|
AB 2676 (CALDERON) BACKGROUND
-
Below is the California Penal Code on how animals are protected.:
597. (b) Except as otherwise provided in subdivision (a) or (c), every person who overdrives, overloads, drives when overloaded, overworks, tortures, torments, deprives of necessary sustenance, drink, or shelter, cruelly beats, mutilates, or cruelly kills any animal, or causes or procures any animal to be so overdriven, overloaded, driven when overloaded, overworked, tortured, tormented, deprived of necessary sustenance, drink, shelter, or to be cruelly beaten, mutilated, or cruelly killed; and whoever, having the charge or custody of any animal, either as owner or otherwise, subjects any animal to needless suffering, or inflicts unnecessary cruelty upon the animal, or in any manner abuses any animal, or fails to provide the animal with proper food, drink, or shelter or protection from the weather, or who drives, rides, or otherwise uses the animal when unfit for labor, is, for each offense, guilty of a crime punishable pursuant to subdivision(d).
(d) A violation of subdivision (a), (b), or (c) is punishable as a felony by imprisonment pursuant to subdivision (h) of Section 1170, or by a fine of not more than twenty thousand dollars ($20,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment, or alternatively, as a misdemeanor by imprisonment in a county jail for not more than one year, or by a fine of not more than twenty thousand dollars ($20,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment.
- AB2676 (Calderon) would put in place the same criminal penalties for farm workers that already exist for animals.
- Over 400,000 farm workers toil on over 35,000 farms in California. These farm workers provide 90 percent of the labor for California’s multibillion-dollar agricultural industry – the nation’s largest – that produces everything from grapes and strawberries to lettuce to tomatoes.
- Farm workers in California work in the extreme heat and tough conditions to feed our nation and face the risk of death and illness. The people who feed us should not fear death when they go to work. Even with a heat related regulation in place, farm workers are literally dying because of no water and access to shade.
- When a farm worker at Giumarra Vineyards, the largest table grape grower in the country, died of heat in 2004, the UFW began a campaign to end heat deaths.
- Then, Maria Isabel Jimenez, a 17-year girl who was pruning a vineyard near Farmington, California died without water or access to shade. This young girl’s case highlights everything that is wrong… the farm labor contractor involved had been caught before not providing water, the farm labor contractor did not call “911”, and when charged with manslaughter the farm labor contractor’s sentence was “community service.” Can any of us imagine a community service sentence for manslaughter committed by someone driving under the influence – it was just such a case that led to the founding of MADD.
- Unfortunately, these heat-related deaths are a reminder that agriculture is one of the few industries in this state and country where a person can be worked to their death.
- Without AB 2676 (Calderon), adequate protections will continue to be good intentions.
- AB 2676 (Calderon) is minimal protection when compared to Penal Code Section 597, makes it punishable as a misdemeanor or felony for every person who fails to provide any animal with proper food, drink, shelter or protection from the weather.
Legislative News
|
|
TAKE ACTION
e
|
Humane Society Support Letter
Farm Worker Stories
I would work all day without taking a break or going for water because I was afraid of getting fired.
–Erika Contreras,farm labor contractor worker
They give us the water they use to irrigate the fields.
–Pedro Zapien,vegetable worker
We have to pitch in money to have clean drinking water.
–Juan Martinez Vasquez, pea worker
Our water has a mossy smell and bitter taste.
–Ramon Mendoza,irrigation installer
The foreman drinks the water we bring ourselves.
–Francisco Villasaña,cotton worker
He treats us worse than animals…We don’t have fresh water.
–Juan Negrete,
cotton worker
The company did not provide shade for us to use.
–Juanita Mendoza,grape worker
When someone wants to drink water, the boss gets mad.
–Imelda Valdivia,grape worker
One foreman carries a gun on his side to scare the workers.
— Alejandro Gil,cotton worker
They would never take us water. We had to take our own water.
–Gaspar Silva,vegetable worker
Sometimes full days would go by and they would never bring the bathrooms.
—Pedro Zapien, vegetable worker
They place the water on top of a box or on a tailgate of a pickup truck and when a worker goes to drink water, the heat is unbearable.
–Eva Zenteno,grape worker
They did have water for us. I got headaches.
–Evelyn Aguilar,grape worker
Last year people got sick and people fainted. They had no water and needed breaks.
–Jorge Rodriguez,almond worker
Being without water is dangerous. We are not camels that can be working without water.
— Jairo Salin Salosairo Luquez, grape worker
For more stories click here
|
