Tuesday, Jun 28 2011 3:46PM
Thousands of migrant workers move from California and Mexico to Oregon each year to live on farm camps and pick fruits.
Members of the Farmworker Housing Development Corporation (FHDC) toured some farmworker camps in Oregon this month to determine what can be done to better housing conditions for the migrant workers occupying the residences, reports OPB News.
The FHDC, which helps ensure workers live in decent, affordable housing, found some residents of these camps who claim there are severe issues with housing.
Jim Moorefield, director of the Willamette Neighborhood Housing Services in Corvallis, toured the camps with the FHDC. He told the source many people living near the camps don't realize the poor conditions many workers live in.
"Most people don't know, when they drive down a rural road, that some of the buildings they're driving by, people live in," Moorefield told the source. "They don't look like places that people live in. They look like places that people abandoned a long time ago. When in fact, these are people's homes."
It's estimated there are 300 such camps in Oregon, with a migrant worker population of roughly 50,000.