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Somewhere in your city this morning, people are probably gathering to search for day-labor work. They will do hard, sometimes dangerous work. A new study says three-fourths of all day-laborers do dangerous work on roofs or around chemicals. One out of five of these workers has been hurt badly enough on the job to necessitate medical attention. Many will not get paid -- and there is nowhere for them to complain; many are working in the United States illegally.

Still, they are doing important work that your community needs. For the first time, we are getting a national picture of who these workers are and how they are being treated by their employers.

 

The New York Times reports:

The first nationwide study on day laborers has found that such workers are a nationwide phenomenon, with 117,600 people gathering at more than 500 hiring sites to look for work on a typical day.

The survey found that three-fourths of day laborers were illegal immigrants and that more than half said employers had cheated them on wages in the previous two months.

The study found that 49 percent of day laborers were employed by homeowners and 43 percent by construction contractors. They were found to be employed most frequently as construction laborers, landscapers, painters, roofers and drywall installers.

The study, based on interviews with 2,660 workers at 264 hiring sites in 20 states and the District of Columbia, found that day laborers earned a median of $10 an hour and $700 month. The study said that only a small number earned more than $15,000 a year.

The professors who conducted the study said the most surprising finding was the pervasiveness of wage violations and dangerous conditions that day laborers faced.

"We were disturbed by the incredibly high incidence of wage violations," said one of the study's authors, Nik Theodore of the University of Illinois at Chicago. "We also found a very high level of injuries."
 

Forty-nine percent of those interviewed said that in the previous two months an employer had not paid them for one or more days' work. Forty-four percent said some employers did not give them any breaks during the workday, while 28 percent said employers had insulted them.

Another of the study's authors, Abel Valenzuela Jr. of the University of California, Los Angeles, said: "This is a labor market that thrives on cheap wages and the fact that most of these workers are undocumented. They're in a situation where they're extremely vulnerable, and employers know that and take advantage of them."

In some communities, tensions have soared over day-labor sites, with complaints that the workers interrupt traffic, block sidewalks, trespass on store property and litter. In addition, the laborers have become the target of groups opposed to illegal immigrants.

The town of Herndon, Va. is intimately familiar with the controversy that surrounds day laborers and their work. In a 2005 attempt to cut down on pedestrian congestion where day laborers in the area congregated each morning, the town turned the parking lot of an old police station into a center where the workers could meet up with potential employers. It's only been open a few weeks, and already the center has been a catalyst for protests and counter-protests. The Washington Post wrote an editorial on the issue in early January.

The cleanup of the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina has fallen heavily on the shoulders of day-laborers, too. Newhouse News Service reported:

"Every single day, day laborers get into cars with people they don't know. They take their lives into their hands just to make $10 an hour," said Steve Smitson, a lawyer with CASA of Maryland, a Hispanic advocacy group in the Washington, D.C., suburbs. "Katrina is a real opportunity to bring the exploitation of these workers out into the open, to bring to the fore how much of our economy depends on the exploitation of these workers."
 

Most day laborers, according to Professor Abel Valenzuela of the University of California, Los Angeles, are Latino immigrant men with little command of English. Most are undocumented. In recent years, they have become a growing presence in the construction industry, a perfect fit for employers eager to classify -- or misclassify -- their workers as independent contractors so as to evade unions and avoid providing workers' compensation or other benefits.

No Secrets Online for Teens

The Des Moines Register published a wake-up call to parents about the Web sites their kids are using.

MySpace's population grew by 32 percent in the last year, with more than 32 million visitors to the site last month, according to ComScore. Nearly 9 million people have flocked to LiveJournal, another blogging site. These communities are dominated by twentysomethings and teens, who are able to identify their school online on MySpace and other similar sites, such as LiveJournal and Facebook.

Half of all teens leave something online when they visit, according to a recent study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, the first research by the institute to look at what teens put online. They post messages, journal entries, photos and their favorite music.

Children as young as elementary school age are drawn to such sites.

For parents and schools, keeping up with what youngsters are posting and where they congregate can be like treading quicksand. It's impossible to keep up.

Tainted Trials, Stolen Justice

You really should spend some time looking at this project. The San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News has been investigating the local legal system and found big problems. The investigation shows that the courtroom deck is stacked in favor of the district attorney. What's more, the study found, when injustice did occur, the media generally didn't notice: 

A dramatic number of cases were infected with errors by prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges, and those errors were routinely tolerated. In dozens of cases, the errors robbed defendants of their right to a fair trial. And in a small number of the very worst cases, they led people to be wrongly convicted.

The study reveals "a basic truth about how the criminal justice system operates," said Laurie Levenson, a former federal prosecutor who teaches criminal law and ethics at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. Levenson was one of seven experts in criminal procedures and ethics who reviewed the Mercury News findings. "A lot of sausage gets pushed through that machine. Errors that help the prosecution are common. The uneven nature of criminal justice is a serious concern."

The Mercury News began its investigation in late 2002, as concerns emerged about the quality of justice in a series of high-profile cases. To test how the system worked more broadly, the newspaper reviewed the records of five years of criminal jury trial appeals decided by the California 6th District Court of Appeal -- 727 cases in all. In addition, the newspaper uncovered about 200 cases of questionable conduct that were not part of the study period, by reviewing files and interviewing lawyers.

The result is an unparalleled look at the extent, nature and impact of errors in a criminal justice system.

The review established that in 261 of the appellate cases reviewed -- more than one in every three of the total -- the criminal trial had been marred by questionable conduct that worked against the defendant. In only about one in 20 cases did the defendant win meaningful relief -- either a new trial or a significantly reduced sentence -- from higher courts.

Newest Roller-Coaster Gamble

Late this week, Disney World will open its "$100-million gamble," a replica of Mt. Everest. The customers will ride down the mountain on a "runaway" train.

 

It raises the stakes in a national roller-coaster derby. How high, how fast and how elaborate must an attraction be to make it in the ballgame these days?   

Affordable Homes, Horrible Commute

The Arizona Republic ran a story that, no doubt, could be told about nearly any city of size. People who, several years ago, moved to the suburbs to buy affordable homes now find themselves ensnarled in what has, in some cases, become hours of commute time. The only answer to the mess seems to move to the very place they were trying to escape from -- the city.

Editor's Note: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided whenever possible.

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