PASSAIC
Day laborers who gather near The Home Depot on Dayton Avenue said undercover police have been on a ticketing blitz, cracking down hard in the past several weeks -- and they called on Mayor Samuel Rivera to find a solution.
"This is a really serious problem, we need a place where we can be, and where people can see us to pick us up for work," Diego Rios, a day laborer from Peru, said in Spanish Thursday. "We beg the mayor, in the name of us all, to come here and solve this problem. It's a city problem, but he only sends the police to deal with it, and they just come every day to harass us and mistreat us."
Workers said the police are violating the terms of an agreement signed by Rivera in September 2004 which allowed them to solicit work in the area.
A spokesman for the mayor, who acknowledged undercover officers had issued tickets recently, countered that the workers themselves have not been respecting the agreement, which includes provisions on no littering, no public urination and no disturbing of parents escorting children to local schools.
Both sides said they are willing to sit down and talk it out. Both sides also agreed the situation is getting out of hand.
Day worker Pedro Martinez said he was given a ticket for $258 on charges of loitering and blocking public access. He said he was one of at least 20 workers who had received a fine within the past two weeks.
"They told me the second ticket will be $500, and the third time, you'll be arrested," Martinez said in Spanish. "The mayor said we bother women, but we do not. They've pushed us all the way to the intersection (of Dayton and Route 21) now; we could get killed standing there. We as day laborers have rights."
Martinez said he was caught in a Catch-22: ordered not to work under threat of getting another ticket, but unable to pay the ticket unless he worked.
Police department spokesman Detective Andrew White did not return a phone call for comment on the ticketing crackdown.
Keith Furlong, a spokesman for Rivera, said the mayor was aware the situation was escalating.
"He's very sensitive to this issue," Furlong said. "It's a big concern in the city, it's a very diverse city, and the day laborers are part of the culture in Passaic, but when he gets complaints of bad language or harassing ladies, he has to take action."
Day laborers said the recent ticketing blitz -- and undercover detectives and uniformed police officers corralling them further down Dayton Avenue in Msgr. Romanak Plaza, which is enclosed by a high fence in a zone where cars are not permitted to pull over -- was making it difficult to get work.
Furlong said in addition to letting them wait in the plaza, Rivera had given the day workers an office on President Street to operate out of.
He said the workers had rejected the office, saying it was too far from where contractors solicit day laborers.
Furlong added that the mayor was frustrated by lack of a clear leader among the day laborers, even as their ranks continued to grow.
"He's open to meeting with them and figuring things out," Furlong said. "But the current situation doesn't appear to be working."
Day laborers countered that they've been ticketed for no reason other than for looking to earn a day's pay to feed their families.
"We are not doing this for fun; this is the hellish reality we go through every day," said Fabian, a 26-year-old from Mexico, who asked that his last name not be printed for fear of retribution from the police.
"We deal with racism. With exploitation. We just want to go to work and do a job and get paid, not get discriminated against," he said.
In a solicited statement on day laborers from The Home Depot, spokesman Yancey Casey wrote by e-mail: "The Home Depot maintains a policy of non-solicitation at its stores by individuals and organizations not affiliated with our company.
In the interest of safety and convenience, our policy prohibits people from loitering or otherwise creating or causing safety risks to our associates and customers."
Daryn Martin, the president of the New Jersey chapter of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, who negotiated the original agreement with the city on behalf of the day laborers, said he had received complaints from workers in recent weeks and that he was hoping to arrange a meeting with the mayor to work out a solution.