Advocates for Florida farmworkers are calling for community support after a traffic accident Tuesday in Marion County killed eight farmworkers and injured dozens. The workers were traveling in a bus to a farm in Dunnellon.
The driver of the pickup truck that struck the bus carrying the workers faces eight counts of driving under the influence-manslaughter.
Mexico’s president says 44 of those passengers were working for a Mexican-American farmer under H-2A visas.
The Farmworker Association of Florida’s Ernesto Ruiz said families of the injured workers may be dependent on their wages, and because of this crash there could be wider impacts to their families.
“We talked to the brother of one of these workers, and he said that one of the ones who survived, that his first concern was ‘are we going to work tomorrow,’” Ruiz said. “That shows the gravity of why they're here. And the reason for the urgency of why they're here. They're leaving their families to a foreign country where they're often treated poorly, not because it's a joy for them. But because it's an economic necessity.”
The agricultural work is low-paying and comes with few benefits. Ruiz said that makes this an even greater financial burden to those involved.
“Workers do not have health coverage. They're here without any health care.” Ruiz said in some cases they could be entitled to workers' compensation, “If they are injured when they're not working, as is the case here, it is our understanding that it would be the responsibility of the transport company.”
Ruiz is calling on the community to appreciate the labor that comes from these agricultural workers, and his organization started a Go Fund Me to support the victims and families.
“We often hear about the more migrant farmworkers that are coming here to do crime, that they're immoral people, and it is infuriating,” Ruiz said. “Infuriating that these eight individuals lost their lives. Some people don't have fathers, some people don't have brothers and sons now because of this reckless drunk.”
Both The League of United Latin American Citizens and the Professional Fire Fighters of Marion County expressed messages of condolences for the victims and their families.
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