of the plants), were followed by green beans, canned by half the companies, and peas, canned by more than two-fifths of them. Beets as well as potatoes were dehydrated; fruits as well as vegetables were frozen. The range was from soup to coffee, from baby food to army rations. Only two plants restricted their output to one product. Most of them reported from 4 to 8 products, but four listed 10 or more, the highest turning out 16. Government Orders. Practically all the canneries visited were processing food for some branch of the armed services or Lend-Lease. It was not possible for all the companies to estimate the exact percentages of their products going to the Government. Some of them had not yet received their contracts. For those that had, the percent age frequently was based on the output of the year before and was contingent on the weather and the crop yield as well as the de mands made by the Government, which might change from day to day. SOURCES OF LABOR SUPPLY AND ITS RECRUITMENT The large contracts for food for men in the armed services and for Lend-Lease made the need for workers in the canning industry greater this past season than in normal times. That there should be a shortage in the usual labor supply of cannery workers was inevitable. That it has become important to induce greater num bers of women to step into this breach is a matter that the Women’s MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 3 Bureau recognizes. Women have been taken on in New Jersey and New York canneries to replace men, casual as well as regular workers, who have been drawn into military service, and to replace men and women who have left for better-paying jobs in industries offering continuous employment. The greatest need for additional workers was not realized, how ever, this summer. The drought in New Jersey that lasted from June all through the summer greatly reduced the crop yield, while continuous rains in New York State prevented early planting of peas, and frost practically ruined the New York peach crop. It had been anticipated that more peelers, especially, would be needed in plants canning whole tomatoes, since Government con tracts for this commodity were enormous, and because several products, such as pork and beans and others using large quantities of tomato pulp, puree, and paste, for which unskinned tomatoes are used, had been eliminated by the War Production Board. Visits to plants disclosed, however, that some of the plants were not canning whole tomatoes as they had done heretofore, but, be cause of the shortage of labor, were doing those processes that do not take so large a force. Efforts to fill the labor requirements were met in part by the greater use of housewives from the surrounding farms and com munities, many of whom had never worked in canneries before. The use of school children1, college students, and teachers was general. In New York State in particular, use was made of holiday workers, recruited both locally and from New York City. At tendants at a church youth conference worked two weeks at a time to harvest crops and some of these same people helped in nearby canneries. Workers in other industries and.office employees were used for “Victory” or part-time shifts. In one community where the canners were unwilling to operate short evening shifts, women and men who worked on night shifts in defense plants were taken for a minimum 6-hour day shift in canneries. It occurred to the Women’s Bureau agent that two manufacturers producing non essential goods, who were having a difficult time getting enough material to run full capacity since there was not a normal demand for their products, might be willing to loan their employees to a canner in the peak canning season. The two manufacturers were delighted to make such an arrangement; they had held on to their help because of the fear that if they let it go for short periods they would not get it back. In the course of the study, a number of methods that had proved successful elsewhere in the recruitment of labor were suggested. For example, soldiers, sailors, and coast guardsmen had been called in to aid the New Jersey canners in saving the tomato crop; and in northwestern New York State soldiers and sailors had answered a call for help and worked in canneries at the peak season. A greater use of migratory workers had helped to meet the labor needs. Workers were brought from Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, and other southern States in numbers 1 The New Jersey State law covering the employment of children has been modified to allow minors as young as 16 to be employed in commercial food canneries to the full maximum of 10 hours a day and 48 hours a week and up to 11 p. m.f between May 1 and October 1, without any dispensation from the Commissioner of Labor. 4 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY far exceeding those of earlier years. They included white and colored unattached men and women and family groups of men, women, and children. Hundreds of Jamaicans and workers from the Bahaman Islands were brought in as farm labor, and some worked in canneries where there was need. Recruitment methods included efforts on the part of cannery employees to bring in their relatives and friends. Private em ployers had their own scouts on the lookout for both local and migrant labor. In some instances representatives of cannery work ers’ unions assisted the recruitment program. In Fredonia, N. Y., where there was no United States Employment Service, through the coordinated efforts of the local agencies concerned a voluntary office operated for the recruitment of farm and cannery labor. The salary of the' man in charge was paid by one of the canners but the office was largely staffed by volunteers. Practically all the canneries visited made use of the United States Employment Service. The Service found it difficult at times to fill these orders, not only because of labor shortage but because in some cases the canners did not order labor early enough for the demands to be met. Recruitment by Government agencies was handled somewhat differently in New Jersey and New York. In New Jersey the Extension Service of the Department of Agriculture recruited farm labor and the Employment Service of the War Manpower Commission recruited cannery labor. In New York State there was a closer cooperation between these two agencies, the Employ ment Service recruiting farm as well as cannery labor and the Extension Service depositing money for the use of the Employment Service in defraying expenses entailed in the recruitment of farm labor. One handicap in this practice is that since all States do not have this arrangement, there may be delay by the Employment Service of clearance orders in the States where recruiting for farm labor is being done, as the Employment Service there may be recruiting cannery labor only. Advertising for workers was done through newspapers and over the radio. House-to-house canvassing was undertaken. Talks by workers, employers’ representatives, and employees of the United States Employment Service were made to various groups. Those most frequently contacted in the effort to get women workers were settlement houses, Y. W. C. A. mothers’ clubs, church groups, unions, American Legion women’s auxiliaries, American and British selectees mothers’ clubs, and societies of colored people. Many of the migrant workers talked with were dissatisfied be cause the promises made to them when they were recruited, with regard to work, earnings, housing facilities, and so forth, had not been kept. The result was that many of these workers moved to other places or went home. The expense of such turn-over to the industry is an important item and the dissatisfaction of the work ers may affect their availability another year. There was said to be a practice in one locality to give women enough employment to entitle them to unemployment insurance and then discourage them from taking other regular jobs so that they would be available to canners in peak season. In this same locality, one canner was said to make a practice of hiring and 5 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY firing women in quick succession in the slack period just prior to the peak season, giving them the impression that they were “frozen” in cannery jobs and thus making them available for the peak season. EMPLOYMENT Seasonality of Product. Because canning is a seasonal industry, the number of weeks of plant operation during the year varies from plant to plant, and the number of employees in any one plant varies from week to week according to the kind and the amount of food to be processed. Altogether 19 canneries in New Jersey and 35 in New York re ported on employment and on the seasonal nature of the crops processed. Though more canneries were visited in New York than in New Jersey, employment at the peak season totaled a few thousand more in New Jersey than in New York. In each State approximately one-half of the canneries worked solely on seasonal products, but only one-fifth to one-fourth of all employees were found in these canneries. The proportion of women among total employees at the peak, slightly more than one-half, was practically the same in both States. However, the proportion of women in the canneries en gaged solely in seasonal operations was decidedly different. That it was 20 points lower in New York is due in part to the greater importance of the pea and bean crops in that State, crops the processing of which uses few women. In 6 canneries in New York the proportion of women employed at the peak of the pea or bean season ranged from 10 to 38.3 percent. At the other extreme there were several individual plants in which three-fourths or more of the employees were women. The detailed figures follow: Type of product Number of canneries reporting Number of employees at peak season Total Women Number 1 Percent New Jersey Total................................................................................ Seasonal only.......................................................... . Seasonal and nonseasonal..................................................... 19 16,628 8,268 52.8 10 9 8,289 12,389 2,064 6,194 62.8 60.2 New York Total................................................................................ Seasonal and nonseasonal..................................................... 35 12,014 6,293 52.4 16 19 3,076 8,938 1,307 4,986 42.5 65.8 Length of Season. Canning operations were limited to periods of not over 13 weeks (3 months) in almost one-third of the canneries in New Jersey and in New York. Few crops were processed in these short-term operations; for example, one plant operating about 4 weeks canned 567320*—44------2 6 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY only cherries, another operating about 6 weeks canned only tomato products, another operating 10 weeks canned two crops, peas and beans, and another operating 11 weeks canned three crops, beans, tomatoes, and raspberries. In another significant group of canneries in each State, opera tions continued for 14 to 26 weeks (3 to 6 months). Most of the canneries that operated longer than 17 or 18 weeks also processed nonseasonal products, thereby prolonging the canning period to 5 or 6 months. However, operations of some of the New Jersey canneries that began the season with strawberries and asparagus and continued through the various succeeding crops, ending with pumpkin and cranberries, covered from 5 to 6 months processing only seasonal vegetables or fruits. Eight canneries in each State operated throughout the year, though at times with only a skeleton force. In New Jersey this number represents almost half of the canneries that reported; in New York less than one-fourth. Needless to say, in order to operate throughout the year they process not only the usual sea sonal vegetables and fruits but other nonseasonal products such as jellies, jams, pickles, baked beans, and soups. In New York State the canneries that operated over short periods employed for the most part few workers, rarely over 200 and occasionally less than 100 persons at the peak season. On the other hand, all but one of the year-round plants employed 200 or more persons, three-fourths of them at least 500, and more than a third of them as many as 1,000. Number of weeks in operation Number of canneries reporting Number of canneries reporting employment at peak season as— Under 100 persons 100 to 199 persons 200 to 399 persons 500 to 999 persons 1,000 persons and over New Jersey 14 to 26.......................................... 27 to 39.......................................... 62...................................................... 18 4 4 4 3 6 4 1 8 1 1 1 2 1 2 1 2 2 2 4 2 3 i New York 14 to 26.......................................... 27 to 39.......................................... 62..................................................... 85 6 10 12 4 11 13 3 8 2 2 7 3 1 7 3 1 1 1 3 1 3 The distribution in New Jersey is not so clearly defined. As many of the year-round plants had less than 400 employees as had more than this number; and among those on short-time operations of only a few weeks or months, numbers employed were scattered from less than 100 to 1,000 or more. Summary. Of 21 canneries surveyed in New Jersey, 19 reported their em ployment. The figures aggregated 15,628, of whom 8,258 (53 per MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 7 cent) were women. All but 1 of the 36 New York canneries re ported employment; these had 12,014 workers, of whom 6,293 (52 percent) were women. Of the 18 New Jersey canneries reporting on length of season, 8 operated throughout the year; 5 operated for 3 months or less, 4 from over 3 to 6 months, and 1 from over 6 to 9 months. Of the 35 New York canneries that reported, 8 operated the year round; 11 operated 3 months or less, 13 from over 3 to 6 months, and 3 from over 6 to 9 months. OCCUPATIONS NEW TO WOMEN The jobs customarily done by women in canneries are in the preparation of fruits and vegetables, such as sorting, peeling, trimming, feeding machines, and working on the can line. In many canneries women were employed on jobs previously done in those plants by men and boys; though these same occupations were customarily done by women in other plants, they were new for women here. Outstanding among these occupations new for women were processing jobs involving the control of retorts and of pulping, extracting, evaporating, and scalding equipment, as well as the more usual jobs of operating the filling and closing machines. Some women were doing heavy labor such as unloading cars, handling cases weighing from 15 to 42 pounds, handling bushel baskets filled with produce. Others were employed as general laborers feeding cans, salvaging cans; shaking sacks, and as con veyor and bell attendants. A new job for women in one plant was putting glass jars in retorts. In the manufacture of containers women were employed for the first time in one or two plants as box-machine operators and in making cases, as well as operating shears, various presses, and coating equipment. In some canneries women were used in place of men in packing cases, hand and machine labeling, stenciling, and strapping. As maintenance and miscellaneous workers they were employed as janitors, elevator operators, truckers, directors of shed and yard traffic, and to clean and grease machines. A few women had been taken on as laboratory assistants. Even as clerical workers, the employment of women in factory depart ments as timekeepers, production workers, and weight checkers was an innovation. HOURS OF WORK As previously stated, this study is concerned chiefly with work ing and living conditions, and not with statistics such as wages and hours. However, during the interviews with management, wage policies and hourly rates of pay were discussed, as well as the irregularity in hour schedules in canneries. Hours of work and wages paid in the canneries are controlled to some extent by Federal laws, and in New York the State hour law for women also regulates employment. The New Jersey statutes provide no such regulation. 8 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Though the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act does not directly limit the hours of work, in providing for overtime pay for work performed beyond a certain point it does indirectly set a control of work hours. In the case of the canning industry, however, exemptions practically nullify the usual standards of the Act. In the first place, since the overtime-pay provision may be set aside for an aggregate of 14 weeks in this industry, the law pro vides no check to unlimited hours during this period. In the second place, for another 14 weeks overtime pay is required only after work continuing beyond 12-56 hours. Since peak seasonal operations rarely extend beyond 28 weeks, the total for which special exemptions are allowed, it is apparent that the law has little effect in restraining the all too prevalent tendency to long hour schedules in canneries. The Federal Act is the controlling factor in New Jersey, but in the case of New York provisions of the State hour law complicate the situation, as the Federal Act in no way excuses noncompliance with State standards. In contrast to the Federal Act with its allowance for exemptions for 28 weeks for men and women, the State law for women em ployees makes special provision for canneries from June 15 to October 15, a period of approximately 17 weeks. During this period the maximum hours are set at 10-60 but during the 6 weeks from June 25 to August 5, 12-66 hours are permitted in emergency, a striking departure from the 8-48-hour standard for the re mainder of the year. The 6-day week restriction remains in effect in emergencies. Practically half of the New York canners stated that they had taken advantage of the 60 and 66 hours provisions of the State act, though others had not exceeded the 56 hours allowed by the Federal Act for the second period. Moreover, the situation was confused by action taken according to the provisions of the New York War Emergency Act, which give the Industrial Commissioner authority to relax the labor laws in the interests of maximum war production. Several dispensations were made to individual can ners, some permitting employment for 10 hours a day after Oc tober 15. Though irregular hours and hours longer than the accepted standard may be unavoidable in canneries, due to weather condi tions, crop yield, and the seasonal character of the industry, they should not be so long as to affect the health or the efficiency of the worker. Where an emergency makes overtime work neces sary, some compensating time off should be given the worker directly before or following the long hours worked. Hour recommendations of the Women’s Bureau are that women’s hours do not exceed 8 a day and 48 a week, with a week of 40 hours in normal times; that women should not work longer than a 5-hour stretch without a lunch period; that 10-minute rest periods should be given half-way through each work spell, which improves the workers’ efficiency and increases production; and that one day’s rest in seven should be the rule for each individual even in times of emergency. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 9 New Jersey. Statements on the length of the workday were made by 19 of the New Jersey canners interviewed. Maximum hours at the peak of the season were admittedly high in a number of instances. Though in 7 canneries the workday was kept at 8 or 9 hours even at the peak, in the other canneries it was said to be 10, 11, 12, 13, and even 16 hours long. As one canner commented, “In tomato season we sometimes work 12 hours a day, 6 days a week,’’ and another said, “Sometimes the women work 15 and 16 hours a day for 6 days a week.” Five of the canneries made use of a second shift of workers, which should have eliminated the excessively long hours resorted to when only one shift is employed. As a matter of fact, however, in 2 of these the day’s schedule was 10 or more hours for each shift. Four of these two-shift plants operated throughout the year on seasonal or nonseasonal products, though sometimes with only a skeleton force. In most cases the second shift was necessary only during the peak harvest time of perishable crops. While the hours of work varied and often were extremely long in the busy season, the usual hours at other times of the year were 8 or 9 a day. One canner, who operated the year round, did report that the usual schedule for his plant was 10 hours a day. A few canners reported that when women work overtime until 9 and sometimes 11 o’clock at night or even later, an effort is made to give them compensating time off during the week, and pref erably the following day unless an abnormal amount of produce is delivered to the cannery on that day. The long hours must have been particularly difficult for house wives, who were employed in large numbers in every cannery and many of whom were not young. New York. In about two-thirds of the 34 New York canneries reporting on hours, including those operating short seasons and the year-round plants, the usual workday was 8 hours; 6 reported a 10-hour day and 1 seasonal plant stated that a 12-hour day was usual. In the rush of the harvest peak, however, work hours were another matter. In the peak season only 3 canneries adhered regularly to their 8-hour schedule, while in 20 women worked frequently in excess of 10 hours; in fact, 19 canneries, including one-half of the year-round group, reported maximum daily hours as long as 12, and in 6 seasonal establishments women worked as many as 13, 14, and 15 hours a day. In these plants at such times, following the usual 9- or 10-hour day work dragged on for 4 to 6 hours after supper. One canner said that work continued from 7 a. m. to whatever hour was necessary to take care of the produce on hand; on one occasion it was 2 a. m. when they quit. Another said, “When peas come in heavy we work from 9 or 10 a. m. to midnight, and on peak days for beans and corn from 8 a. m. to 10 p. m.” Such situations undoubtedly are typical of the irregularity and long hours in this industry. In a few instances plants operated a second shift during the busiest season in lieu of long overtime hours. 10 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Summary. Hours of work in canneries, uncontrolled by State law in New Jersey and liberally exempted from the State law in New York, run to extremes at peak season. In New Jersey the usual hours at other times of the year are 8 or 9 a day, but emergency hours were reported variously as reaching from 10 to 13, and even 16 hours, for 6 days a week. In New York the most usual daily hours over the year are 8, but peak-season hours were reported as from 12 to 16, only 3 plants adhering to their 8-hour schedule. CANNERY WAGES In the canning industry so many employees work on piece rates based on quantity production that hourly wage standards cannot be used as a criterion of actual earnings of the majority of the women employed during the short seasons in many of the canneries. A cannery survey by the Women’s Bureau that included the 1939 earnings of employees showed that from one-third to more than one-half of the women working on various products in New York canneries in 1939 were earning not more than 25 cents an hour. At that time 25 cents was the minimum set by the Fair Labor Standards Act, but in October 1939 the rate was raised to 30 cents, the minimum still in effect throughout the season of 1943. Though as early as March 1943 the Industry Committee for Canned Fruits and Vegetables and Related Products, acting under the Fair Labor Standards Act, recommended a 40-cent minimum rate for canneries, this rate was not made effective until October. The summer of 1943, however, was one of unusual confusion and agitation for higher wages. To meet the competition of earn ings, especially in war industries, many canners were forced to raise their wage scales, and in June 1943 the Director of Economic Stabilization authorized an increase for cannery workers provided it did not exceed 10 cents. In the New York and New Jersey survey by the Women’s Bureau in 1943, no canner reported hourly rates below 40 cents. Further adjustment of the wages of cannery workers may be needed to meet the increase in the cost of living and to enable canners to secure an adequate labor supply. Some way must be found to insure against a return to the substandard wages paid women cannery workers before wartime needs compelled improve ment in this situation. That wages should be paid on the basis of occupation and not on the basis of sex is a Women’s Bureau principle as old as the Bureau itself. Further, the matter of seasonal or nonseasonal em ployment should make no difference to the rate. The recom mendation that where women are employed on jobs still done or formerly done by men and are turning out substantially the same work, women’s wage rates should be the same as men’s, has been enunciated by Federal Government agencies for the past 40 years. Women in New Jersey. For the most part women were classified as laborers in the New Jersey canneries, and 17 canners reported hourly rates of pay for MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 11 such seasonal workers. Five were paying 40 cents an hour, but the most usual rate for seasonal labor was 45 cents, and only three canners paid more than 45. Fifty cents an hour was the maximum hourly rate paid to seasonal women laborers. Higher rates usually were paid to the more regular force of year-round laborers, though frequently the seasonal workers, who in many cases return year after year, were doing the same kind of work as that done by the more regular workers in the yearround canneries. Of 7 canneries that operated throughout the year and reported rates only 2 quoted a rate above 45 cents for their seasonal workers, and none quoted a rate below 45 cents for their more regular workers. The highest rate for women regular workers was reported as 521/2 cents. Aside from hourly rates for labor, a few managers quoted rates for specific occupations such as machine operators and foreladies. Though two of the very few foreladies reported were rated at 45 cents, other foreladies and the machine operators referred to were rated at from 55 to 67 cents' an hour, the highest hourly rates reported as paid to women in the New Jersey canneries. In one cannery that operates 52 weeks of the year, employees were paid on a definite production-bonus basis, and in many can neries certain types of work were paid on a piece-work basis. Pay for output instead of hours was especially common in tomato peeling. One New Jersey canner, whose plant operated throughout the year, reported a system of automatic wage progression based on length of service. In some of the organized plants in New Jersey the union has no responsibility for the seasonal workers. In a union agreement in effect at the time of the survey, a seasonal employee is defined as one who is hired between July 15 and October 15 of any year, and the contract specifically states that seasonal workers are excluded from the coverage of the agreement. Women in New York. Women laborers were paid at the rate of 40 cents an hour in only 3 of the New York canneries covered in this survey, and these were in nonindustrial communities remote from the influence of the higher wage scale paid in war-industry plants. Further more, 2 of them were dependent to some extent on migrant work ers, and all operated over comparatively short periods. In an outstanding majority of the canneries, 29 of the 36 reporting, the labor rate of the women was 50 cents; in only 1 cannery was it higher and there it was 55 cents. The 50-cent rate predominated in canneries operating on a seasonal as well as on a 52-week basis, but no cannery operating throughout the year reported a labor rate of less than 47 cents. Customarily, rates for machine operators and foreladies were higher than the rates for labor, though these better-paid jobs were in a decided minority and less than one-third of the canners reported rates for specific jobs. In only 2 cases were rates reported for such occupations as low as 50 cents; 55 cents was the most common rate and a few were reported to be as high as 60 cents. 12 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Additions in the way of a bonus or incentive payments were rare. One cannery reported the payment of overtime above 40 hours. Two plants operating throughout the year had definite automatic wage-progression systems; another paid a bonus for work on the second shift, and others raised the usual hourly rate for work during the apple season. Rates for Men. Rates of pay for men in the labor classification were invariably higher than those for women. Only one canner in New Jersey reported a labor rate for men as low as 40 cents an hour. This was a small rural plant, remote from the competition of higher paying industries, and all the women employed here were paid on a piece-work basis. The prevailing hourly rate paid men was the same in New Jersey and New York. Six of the 9 canners re porting men’s rates in New Jersey, and 23 of the 29 reporting them in New York, paid 60 cents an hour. In only 2 canneries was the men’s labor rate more than 60 cents, the maximum being 68 cents paid in a cannery operating 52 weeks in New York State. Summary. For the most part women’s seasonal work in canneries is classed as labor. In many plants it is paid on a piece-rate basis, and no data were obtained as to earnings. Production bonuses are rare, as are systems of wage progression. In the case of hourly workers, no canner in either State reported a rate below 40 cents. In New Jersey the most usual rate was 45 cents; 3 canners paid more than this with 50 cents the maximum. In 29 of the 36 New York canneries women laborers’ rate was 50 cents; in 1 it was 55 cents. Men’s rates were higher than women’s, their prevailing rate in both States being 60 cents. WORKING CONDITIONS As regards working conditions in the canneries of New Jersey and New York, each presents its own individual problems, the remedies for which cover a wide range. Some few companies would need entirely new plants or buildings before conditions could be made satisfactory. For others it would mean new equipment or machinery or the realignment of production lines. Still other situations could be remedied by the use of paint, better lighting, more seats for women, and so forth. It is true, nevertheless, that plant outlay and working conditions in the canneries of these two States have been decidedly improved in recent years. There are fewer “fly-by-night” canneries, the kind that would spring up in some old barn or abandoned cannery, operate a year or two, and then move elsewhere or go out of business. Several small plants and chains of canneries have been bought by large food corpora tions that are better able financially to improve and maintain them. Canners are approaching the problems of production and of working conditions more scientifically. They point with pride to new machines and to new production methods. One small cannery visited had unusually good mechanized equipment and a minimum MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 13 of hand labor for the amount of food processed. As a consequence the owner was having little difficulty in securing the small number of workers needed. In a community where there were several canneries it was interesting to note that two canneries having good working conditions were having no trouble getting labor, while one with a long-time reputation for bad working conditions was finding it almost impossible to get help. Much credit is due the Association of New York Canners for this more progressive attitude. This organization has recognized cer tain standards for working conditions and has urged the canners of the State to maintain them. In cooperation with the offices of the War Manpower Commission in Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and other cities of northwestern New York, as well as the local United States Employment Service offices in cannery areas, the association has done a splendid job of recruiting cannery workers and has observed fair practices in so doing. During the less busy winter season, the Canners Association plans to assemble material on good housing for migratory workers and make this available in usable form to canners who may desire or need it. The practical studies made by the Division of Women in Industry in the New York State Department of Labor in 1930-31 un doubtedly have had much to do with the changed attitude and practices of many New York canneries, several of which mentioned these studies in the present survey. The studies were made in cooperation with the Canners Association and were concerned especially with the kinds of jobs for women in canneries and with better production methods. The studies resulted in a new cannery code for the State, which is administered by the Inspection Division of the Department of Labor. General Plant Conditions. Canneries vary as to type of construction from large brick and concrete buildings of several stories, usually in cities or towns, to the less pretentious frame buildings, barnlike in appearance or of pavilion-type construction. With some notable exceptions, the canneries visited, though in few cases housed in new buildings, are kept in good repair and generally appear freshly painted on the inside. Lack of ventilation is not a problem for the most part, but for the buildings of platform or pavilion type too much ventilation and too little protection from cold or wet weather is the case. A bad feature of several plants is the use of basement workrooms that are dark and damp. In a few canneries steam condenses on the ceiling and drops on the workers. Daylight is plentiful in most canneries on bright days but in many of them the artificial lighting for dark days is not adequate. The usual method of such lighting is by bulbs suspended on cords over the production lines or machines. These frequently are spaced too far apart, of insufficient voltage, and so dirty that much light is lost. Skylights are used in some canneries as a means of light ing and ventilation. Though recently more thought has been given to the placement of machinery, work tables, conveyors, and so on, further improve ments in this direction would make for more efficient production, 567320°—44------3 14 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY a greater degree of cleanliness, and would add appreciably to the comfort of the workers. One New York cannery had supplied a sufficient number of metal stools for bean snippers but the aisles between the lines were so narrow that the workers had to place their stools sideways and could not face their work. Narrow aisles and crowded conditions are not infrequent, but there were only two or three canneries in either State where the agent actually had to duck under conveyor belts, stairways, and apparatus to get about the plant. It is almost inevitable that the floors in canneries where certain processing is done should be wet. This condition can be overcome to a large extent by the use of cement floors built to drain readily and by the provision of platforms on which the workers can stand. Many canneries visited still have flat wooden floors. Several have long perforated metal platforms the length of the “line”; others seen, each long enough for several workers to stand on, are of wooden slats. Some are small wooden platforms for individual workers; in the use of these smaller platforms there is often an insufficient number and they are poorly placed. In some cases more than one worker will stand on a platform so small that there is scarcely room to balance. Seating. Certain work in canneries in connection with operating or feed ing machines necessitates continuous standing; other jobs can be done sitting. With the exception of one cannery in New Jersey, all those visited in New Jersey and New York provide seats for the women workers whose jobs permit of their use. It probably is true that very few of them have enough seats for all workers employed on such jobs in peak season. These seats comprise metal stools with backs and in some cases with foot rests, stools without backs, wooden kitchen-type chairs, crudely constructed wooden chairs, and packing boxes of all kinds and shapes, some upholstered in burlap bags. Of a New Jersey cannery the plant report reads: “Two women sorting at a tomato-washing machine sit on stools, which to make them high enough are placed most dangerously on wooden boxes.” The report on a New York cannery states that “one tomato line is operating at a sorting table on the receiving platform. The sloping table is placed on a narrow platform V/2 to 2 feet higher than the receiving platform. For seats, the elderly women working here are using two wooden boxes, one on top of the other, on which they perch precariously near the edge of the platform.” Sanitary and Service Facilities. One canning company in New Jersey devotes the entire space of a 4-story building to personnel work and service facilities. This building houses the personnel, pay-roll, time, and medical depart ments, two cafeterias (one for men and one for women), locker rooms, toilet and wash rooms, kitchen, and laundry (for plant uniforms). These facilities are duplicated in the second plant of this companyOne company in New York has equally adequate service facilities, but these two are exceptional. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 15 The housekeeping conditions of the service facilities obviously are better in canneries where matrons are on duty and where definite arrangements have been made to have the facilities cleaned regularly. The expense of such provision probably is repaid in less loss of time by workers loitering in service rooms and in fewer repairs and less upkeep due to untidiness or carelessness. Washing facilities.—Washing facilities are provided in all the canneries visited in New Jersey and New York, but it is ques tionable whether these are sufficient to meet the peak-season needs of most of the plants. In other than peak season, probably six of the New Jersey canneries visited would not meet the standard set by the Women’s Bureau of one washbowl to every 10 employees up to 100 persons,2 and this would be true of perhaps two or three canneries in New York. The washing facilities in six of the New Jersey canneries consist of sinks in the workrooms, each supplied with from one to three spigots. These sinks are used for many other purposes than hand-washing. In but one New York cannery visited are such sinks in the workrooms the only washing facilities provided. Other canneries in both States supply washbowls that usually are in more or less pretentious washrooms, often combined with toilet rooms. Two canneries in New York have round, fountain-type washing arrangements that accommodate 6 or 8 workers at a time. Of the 21 canneries visited in New Jersey, 9, including those with only sinks in the workrooms, supply only cold water for washing pur poses. In New York, of the 36 canneries visited 15 supply both hot and cold -water for this purpose. At the time of visit, soap and towels were not provided in one New York and five New Jersey canneries. Toilets.—Toilets separate for men and women are provided in all the canneries visited in New Jersey and New York. In many of the canneries the number of toilets would not meet, in peak season, the standard set by the Women’s Bureau of 1 seat to every 15 women employed. Of the 21 canneries visited in New Jersey, 8 have outdoor privies and 1 has a small separate service building. Of the 36 visited in New York; 6 have outdoor privies and 1 has a small separate service building. The condition of the outdoor toilets varies. At one New Jersey cannery that has outdoor toilets with the pit method of disposal, these toilets are freshly painted and kept very clean, and lye and disinfectants are used generously. In another cannery with similar equipment, the toilets are filthy; no one is responsible for keeping them clean. One plant with indoor toilet facilities has three flush toilets crowded into a tiny room, the openings to the three com partments being covered only by curtains and with a partition not reaching to the ceiling separating the compartments from the washing facilities. At least one plant visited in New York that pro vides indoor toilets has arrangements that are questionable from the point of view of sanitation. At the time the canneries were visited a number of the toilets were not supplied with paper. s The Women’s Bureau has prepared a pamphlet (Special Bulletin No. 4) supplying au thoritative recommendations for the construction of suitable washroom and toilet facilities for industrial plants, with suggested standards that conform to those of the American Standards Association sponsored by the U. S. Public Health Service. 16 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Cloak rooms.—Sixteen of the 21 canneries visited in New Jersey and 21 of the 36 in New York have no cloak rooms or other special arrangements for women to hang their wraps. This is due in some cases to the short season of the canneries’ work at which time workers would not wear wraps; but season would not excuse the failure to meet this need by the 3 canneries in New Jersey that operate 24 to 28 weeks and the 8 that operate 52 weeks, nor the 11 canneries in New York operating 15 to 25 weeks and the 8 operat ing 52 weeks. In the canneries where no provision is made, wraps are hung on backs of chairs or are thrown down on boxes or tables about the workroom. Two of the five New Jersey canneries that furnish lockers for wraps have not nearly enough for all workers. In one New York plant only women workers members of the union are supplied with lockers in a locker room; nonunion or seasonal men and women workers hang their wraps on racks in the linen room. Several of the New York canneries do not supply enough lockers for all workers, one combines the locker room with the rest room, another with the toilet room, and one has hooks around the walls of a small cloak room. One of the best cloak-room arrangements is a large room enclosed by heavy wire netting where racks are provided on which to hang coats, with shelves above them for hats and packages. Such an arrangement is much more sanitary and less hard on clothing than that afforded by the use of lockers, but to be entirely satisfactory should be in the care of matrons. Rest rooms and lunch rooms.—Six of the 21 canneries in New Jersey are equipped with rest rooms; two others combine rest and lunch rooms. Eight canneries have lunch rooms or cafeterias. In all of them food is available. Six of them are canneries that operate 52 weeks. At two plants the migratory workers eat their lunches in the dining rooms connected with the housing units, adjacent to the plants. In one plant lunch rooms are separate for colored and white. Seven of the 36 canneries covered in New York have rest rooms. Only 5 provide cafeterias or lunch rooms; all these operate 52 weeks in the year. Uniforms.—Uniforms are required and worn in but one of the canneries visited in New Jersey. Uniforms, caps, aprons, and gloves are furnished free by the company. The company launders free the men’s uniforms and the women’s aprons and caps, but the women prefer to launder their own uniforms as these are made to individual order and they do not want to risk having them ex changed for others. Six canneries visited in New York require uniforms, one other furnishes uniforms, caps, aprons, and rubber gloves in some in stances, still another urges the workers to purchase the uniforms and caps kept in stock at a local store. Three of the six plants requiring uniforms furnish them free, together with caps, rubber aprons, and rubber gloves, and launder the uniforms and caps without charge. At one plant a $2 deposit for the season is re quired on uniforms, SI of which is returnable when the uniform is turned in. Caps and aprons are not returnable and cost 25 cents MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 17 and 35 cents, respectively. Another cannery requiring uniforms rents them with caps and aprons for a nominal sum. Medical facilities.—A very fine medical department is main tained in one cannery in New Jersey and in one in New York. The medical department in the New Jersey plant has fine facilities and equipment; it has a certificate from the American College of Sur geons. A doctor is regularly in charge and is on duty from 8 a. m. till 12:15 every workday. A head nurse is on duty from 3 p. m. to 12 midnight so as to cover time on both shifts. Two or three registered nurses divide the time on the two shifts and an extra nurse, also registered, is engaged for the peak season. The facili ties consist of a surgical dressing room with instrument cabinets, dressings, sterilizers, and so forth; an eye, ear, nose, and throat room; two bedrooms, each with two beds supplied with first-quality mattresses and each room with a lavatory; and a laboratory where blood tests, urinalysis, Wassermanns and vaccinations are given. There is also equipment for baking and diathermy. An examina tion is made of each new worker and all workers are examined once a year thereafter. A wheelchair and two stretchers are provided in the department and other stretchers are placed throughout the plant. Another New Jersey plant maintains a large and well-equipped first-aid room with a registered nurse in charge. One cannery has a clinic equipped to take care of minor burns, cuts, headaches, and so forth; three registered nurses are employed here, two for the day shift and one for the night shift. No comfortable place is provided to lie down and it was reported that on the day before the plant was visited a girl who was ill had sat all day in the ladies’ room waiting to get a ride home at 6 o’clock. The facilities in another cannery comprise a dispensary wTith inadequate space in part of a tiny building housing a canteen or lunch room. There is no privacy here. The “cot” consists of a mattress, with no springs, placed on a wooden table. There is a trained nurse in charge, who renders the best service she can under the circum stances and manages to keep the place immaculately clean. All the other New Jersey canneries provide only first-aid kits or cabinets and some of these seem to have minimum supplies. Besides the one New York cannery with a complete medical department that corresponds to the one in New Jersey described above, five New York plants provide very well-equipped first-aid rooms with trained nurses in charge, and require medical exami nations of new workers and periodic examinations thereafter. Another plant has a small first-aid room and the nurse here acts also as matron. As in New Jersey, the remaining canneries visited in New York have first-aid kits or cabinets variously stocked with supplies. PROBLEMS OF MIGRATORY LABOR The presence of migratory labor in New Jersey and New York has presented a continuous problem over a long period. Migrant workers have been attracted to these States by the promise of seasonal work and by the relatively higher wages paid. That some of these people stay and become a permanent part of the 18 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY labor supply presents the separate problem of how they are to be absorbed into the economic and social life of the communities of their adoption so that they may be independent and self re specting and will not become a burden requiring relief from private and public agencies. In spite of the fact that in recent years the attention of the general public as well as that of official agencies—Federal, State, and local—has to an increasing degree been directed toward migra tory-labor problems, particularly as regards living conditions, there still remains much to be done. Greater cooperation between the official agencies at all levels is essential in determining the extent of the need for such workers and in effecting an integrated plan for adequately providing for and controlling the conditions under which migrants work and live. The war program has greatly stimulated the use of migrant workers and has increased the urgency of the matter of control. The migrant worker, it would seem, has been nobody’s respon sibility. Federal agencies have been slow to step in, due in part to lack of funds to do an adequate job and perhaps due partly to a hesitancy in encroaching on what might seem a State or local problem. Causes of States’ failing to meet their responsibilities include lack of funds, absence of a well-defined authority to in vestigate and enforce their recommendations, and a feeling that the migratory worker does not “belong”, that these people are not a permanent part of the population. With the exception of a few individuals, the attitude of the communities in which migratory workers are found seems to be one of indifference if not resent ment. Such expressions as, “We didn’t bring them here”; “We don’t want them”; “The employer brought them here, let him take care of them” are commonly heard. The fact is, however, that if migrant labor is essential to the producing of crops and the pro cessing of food, either annually in normal times or for the duration of war, the raising of standards for its employment is of vital importance, since its very presence is bound to affect the lives of the people in the community and may, if not properly dealt with, cause unnecessary problems and even constitute real hazards. It is altogether true that certain aspects of the migratory-labor problem will never be satisfactorily worked out until the com munities in which migrants work and live are willing to assume some interest in and responsibility for them. The welfare of the migrant worker is a primary responsibility of the individual employer. This may be less true in wartime when, because of its large contracts for food, the Government becomes practically a co-employer and when it is more difficult to obtain materials for the housing and other arrangements that must be provided. This does not alter the fact that, on the whole, employers have not in the past met their responsibilities in this direction. The war should not be used by them as an excuse for doing less than is possible. Migratory workers themselves have little control over the living conditions with which they are confronted on the job. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 19 HOUSING AND LIVING CONDITIONS FOR MIGRATORY WORKERS It may be accepted as a fact, in a war emergency as in peace time, that only when a thorough survey shows the local labor supply to be inadequate, should the employment of migrant work ers be considered. If workers can be secured in the vicinity of the industry, the problems of housing, transportation, feeding, child care, and so forth, are greatly reduced. Of these problems, that of housing seems the most important and the most difficult. One difficulty lies in the fact that the most careful estimates of the probable number of workers needed and expected in a given area must be available if adequate programing is to be at all possible. The difficulty of persuading canners to order their labor early is a factor in making it hard to anticipate housing needs. Delay in the completion of Government housing projects re sulted in a serious condition in at least one important canning and farming area in New Jersey. This was due not only to a shortage of labor in the building trades, and a difficulty in securing building materials, but to a lack of programing housing needs. The result here was that American migrant workers were expelled summarily from their homes and in some instances put into quarters without the bare necessities of decent living, in order to make room for hundreds of Jamaican workers whose contracts called for certain minimum guarantees in living standards. New Jersey. Realizing that a consideration of the housing situation for migratory workers in New Jersey involved an overlapping of the interests of several agencies, and in the interest of cooperative effort, the agent of the Women’s Bureau, together with represen tatives of the U. S. Children’s Bureau, the Regional Office of War Manpower Commission, and the Regional Office of Community War Services made a joint survey of some of the housing provisions in that State. The survey included visits to nine centers, housing the employees of four different canneries. In addition to the projects visited jointly, the Women’s Bureau agent surveyed two other housing centers in New Jersey. Both good and bad condi tions were found. A description of the several centers follows: 1. Occupied by southern white families. A group of 36 pre fabricated houses, each about 16 by 16 feet, in four rows of 9 houses each. The houses are well spaced and there are fairly wide spaces between the rows. Screened windows on three sides of each house and a screened door on the fourth. Houses occupied by as many as eight people, in some cases more than one family. Each house has four built-in double-decker bunks, but there are not enough mattresses for all. Each house has a table with benches attached to the sides. At time of first visit no stoves or cooking utensils had been supplied. Later, two-burner oil stoves were in stalled in some of the houses but they are a heater type unsuitable for cooking; the burners are a considerable distance from the top surface, with no chimneys above the burners. Some of the tenants 20 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY were dismantling sections of the stoves in an endeavor to make them usable for cooking purposes. If they wish to cook they must either use these stoves or build a fire out of doors. Water supply consists of three faucets for cold water, one at the end of each camp street. No showers and no facilities for washing clothes. Privies of a sanitary type of construction, two for men and two for women, close together in the center of the rows of houses. Very little privacy. Sewage disposal supposed to be by pit method, but as yet no pits under the women’s toilets and no doors on these. An open space around outside of the toilets at base of the privies, so flies and other insects have easy access to pits. A company store accessible, but inadequately stocked. Serves not only this camp but four others and is open only three hours in afternoon when many women are working in the cannery. Cannery has a clinic but presumably only sufficient to take care of industrial accidents or the minor sickness of workers in the plant. No supervision is provided for the camp. No telephone at camp or within reasonable distance for use in emergencies. It was indicated that this camp was only temporary, but it had been occupied over three weeks at time of visit. It was apparent that no family units planned for these people would be constructed by employer or by Federal Public Housing Authority this season. 2. Occupied by Negro families. This camp consisted of tents with wooden floors. It was reported that the families were to be moved to new housing when it was completed, but here again it was understood that the new housing planned for family units being built by Federal Public Housing Authority could not be completed this season. Definitely, some other method of housing the workers should be made. Cots with one blanket were the only furnishings provided; no tables, chairs, or stoves. Water was piped in with faucets at intervals along the camp streets, but there were no showers and no facilities for washing clothes. Waste water was poured into gutter in front of the tents. A toilet pit was being dug but on the day of the visit there were no toilet facilities available for the use of tenants of this camp. Tent village was considerable distance from clinic at cannery where tenants worked, and also from nearest store. No telephone service and no supervision provided for camp. 3. Occupied by approximately 300 Jamaican men and nearly 150 American Negro women. Barracks provided separately for men and women, built originally for a C. C. C. camp. Beautiful loca tion, some distance from cannery in which these people work. Barracks furnished with cots placed fairly close together, but crowding not too bad considering emergency conditions. Each barrack has hot and cold water. Separate showers for men and women. Facilities for washing clothes. Flush toilets in all barracks. Cafeteria service provided for all residents of this camp, with food of a type that Jamaicans prefer. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 21 No medical service at camp, but services of cannery clinic avail able. Camp has a resident supervisor; telephone service available in his office. 4. Occupied by single white women. An old summer-resort hotel is used for a camp; situated on a small lake. Accommodations satisfactory. Rooms equipped with same furnishings as provided when build ing was used for a hotel. These include beds, mattresses and bedding, chairs and dressers. Hot and cold running water; shower baths and bath tubs; provi sion for washing clothes. Meals prepared by workers employed for this; served in dining hall separate from main building. No medical facilities provided at camp. Clinic at cannery not only several miles away but not equipped or staffed to provide medical care for workers when not actually on the job. Telephone service available. A resident supervisor, a woman school teacher, in charge of the camp. 5. A Farm Security Administration camp. Occupied by Jamaican men and American Negro families. Due to daily shift of occupants to privately operated camps, it was hard to determine exact number of occupants on a given day. According to Regional Office of Farm Security Administration there were about 516 Jamaican men and approximately 100 Negro families living here the day of the visit. The Negro families were gradually being moved to other locations but a number still lived here at the end of summer. Jamaicans housed in prefabricated wooden houses and Negro families in tents. Houses and tents contained the barest necessi ties in the way of furnishings. A fairly generous water supply but only one shower-bath build ing and but 12 shower heads for entire camp. Supervisor said more showers were planned and would be built shortly. No special facilities for washing clothes; women wash for their families in galvanized tubs. Several privies on borders of camp, but built too close to some of the houses and not easily accessible to others. Not adequate in number. Single men fed in cafeteria, but families prepare own meals on cook stoves provided in the tents. That a check and closer supervision of camp’s sanitary arrange ments should be made seemed necessary, as there had been one death from typhoid here. A clinic is set up for the camp in a trailer, attended by a Negro public-health nurse and by a doctor who gives several hours a week. Medical service of Farm Security Administration in this region is under direction of a United States Public Health Service officer assigned to the Regional Office of the Farm Security Ad ministration. A Farm Security Administration employee is assigned to man age this camp. 22 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 6. Occupied by Negro families. Most of the tenants work on farms but some in a cannery. Number of occupants not deter mined. Camp consists of a combination of frame houses built during World War I, of new prefabricated houses, and of tents. Pre fabricated houses are 16 by 20 feet, some with partitions down the middle. Are occupied by 8 or 10 people, and in one case 12 people live in one of these tiny boxes. In a house divided by a partition two unrelated couples are assigned to one side. Houses and tents furnished with cots and bunks, but not enough mattresses. No cook stoves provided. A few families have their own stoves, but most tenants have to build open fires in order to cook. One water line with an inadequate number of spigots. No facili ties for washing clothes. One tenant said there were only four washtubs in whole camp, and people who can do so borrow them. Toilet facilities of the outdoor privy type, and apparently not a sufficient number. Some people use the nearby woods because toilets so few and inaccessible. An open space around base of privies permits easy access by flies and other insects. Distance to nearest store approximately three miles, and store open only about three hours in afternoon. No provision for re frigeration of perishable foods. Said to be no garbage and refuse collection, and such material is deposited in woods on borders of camp. No medical or nursing care provided except at cannery clinic, a considerable distance from camp. Clinic set up to take care of workers in plant and not for general medical services. No supervisor of camp in regular attendance and camp not pro vided with telephone service. 7. Occupied by Negro families. This tent colony, set up in a field, furnishes temporary shelter until other housing can be made available. Families are to be moved into a Federal Public Housing project when it is completed. However, since public housing is not far enough along to be finished very soon, it appears that people in this camp must stay here a long time. Here again the facilities for even minimum decent living are absent. Tents are close together, and because of excessive heat the sides are kept up most of the time, giving the effect of dozens of people living together in a more or less promiscuous fashion. Workers on night shift have little chance of resting in daytime, as noise of children and other campers goes on unabated. Roughly constructed toilets have been built but are insufficient in number. Water is piped in, but there are no facilities for bathing and laundry. A few washtubs among the tenants, loaned from person to person. Workers in cannery can get one and sometimes two hot meals in cannery cafeteria. These consist of sandwiches, hot soup, tea, coffee, or milk. It seems almost impossible that they could prepare even one simple square meal a day with the stoves they themselves MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 23 provide and their few cooking utensils. A company store is nearby but it appears inadequately stocked. No medical service provided for tenants of camp beyond that offered by cannery clinic to workers when on the job. No tele phone at camp, and nearest doctor and hospital in a town nine miles distant. No one to supervise this camp. 8. Occupied by adult men and women and by family groups. This camp built recently as a permanent camp; constructed of lumber and wallboard. Houses in units 20 by 20 feet and 20 by 16 feet with partitions down the middle, each half having its own door. Camp intended for single men and women but has a number of family groups with children. During peak season a great many additional men were brought in. To take care of these, tents were pitched in front of regular camp. All service facilities planned to take care of permanent camp, and probably adequate for that, must have been terribly overtaxed by addition of this tent colony. Each house has built-in double-decker bunks for four people, a wooden table, and one or two chairs. Mattresses and pillows made of ticking filled with straw, and some bedding, are furnished for each bed. Sanitary privies are on the outside border of camp at rear of housing units. Adequate in number for the occupants expected for permanent camp. Separate toilets plainly marked for men and for women. Adequate supply of water with a spigot between each two houses; separate shower baths for men and women; four stationary tubs for washing clothes, with hot and cold water, in a wash house. A large mess hall, and another building for commissary and kitchen. It is thought by owners that if any considerable number of families with children occupy this camp it may be better to use the mess hall for a recreation center and the kitchen as an office. This would necessitate providing stoves for individual housing units so that families could do own cooking. Milk is to be delivered to camp daily, but as yet no provision for refrigeration of milk or other perishable food has been made. Food stores of the town are readily accessible and believed to be adequate. Regular garbage and refuse collection has been arranged for with town collectors. Camp not equipped with a clinic, but situated on outskirts of a town in which cannery has two doctors on call. Camp is to have a resident supervisor, available to answer ques tions and take care of any emergencies that may develop. It is planned to keep a complete register of all occupants at all times. 9. Originally designed to take care of Italian families from a city in an adjacent State, but probably to be used this season for Negro migrant workers from South. Cannery had not yet started operat ing at time of visit. Camp is directly adjacent to cannery on outskirts of a small town. Consists of long, shed-like, wooden buildings divided by 24 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY partitions into about 20 units. A covered porch runs full length of the front of each building. Each unit has 2 double-size built-in bunks of very rude con struction. Italian families had always brought and seemed to prefer their own mattresses and bedding, but these will have to be furnished by company if migrants unused to this are brought from a greater distance. Hot and cold water are available. No showers, and migrants heretofore have furnished own tubs for washing clothes. Outdoor privies with septic tanks, in three accessible locations, are provided. An adequate number of cook stoves provided for community use, placed on porches of the buildings. Fuel for these is fur nished by company. Food stores are accessible and apparently adequately stocked. Cannery first aid is available to camp. Nearest doctor is in a town about five miles distant; nearest hospital, seven miles from camp. 10. A housing unit occupied by white and colored men, consisting of two-story bunkhouses built on cannery property, was not inspected. Another unit, for white and colored women, was about a block from the cannery. This consisted of a two-wing, one-story dormitory of frame and stucco insulated with beaverboard, estimated by the company as able to house 250 women. White women were to occupy one wing and colored women the other. At time of second visit to the camp the tenants were occupying it, the furnishings were in, and the place seemed ter ribly crowded. The beds were placed so closely that in some cases there was not space for a chair between. Chairs had been furnished but some of them could not be used because of lack of floor space. Each wing has an office and a tiny reception room; toilet rooms, with an adequate number of flush toilets; shower rooms; and laundry rooms with stationary tubs and ironing boards. No recreation room in the building. Outside court could be used in pleasant weather but dormitory is too near a busy street to allow for much privacy. Double-decker beds, mattresses, pillows, sheets, pillow cases, and towels are furnished by company. Linens are changed fre quently and laundered by company free of charge. A large brick building adjacent to plant has been renovated and made into a central mess hall for the use of both men and women. No cooking is done in dormitory. Three meals a day are served and the cost to workers seems reasonable. Mess hall could be used for certain recreational activities if a program could be set up. No clinic is provided in dormitory. First aid is available to workers in the cannery. Plant has a doctor on call and the physicians in the town are accessible. Telephone service is avail able. A matron and assistant matron supervise upkeep of the dormi tory. Apparently they lack the qualifications to get the best cooperation from tenants. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 25 11. Occupied by colored men and women. Camp consists of a long, narrow, frame dormitory building originally intended to house only men. Building was supposed to have space for 100 workers but is not adequate for this number. There were about 45 tenants at time of visit, 30-some men and 10 or 12 women. Windows and doors of dormitory are screened and heavy wooden drops or shutters can be let down in case of rain. Double-decker bunks placed close together on both sides of the room leave a narrow aisle down the middle. Some bunks have been replaced by army cots. No chairs or other furnish ings. When company found itself confronted with the need of housing women as well as men, partitions of light wood or heavy cardboard were put around some of the bunks. These partitions are in no sense soundproof, they do not reach to the ceiling, and there are wide cracks around the doors. Privacy is absolutely impossible, not only for the women for whom inclosures are intended but for the men who occupy the open dormitory space. Aside from the potentialities for immoral behavior which the occupants of this center may or may not have, in the face of these housing arrangements the complaints by the employer of such behavior seem ironical, even when, several of the women being fired on the grounds of seeming misconduct and unwilling ness to work, a number of men quit with them. There are two showers at the end of the room. A partition is placed between the two, and one is designated for men, the other for women. The out-of-doors toilets are behind the dormitory or bunkhouse. One of them is for women. It has a screen door, and a wooden partition is built in front, which affords little privacy. Adjoining the dormitory, a screened-in pavilion-like building houses dining room and kitchen. This seems adequate. The dining room is furnished with long wooden tables covered with oilcloth, with benches on either side of the tables. The migrants eat their regular meals here but can buy sandwiches, soft drinks, and so forth at cannery restaurant. Kitchen is equipped with a large range and what seems an adequate supply of utensils and dishes. The colored preacher who recruited these workers has super vision of their living arrangements. He also conducts some religious meetings for them. There is no telephone in this center, but one in the cannery is accessible in case of emergency. New York. As was true of New Jersey, both good and bad conditions were found among the New York housing centers. 1. A company that furnishes housing for men only has leased a building for this purpose. The building appears adequate from point of equipment and sanitary arrangements but was not closely inspected. Board and lodging are provided at this center, as is also trans portation to and from work. 26 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Recreation is supplied in the way of a soft-ball diamond and tennis courts, radios, checkerboards, cards, newspapers, and magazines. 2. A new center not yet occupied at time of visit. Adjoining dormitories, one for men and one for women, within walking distance of cannery. Buildings are of frame and stucco and have a capacity for housing 250 men and 250 women. Each dormi tory has office, lounge room, laundry room, shower room, and toilet and wash rooms with adequate facilities. The double-deck metal beds have double metal lockers attached to them. It is planned to have both a man and a woman supervisor for the dormitories. A dining room connecting the two dormitories is to be used by both men and women. 3. This company has its own housing center for migrants and the Federal Public Housing Authority has a trailer camp here for the care of additional workers. The company’s center was occupied by white and colored families and unattached men and women at time of inspection. On first visit the trailer camp was occupied by southern white families, but a month or so later it was occupied largely by colored families. This almost complete turn-over was reported as not due to unsatisfactory living ar rangements but to unsatisfactory working conditions. The company housing is crowded into a little space across from a railroad track between a public road and some plant buildings. It is old and dilapidated. Center has had a reputa tion for bad conditions but the day of the visit it was clean and not overcrowded. Probably the presence of the trailer camp has eased the situation and has encouraged better conditions. Rooms are small, accommodating from two to four people, and are sparsely furnished with bunks and an occasional chair. Apart ments and conveniences for white workers are separate from those for colored. Cooking arrangements and dining rooms, separate for colored and white, are in the building used for sleeping quarters. Outside toilets probably meet requirements of State and local ordinance but they seem few in number and are not properly cared for. No bathing facilities were seen. The F.P.H.A. trailer camp, in a thinly planted grove of trees, is very attractive, though on land that does not drain very well and often makes a muddy playground. There are 20 expanded trailers housing from four to six per sons, and 30 standard ones housing from two to four. The trailers have linoleum floor coverings, built-in cupboards and closets, davenport-like beds, chairs, and so forth. They have electric stoves and refrigeration. There are a trailer office, which is headquarters for the camp supervisor and the post office; a camp clinic; a wash house with six or eight stationary tubs sup plied with hot and cold water and ironing boards; shower houses, separate for men and women; and a trailer for use as a child MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 27 care center. It is expected that the Child Care Committee of the New York State War Council will place a worker here. The New York Church Committee on Migrant Work already has a representative here, engaged in supervising a religious and recrea tional program for the workers. 4. About 25 one- and two-story houses of from three to six rooms, owned by the company. Houses are spaced fairly well apart. They need paint and repairs but seem fairly comfortable. Some are occupied by more than one family, according to size of family and size of house. Company supplies the minimum requirements and the workers bring additional furnishings with them. Cooking is done in two or three community kitchens or cook houses and there are enough stoves for the families. The out-of-door toilets are located conspicuously, crowded close to the houses, some behind and others in front of the houses. Separate shower houses for men and women are supplied with hot and cold water. The laundry is done in the houses, which have running water. There is a small recreation building. Center is adjacent to the cannery and at the edge of a sizable town where a sufficient food supply is available. Company has a doctor on call whose services are available to workers in the housing center, and medical and health services of the town are accessible also. 5. Occupied at time of visit by about 80 Negro men and women and some children, who came from Florida. Canning season was practically over when center was visited and many workers had left. Buildings consist of an old farmhouse and an old barn, both in a terrible state of disrepair. House was filthy the day of the visit, windows broken out and screens torn. Furnishings very meager and crude. It was not ascertained how many persons had occupied the house, but not enough sanitary conveniences were provided to meet the needs of more than a few. No bathing facilities beyond those the worker might provide for himself. As for the barn, holes in the walls have been partially patched up with cardboard. A few small windows have been cut in the walls; they are covered with screening, but obviously are in effectual in face of the gaping cracks through which wind, rain, flies, and mosquitoes enter unrestrained. Sleeping rooms are partitioned off by use of heavy cardboard, which extends a few feet above head level; a kitchen is set off in one corner of the barn, also with cardboard. Gas is piped in for the kitchen stove. A long table covered with oilcloth stands on the unpartitioned floor, which serves as a dining room. Flies attracted by the cooking and food are thick. Caterpillar-like worms crawl on the floor and over the beds. Soiled bed ticks filled with straw are used as mattresses. There are no bathing facilities nor running water at the bam. Out-of-doors privies, inadequate in number, are behind the barn and it is questionable whether they meet the minimum require ments of State or local sanitary codes. 28 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY There is no provision for child care and no recreational pro gram is provided. 6. Formerly occupied by Italian families brought from a city within the State, but occupied this year by colored families. Center is composed of two rows of run-down, dilapidated shacks that should be condemned. The built-in bunks with wooden slats and no springs are broken down and dirty. There are chairs in some of the rooms or shacks but most of them are without any furnishings but the beds. The Italian families that formerly occupied this center preferred to bring their own bedding, but this is impracticable for migrants from a distance. The workers do their own cooking and a stove is provided in each shack. Fuel and lights are furnished free by the company. Outdoor toilets, one for men and one for women, are inadequate in number and are too close to the shacks; the odor was disagreeably notice able the day of the visit. There is only one shower, adjacent to the toilets, for the entire group of shacks. Food is available in the nearby stores of the community. Such medical and health services as are provided in the town are accessible to these people. There is no plan for recreational activities and no provision for child care. 7. Occupied by Italian and Polish families from nearby cities. These migrants are housed in buildings formerly the winter quarters for employees and animals of a circus. The buildings are for the most part shack-like structures, unpainted and for lorn looking. Each family is allowed one, two, or three rooms, according to size of family. Beds are the only visible furnishings and are of all kinds from wooden bunks with wood slats to old brass bedsteads. The tenants supply their own bedding. Meals are prepared at several community cook houses on wood burning stoves shared by the workers. Water piped into the grounds is obtainable at several spigots. The outdoor privies are flushed by a motor arrangement. No showers or other bathing facilities are provided. Scraps of food were lying on the ground outside the houses the day of the visit, attracting flies; the silage pile directly behind the quarters smelled horrible. The medical and health facilities of the nearby village are accessible but their adequacy was not determined. The company has arranged to use one building as a service center. It supplies a trained nurse and the New York Church Committee on Migrant Work provides two social workers. 8. Three housing centers for farm migratory workers were re ported to the Women’s Bureau agent as having unspeakably bad conditions. They were said to have passed the inspection of local and State health inspectors but were considered by many citizens in nearby communities as not meeting at all the minimum stand ards of decent living. The broader social aspects of the living conditions for these people apparently had been given no con MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 29 sideration. The Women’s Bureau agent observed these camps but did not inspect them because they were for farm and not cannery workers. Company Charges for Lodging. In both New Jersey and New York several companies provide free lodging for their migrant workers. One in New Jersey furnishes lodging and a light luncheon in the plant cafeteria without charge. The charges made by companies for lodging and three meals a day range from $6 to $8.50 a week; light and fuel are included. The two companies visited in New York that provide lodging and three meals a day to workers charge $8 a week. The other companies furnish lodging without charge. Trailer houses in the Federal Public Housing Authority camp rented for $7 a week, and the rental included electricity for light, cooking, and refrig eration. Workers furnished their own meals. Transportation. Most of the canneries visited were experiencing transportation difficulties, many of them due to the curtailment by the Office of Defense Transportation in the amount of gasoline available to bus companies and drivers of private cars. Seven of the 21 can neries visited in New Jersey operated company busses or con tracted for the use of school busses and others to transport workers to and from work. One large cannery in New Jersey operates its own bus company to transport workers to and from company housing centers and from nearby towns. This company had also arranged with the Public Service Bus Company for special service to and from specific points. Several canners said that the curtailment of bus service made it impossible for many women in nearby communities to work in the canneries and necessitated the bringing in of more migratory workers for whom housing must be supplied. Women who traveled long distances complained about the time lost in waiting to be transported by company busses, as well as by public conveyance. Many workers felt that they should be compensated for this lost time. Workers recruited locally for one cannery complained that the company does not keep its promises about providing transportation and that busses often are late or do not come at all. Many workers in New Jersey drove their own cars and had “riders.” Most of the canneries visited in New York were near bus lines or trolley lines. As elsewhere in the country these busses and trolleys usually were crowded beyond normal capacity. Many workers drove and shared their own cars. Only two canneries visited operated busses and two others sent automobiles to pick up small groups of workers. STANDARDS FOR THE HOUSING OF MIGRATORY WORKERS Adequate housing for migratory workers is an important ele ment in the successful utilization of manpower and to meet the needs for labor in agriculture and in food-processing plants. 30 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY The pressure of the war situation was bringing some employers of migrant help to a realization that the kind of housing they provided had a definite bearing on their ability to get and to keep the workers. In all too many instances, however, the atti tude seemed to be, “it’s as good as they’ve been used to” or "we can get plenty of migrants without spending any more on housing.” Several factors enter into a determination of what constitutes suitable or satisfactory housing arrangements. If the housing provided is to be utilized for an emergency period, as for the duration of the war, the type of construction and arrangements may be of a somewhat temporary character. If, on the other hand, the housing is intended for migrant workers who annually augment the seasonal-labor supply, then, obviously, housing of a more permanent character should be built. Climate will be a determining factor in the type of construction to be used, and whether the houses are to be occupied by unattached men or women or by family groups should influence the kind of con struction and the spacing of the units. In any case it is neces sary that certain minimum standards be met if the housing is to be fit for human habitation. The standards outlined here entail nothing elaborate, and the knowledge and experience of sanitary and building engineers are not necessary to recognize that such standards are essential minimums. Type of Construction. For temporary housing, tents may be used in warm weather for unattached men and women if entirely separate units are set up for each and if adequate provision is made for water supply, sanitary facilities, furnishings, and so forth. The tents should be provided with platform floors and with adequate protection from the weather. Tents are not recommended for the use of family groups nor for workers doing their own cooking. The Federal Public Housing Authority has set up trailer camps in some places to meet the emergency. Some of these include such facilities as housing for recreation centers, child-care centers, clinics, shower houses, laundries, and so forth. They have the advantage of being movable and can be taken from place to place as the need arises. Portable prefabricated houses have been used for temporary quarters, but in many cases the desirability of this kind of housing is defeated by overcrowding and the lack of essential housekeeping facilities and equipment as well as adequate sani tary arrangements. One farmer met the need of housing for a group of college girls by renovating and converting a chicken house for their use. It turned out to be most attractive and livable and the girls’ promise to come back another year was conditioned on their being allowed to live in the “chicken house.” Another farmer converted a granary that had long been out of use into a most satisfactory dormitory for men. C. C. C. camps have proved useful for housing migratory workers, and small summer hotels, unable to operate in wartime, also are used for this purpose. MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 31 Location and Lay-out. Whether for temporary or for permanent use, the location of housing for workers is important. The centers should be on sites convenient to the place of work. If, in providing tem porary housing, it is impossible to locate the housing center near the place of work, adequate transportation facilities should be maintained. The center should be on well-drained ground where it can get some sunshine, and should be near an adequate supply of pure water. The grounds should be lighted at night. From the standpoint of health and cleanliness, dormitories, eating quarters, toilets, and so forth should not be crowded together. The kitchen, commissary, and eating quarters should be some distance from the sleeping rooms and especially from the toilets. If incinerators are used they should be near the kitchen. Water Supply. Plenty of wholesome water for drinking and bathing should be supplied. Privy vaults and cesspools should be so placed that pollution of the water is not possible and the water supply should be free from organic contamination. Sleeping Quarters. Good sleeping quarters are essential to the health of the worker and to his best effort on the job. A standard amount of air space must be provided for each person. Houses should be properly ventilated and protected from the weather. Doors and windows should be screened. Since workers transported by automobile, bus, or train from distant places cannot possibly bring much in the way of household equipment with them, mini mum furnishings provided in each house should include sanitary beds, one for each person wherever possible; mattresses and blankets; and a chair for each person. Cooking should not be done in rooms used as sleeping quarters, but if cooking is to be done in individual units cook stoves and cooking utensils should be provided. If sheets and pillow cases are furnished they should be changed at regular and frequent intervals. Some ar rangement should be made in the assignment and supervision of quarters to insure that workers in plants operating more than one shift have opportunity for rest and sleep in the time allotted for this. Cooking and Eating Quarters. If central or community cooking and eating quarters are pro vided they should be large enough and well lighted and ventilated. These quarters should be screened and free from flies. The place where food is stored should be kept clean and sanitary. Refrig eration should be provided for perishable food. Dishes, cooking utensils, and so forth should be kept clean. Dogs and other animals should not be allowed in these premises. Persons pre paring, cooking, or serving food should be required to have a physical examination. Regardless of whether the food is to be prepared in individual houses or in community kitchens, an adequate supply of inex 32 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY pensive, wholesome food should be available. Garbage and Refuse Disposal. In rural areas where there is no public collection of garbage it should be the responsibility of the company operating the hous ing center to see that regular daily collection is made. Until disposed of, garbage should be kept in covered containers. Metal containers are preferable if obtainable. Toilets. It is essential that adequate and healthful means be provided for disposing of sewage. Wherever possible, the installation of flush toilets is urged. In temporary housing centers it may be necessary to substitute outdoor privies or toilets with septic tanks. If this is done, consideration to privacy should be given in their construction. Doors should be provided with fasteners. Toilets should be marked clearly as for men or for women. They should be located in places conveniently accessible but not so near other buildings as to be unpleasant. They should be adequate in num ber, not less than 1 for every 15 people and at a greater ratio if required by law. Pits should be dug to a proper depth. Light ing and ventilation should be good. Seats should have covers. Disinfectant should be supplied, and lye, soil, or other substance for covering surface excreta so as to keep down odors and repel flies. A constant supply of paper should be furnished. Cleanli ness and care in the use of toilets must be insisted on. Bathing Facilities. Every housing center should be provided with bathing facilities. Showers are preferable because more sanitary, more easily in stalled, and cheaper. There should be at least one shower for every 15 persons. These should be near the sleeping quarters and should be allocated to men and women separately. Bathing houses should be well-ventilated and well-lighted. In permanent camps the floors should be of cement and so constructed as to drain well. Walls should be lined with nonabsorbent material. Drainage from bathrooms or shower houses should be disposed of in some sanitary way. Ground that is wet, if such condition is unavoidable, should be treated for mosquito prevention. In addition to showers, adequate facilities for washing face and hands should be provided. A sufficient supply of both hot and cold water is essential. Laundry. Tubs or sinks should be furnished to enable employees to launder their clothes and an adequate supply of hot water should be provided for this purpose. Sanitation and Health. In every housing center one or more persons should be em ployed whose specific duty is to keep the place clean. The sanitary and health regulations of the State and localities in which there is housing for migratory workers should be strictly observed. There should be regular inspection of the MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 33 centers by sanitary and health authorities, and the enforcement of regulations should be insisted on by citizens. Sufficient health and medical care should be available and access to this care should be provided for the workers. Cases of serious illness or communicable disease should be immediately reported to the local health officer. As already suggested, nothing that would encourage the breed ing of mosquitoes should be allowed to exist. Some method for the extermination of bedbugs should be used frequently and persons infested with lice should be required to get rid of them and be given the necessary means for such treatment. Child Care. It is important to the working mother as well as to the welfare of the child that provision be made for the care of young chil dren. This care, to meet the needs of children of all ages, should be in accordance with the standards established by the Children’s Bureau of the U. S. Department of Labor. Such care should include centers for children of pre-school age and should provide playgrounds, leisure-time programs, and supervision after school hours for children of school age. Recreation. The most desirable thing in the way of recreation for migrant workers is that plans be developed as a part of the community program in the locality in which they live. In addition some pro vision should be made at the housing center for a place where workers can get together in groups for singing, dancing, and games, and where books, magazines, and newspapers are avail able. Registration. A complete register of all the occupants of a housing center should be kept up-to-date at all times. Supervision. Housing centers may be well-located, well-built, well-equipped, and provided with adequate services, but if there is not proper supervision the center will not operate successfully. This super vision involves not only the policing of the buildings and grounds from the point of view of cleanliness, sanitation, health, and order, but takes into account the workers’ welfare from a broader social point of view. This does, not suggest the necessity of supervision by a trained social worker, which, however desirable, is quite out of the question in most cases, but it does mean the selection of a supervisor of sympathetic and intelligent under standing, to whom the workers can go for advice on personal and group problems and who can suggest activities and assist the workers in the best use of such leisure time as they may have. Willingness on the part of the employer to provide some of these things not required by law is almost sure to result in a better attitude on the part of the workers toward their work. It tends to attract a higher quality of labor and should be a factor in securing a more permanent labor supply. 34 MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY Summary of Migrant Problems. Only when a careful survey of the local labor supply, including all available women, shows such supply to be wholly inadequate should the bringing in of workers from a distance be considered. If workers are available in the vicinity of the industry, such community and industry problems as housing, transportation, feeding, and child care can to a large extent be avoided. Adequate transportation is so essential to securing workers from nearby communities that every effort to meet such needs should be made. When migrant workers are recruited, false promises or mis representation with regard to work, earnings, housing facilities, housing costs, and so forth should be scrupulously avoided. Living and working arrangements for American migratory workers should compare favorably with those provided by con tract between the United States Government and the govern ments of other countries supplying such workers. Since to a large extent the need of migrant workers for food growing and processing is not of a temporary character nor for the duration of the war only, agencies interested in the welfare of these workers should seek not minimum standards alone but standards compatible with right working and living conditions. Constant efforts should be made to improve working conditions that fall below accepted standards. Estimates as to labor needs should be arrived at and made available by the canners early enough to make possible adequate programing of housing needs and other essential services for migratory workers. (Standards for these provisions should fol low those outlined in this report.) Orders from canners for migratory labor should not be filled until a check has been made of housing facilities and they are found to be satisfactory. Working through the proper channels, insistence should be made that canneries having Government orders should at least meet minimum standards. Coordination of the efforts of the many agencies concerned with the problems discussed in this report is necessary if the recommendations outlined are to be effectively carried out. A plan should be developed whereby the responsibilities of the several agencies, local, State, and Federal, whose activities relate themselves to these problems can be defined, whereby the proper agencies can be given full authority to investigate and make periodic inspections, and whereby adequate provision is made for the enforcement of their recommendations. Such a plan would offer a basis for united action on the part of both private and public agencies for attacking these problems in a constructive way. Progress was made in the direction of cooperative endeavor when the joint survey of housing provisions and needs of migra tory workers, referred to earlier in this report (page 19), was made by four Federal agencies. A report of the survey, includ ing recommendations, was sent to the companies and to the MIGRANT CANNERY WORKERS, NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY 35 various State and Federal groups concerned, and conferences were held with many of them to discuss the problems. Two meetings called by the Director of the New Jersey Office of Civilian Defense have been held in Trenton for the purpose of coordinating State responsibility in these matters, and the pro cess of developing a conference between Federal and State agencies is under way. Initial contacts have been made with local, State, and Federal agencies concerned with living conditions for migratory workers in New York. It is expected that plans will go forward to meet the problems there and that improvement of conditions existing in. certain places will be made long before next summer’s in migration of workers begins. . The New York Canners Association expects to spend some time during the less busy winter months in collecting material on housing for migratory workers, and this will be made avail able to the canners of the State. One company operating several canneries has already indicated its intention of undertaking the building of housing facilities this winter. The agencies whose functions indicate a responsibility for the conditions under which migratory workers live and work in clude, among others, the United States Department of Labor (the Women’s Bureau and the Children’s Bureau in particular) and the State Departments of Labor; the War Manpower Com mission and its United States Employment Service Division; the United States Public Health Service and the State Depart ments of Health; the Community War Services, the State De partments of Welfare, and the USO; the Extension Service of the United States Department of Agriculture and the State Departments of Agriculture; the National Housing Agency and Federal Public Housing Authority; the State Offices of Civilian Defense; Federal and State child-care agencies; and the State Departments of Education. To this list probably should be added representation from the procurement offices for the Army, Navy, and Lend-Lease, and certainly there should be ad.ded the names of the individual employers and the associations -of can ners and of farmers. O