Rural & Migrant Ministry, Inc. (RMM) commends the New York State government for taking steps to ensure that the labor rights of farmworkers are protected. The recently adopted state budget facilitates lowering the overtime threshold for farmworkers from 60 to 40 hours a week by offering a new tax credit for farmers, who have previously been required to pay overtime to farmworkers after 60 hours of work.

Now that the tax credit is approved, it is time for Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration to affirm the new overtime threshold, creating a pathway for overtime pay after 40 hours of work. This is the case in almost every other employment sector in the state.

The economic concerns of farmers have been addressed, but farmworkers’ rights must be ensured too. In what other industry would it be acceptable to place the burden of profits on the backs of the workforce by denying them reasonable overtime pay? Farmworkers are hardworking people who deserve the same rights as every other worker.

The Farm Laborer Fair Labor Practices Act was adopted in 2019 after a 25-year campaign by RMM and others, granting basic labor rights for farmworkers in New York State. This included overtime pay, a day of rest, workers comp, paid family leave, the right to organize, housing protection and unemployment insurance. But the law set overtime pay to apply after 60 hours, as opposed to the typical 40 hours for the rest of New York State’s workforce.

The Farm Laborers Wage Board was directed to determine if overtime pay should be provided after 40 hours. The wage board’s resolution on January 28 recommended that the overtime threshold be set at 40 hours, phased in over a 10-year period that would end in 2032. The recommendation awaits an official ruling from Department of Labor commissioner Roberta Reardon, at the direction of Hochul, before taking effect.

Juan Antonio Zuñiga is a farmworker who lives and works in Riverhead, Long Island. He believes setting the overtime threshold at 40 hours is justified.

“Establishing the farmworker overtime threshold at 40 hours is what should be done, what is fair, and it is also what was promised. Farmworkers, like any other workers, deserve to be paid for the extra hours of work,” said Zuñiga. “The argument that it is a hardship for farmers to pay for overtime hours is not right or accurate. Why do farmworkers have to pay the consequences for some farm owners not wanting to do the right thing?”

The Rev. Richard Witt is executive director of Rural & Migrant Ministry, Inc., a farmworker justice organization that runs four centers across New York State, bringing together rural communities. The group advocates for better labor and living conditions for farmworkers, educates people about farmworker rights and organizing power, and works with youth in the arts and on social justice.