Governor picks cherries, pushes her ag message

SUNNYSIDE -- Draping a bucket harness over her shoulder and swatting mosquitoes, Gov. Chris Gregoire on Friday tried picking cherries in an orchard overlooking the Yakima River.

With reporters and state administrators laughing and watching, she plucked and dropped the deep red fruit into her bucket.

"I got some leaves in there, that's a demerit, right?" she said to Dan Newhouse, the state Secretary of Agriculture.

Gregoire visited the orchard, owned by Newhouse's family, as part of her two-day "Feeding Washington" tour of Eastern Washington's farm country.

She used the visit to reiterate her goal of boosting agricultural exports by 80 percent in five years -- a feat that she said will require additional water storage and immigration reform that allows for a smoother guest worker program.

"If we do that, we'll find our way out of our recession," she said.

Gregoire said she applauded President Barack Obama's call for renewed efforts at comprehensive immigration reform on Thursday.

While Obama's plan was short on specifics, Gregoire said any new immigration policy must mix stronger border enforcement, a reliable guest worker program and a clear path to citizenship for those now in the country illegally, even if it requires penalties or back taxes.

"I've seen the need of our farmers. People don't understand that farm work is not just for anybody. It takes skill, it takes training," Gregoire said. "For the good of our state, for the good of agriculture, I want to see Congress tackle immigration reform."

She said existing policies don't work because seasonal workers don't go back to Mexico for fear of not being allowed in again.

Newhouse echoed the concern, saying that Washington's $40 billion agriculture industry is more reliant on human labor than other parts of the country, something federal lawmakers have been slow to understand.

"That's been a struggle to tell that story," Newhouse said.

Newhouse said it normally takes from 60 to 80 seasonal workers just to harvest cherries at his family's farm. This year's rain and cool weather meant lower yields, which required only about 30, he said.

Also on the tour of the 600-acre ranch, which also has wine grapes and hops, were Department of Ecology Director Ted Sturdevant and state Commerce Director Rogers Weed.

Friday's agenda also included a visit to Gebber's Farm in Brewster and Inland Empire Oilseeds in Odessa. Gebbers Farms fired an undisclosed number of undocumented workers following a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement audit in December. The company has declined to comment on how many workers were let go -- believed to be in the hundreds -- but Gebbers Farms has reportedly brought in workers from Jamaica since then under a federal guest worker program.

On Thursday, Gregoire swung through Walla Walla, Benton, Franklin and Yakima counties, calling for additional water storage and federal farm disaster area declarations in 29 counties due to losses from rain, cold and wind over the past several months.

* Ross Courtney can be reached at 509-930-8798 or rcourtney@yakimaherald.com.

* Information from The Associated Press was included in this report.