California farm workers are at the forefront of climate change | KQED extension

With her 1-year-old son, Adriel, on her hip, Herrera Ceja leafed through a stack of medical bills on her kitchen table, amounting to nearly $4,000 she owes for a hospital visit in January when the toddler fell ill during the evacuation center.

“We all got sick from the humidity, but the little one got the worst of it,” she said. “He couldn’t breathe and the people at the shelter sent us straight to the hospital.”

Herrera Ceja and her family had settled in Planada a year and a half before the storm. They were admitted to the United States to seek asylum after her husband was shot, and nearly killed, by members of a criminal organization in their home state of Michoacán, Mexico, she said.

“I was so scared. And the government couldn’t protect us. We had to get out of there,” he said. “Here we were building a new life, starting from scratch. Now there’s nothing left.”

In Planada, Herrera Ceja says she feels safe from violence. And she and her husband had saved up some money to hire an immigration attorney for their asylum case. But now that money has been spent on a replacement car so she can get to work. And because they still have no asylum, the family was turned away for help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Sitting on the veranda while her eldest son, 8-year-old Axel, played on a swing set in the courtyard, Herrera Ceja said she knows her family is not the only one suffering.

“I think everyone in the Planada community has been set back,” he said. Then, with a wry smile, she added, “But we won’t let it break us. We have to keep moving forward.”

Planada residents with more resources also struggled. Anastacio Rosales, 70, is a US citizen and has received help from FEMA. But although he is a homeowner, he didn’t have flood insurance. After water pooled 3 feet deep inside his home, he relied on volunteers to help rip out the soggy sheetrock so he could rebuild the walls from the studs.

Six months after the floodwaters receded, Rosales is still slowly recovering and disinfecting her belongings, which are piled shoulder-high under tarps on her back patio. And, Rosales said, the harvest cycle has been disrupted. A semi-retired farmer, he said he hasn’t been able to find work in the sweet potato fields this year.

“There was so much water in the fields,” she said. “The sowing took place very late. So now there is very little work.

And many of Rosales’ neighbors who are undocumented immigrants — and they too lost their jobs to the storms — are ineligible for federal unemployment insurance. The state legislature is considering a bill to create a state safety net program for these workers, but Governor Gavin Newsom vetoed a similar measure last year, citing tax concerns.

A glimmer of hope

Proponents say the flooding in Planada and elsewhere, including the town of Pajaro in the Salinas Valley, which was submerged after a levee break in March, was preventable, if infrastructure was properly maintained.

“It’s been just a nightmare this winter, watching this show first in Planada and then in other communities,” said Madeline Harris of the Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability, a Central Valley group that advocates for the rights of low-income rural people community. “Each time it was a similar story, of a predominantly Latino, peasant, underprivileged community that flooded. If their communities hadn’t been neglected for years, this would never have happened.”

But now there is a glimmer of hope for Planada residents like Rosales and Herrera Ceja.

This spring, researchers at the UC Merced Community and Labor Center, in collaboration with community members and supporters of the Leadership Counsel and other nonprofits, conducted a survey (PDF) to capture the scale of the losses at Planada. The amount reached to restore the city: 20 million dollars.

And some lawmakers were listening, including Planada State Senator Anna Caballero and Assemblywoman Esmeralda Soria.

Working with Pajaro-area lawmakers, they were able to ensure this year’s state budget includes $20 million for Planada, plus an additional $20 million for Pajaro, to help residents, regardless of immigration status, to recover. The funds were approved as part of a larger package to improve flood resilience across the state, despite a $31 billion budget gap that lawmakers have had to close.

“Introducing an item in the state budget… in the exact amount we estimated was needed. This is incredible,” said Edward Flores, co-director of the UC Merced job center, which conducted the survey.

But Flores says the Planada disaster — and the scale of climate-driven impacts affecting California farm workers — raises a much bigger question.