HANFORD — With details still emerging about a bipartisan immigration reform package proposed in the Senate Monday, agricultural leaders were anticipating the inclusion of key components they’ve been seeking for a long time.

“I think it opens the door to everything we’ve worked hard on,” said Manuel Cunha, president of the Fresno-based Nisei Farmers League. “We need agriculture to have a workable program.”

The major reform package, agreed to in principle by Republicans and Democrats in the Senate, includes a path to citizenship for undocumented workers, including farm laborers who’ve been living and working for years in the San Joaquin Valley, many with families and long-standing community ties.

Another component in the package is an agricultural worker program that would allow farm employees to legally work in the U.S. temporarily when agricultural labor is needed.

“We have to realize that a lot of our farms, especially when you get … into those crops that require a lot of labor, that there’s very few people in our country who want to do those types of jobs,” said Joaquin Contente, Hanford dairy farmer and president of the California Farmers Union.

The United Farm Workers issued a press release calling the Senate package “an exciting moment for the UFW and many pro-immigrant groups.”

“We thank this bipartisan group of Republicans and Democrats for understanding that a road map to citizenship is essential to any immigration reform plan,” said UFW President Arturo Rodriguez.

Ag leaders are saying that the stars may have finally lined up. President Barack Obama has signaled immigration reform as a top priority for his second term. Republicans appear more willing to go along than in the past, perhaps because they got clobbered in the Hispanic vote in the 2012 presidential election. That could help a comprehensive proposal clear the House of Representatives, where many Republicans have been wary of anything smacking of amnesty.

Now everybody is looking toward Obama, who will lay out his vision today in a speech in Nevada.

“We’re waiting for when the president presents his points,” said Cunha of the Nisei Farmers League. “It’s going to be a blueprint for the next four months.”

The Associated Press contributed to this story. The reporter can be reached at 583-2432 or snidever@HanfordSentinel.com.