Senators yesterday considered a bill that would increase hiring fees for H-2 workers to fund the jobs of more health inspectors, but the proposed increase had shrunk substantially since the bill was introduced.
Bill 135 originally proposed raising the annual fee per worker by $243, but bill author Sen. Tom Ada amended the proposed legislation to increase the fee by only $91.
Ada said he had "recalculated" the amount of money that should be raised to hire health inspectors and increase enforcement of health standards in immigrant workers' barracks, based on the coming military buildup. The original increase would have funded more workers than necessary, he said yesterday.
By charging an extra $91 per worker, GovGuam would raise about $6.7 million in five years, or nearly enough money to hire about 15 more health inspectors, Ada said.
Those health inspectors will be used primarily to enforce sanitary standards at worker housing, Ada said.
"I think we need to take proactive measures with regards to the temporary worker barracks that will be popping up all over the island to make sure that the environmental health of those facilities are in fact being maintained," Ada said yesterday.
Senators debated Bill 135 for hours yesterday, but eventually agreed to vote on it the next time it is discussed.
The Guam Contractors Association has sent letters to senators attempting to dissuade them from passing the bill, but Ada yesterday dismissed some of the arguments.
A recent letter from GCA President James Martinez said the military was going to enforce standards at worker barracks so Bill 135 was redundant.
Ada wasn't so sure.
"We need to take the responsibility for the health in our community," he said. "If everybody has all these good intentions, then fine, all the better that the health in our community will be looked after. But as of right now, there is nothing in writing that says it will be done."
Ada also said that although the new inspectors would be hired primarily to inspect work-force housing, they could be sent to other establishments if they were following a lead. BY BRETT KELMAN • PACIFIC DAILY NEWS
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