“Migrants’ departure ends dispute over camp closing” from the August 20, 1974 Door County Advocate
Migrants’ departure ends dispute over camp closing
A migrant crew left the Johnson Brothers camp at Gills Rock Sunday to ease a dispute among state officials over issuance of closing orders against the camp.
Mrs. Werner Johnson, whose husband and his brother Penfield operate the camp, said the pickers left somewhat reluctantly.
“They would have liked to help finish some of the neighboring orchards after we finished Friday but decided that under the circumstances they’d better leave for the tomatoes,” Mrs. Johnson said.
The circumstances were not only a dispute among state officials but a lengthy story in the Milwaukee Journal that resurrected Door county’s water quality problems.
The Department of Industry, Labor and Human Relations issued closing orders against the Johnson camp when a test of the well water showed some algae, according to Mrs. Johnson. However, ensuing tests were taken but the results had not yet been returned Monday.
The Johnsons drilled a new well according to state specifications about five years ago. They received a 1974 operational permit and had about 30 adults and 20 children in the camp for a three week period. All were Texas-Mexicans, with adult labor being utilized on a mechanical harvester as well as for hand picking.
The Johnsons have 70 acres of cherry orchards and with the help of Ray Slaby’s shaker got their entire crop off over the three week period, finishing Friday.
“Now that they’re gone we’ll just have to wait and see what comes next,” Mrs. Johnson said Monday. “While we certainly didn’t want to see anybody getting sick, we also want to see what further tests show and what we’ll be required to do next.”
The camp was closed under a DILHR ruling that, unless a camp can provide safe and sufficient water under pressure for all purposes, including bathing and showering as well as drinking and cooking, it should be closed.
However, Santiago Davila, a DILHR migrant camp specialist, broke ranks to say that the camp closing discriminated against migrant workers. According to the Milwaukee Journal, he asked why migrants should be put out of work when cottages and motels in Door county are not shut down even though they probably have the same problem. However, restaurants and motels are under the jurisdiction of the Health Division of the Department of Health and Social Services.
Davila pointed out in Madison that the migrants had been in the Johnson camp for three weeks with no illnesses reported and were on the verge of finishing their work there. He also noted that the migrants did not want to leave the camp.
“I find it discriminating against migrants that they can’t even draw water in another area and bring it in like some campers do,” he said.
Leonard Montie, district administrative officer in Green Bay, said the Division of Health also allows this in motels and restaurants. Pointing out that an extensive water sampling program conducted by his division in Door county the last three years showed that a number of these establishments had water supply problems, he said that in each case they were ordered to haul in safe drinking water while at the same time being allowed to use their own water for bathing and flushing purposes.
Montie said that one restaurant and four tourist rooming houses, all unnamed, were shut down and about two dozen places voluntarily went out of business and that he no longer knows of any licensed establishments operating with unsafe water.
Courtesy of the Door County Library Newspaper Archive
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