Employers turn to foreign workers

By CONSTANCE SEE, Whitefish Pilot

The number of foreign workers employed in Whitefish's resort town businesses has increased significantly in the past few years.

But how they're integrated into the community is an issue workers, labor contractors, employers and the residents must come to grips with.

Foreign workers are filling needed jobs at a time when Montana is seeing record low unemployment, pegged at 3.3 percent in 2006.

While local businesses may enjoy additional customers purchasing groceries, clothing and souvenirs, some residents see an impact on services and infrastructure — lines at the library computers and crowded SNOW buses to Big Mountain.

Big Mountain Resort

hires abroad

This winter is the first time Big Mountain sought help filling their jobs with foreign workers from South Africa, Indonesia and South America. Big Mountain spokesperson Brian Schott said 95 percent of the feedback from this experience has been positive.

"One of our lift supervisors said this is the strongest lift crew we've had in years, and the response from guests is fabulous," Schott said. "There have been a few instances of maybe three students who weren't satisfied with their housing, but out of 60 students, that's minor."

With majors ranging from journalism to robotics, most students come from middle- to upper-class homes. Many have never lived away from home, and working at Big Mountain is their first job.

Schott said many of the students arrived for work unprepared for winter. Big Mountain employees and concerned residents went to great lengths to help.

Big Mountain ski instructor Kelly Bort and her friends collected cash and went shopping at the Salvation Army in Kalispell for household items like coffee pots and blankets.

"They were also starving for meat and didn't have enough money to buy it, so I bought it with the money we'd collected," Bort said. "I want to stress this is not Big Mountain's responsibility. The company they dealt with, the subcontractor, Hospitality Catering, is responsible."

Schott said this was a learning experience, and Big Mountain is re-evaluating the program should they decide to continue it.

"The bottom line is, we want to make sure the students go back with a positive experience," Schott said.

Living and working

in Whitefish

Several Whitefish women who befriended the students organized a public meeting at the library last month where the students answered questions about their homelands.

Lulu Soares, who recently graduated from journalism school in Brazil, said she was surprised at how many people reached out to the students.

"One time, we were carrying bags of groceries home and didn't ask for a ride, but a girl saw us and offered to drive us home," Soares said.

Most of the student housing is located close to downtown, as student transportation is limited to the SNOW bus or walking. Housing is arranged by Hospitality Catering Management Services through local rental agents like Tom McCrea, at Whitefish Property Management.

McCrea provides rental units in three or four-month long contracts. The $250 per month fee students pay covers utilities and time when rental units are empty. With thermostats set high, one was at 90 degrees, electric bills at some student apartments average $100 more than other units he rents, McCrea said.

"Their next-door neighbors are paying $550 a month and their own utilities, and these people are paying maybe $900 a month and we're paying utilities," McCrea said. "After you consider the extra work with shorter four-month instead of six-month leases, they're getting a fair price."

Some students have reported over crowding in their apartments up to seven in a three-bedroom, but McCrea says he does "bed checks" to make sure there are only four students per two-bedroom apartment at buildings he's responsible for.

McCrea notes that if foreign hiring continues to grow, Whitefish could soon see a shortage of inexpensive rental units.

Alliance Abroad Group, the students' visa sponsor, and Hospitality Catering guarantee the students 32 to 40 hours of work per week. When some students sought second jobs, the Whitefish Chamber of Commerce let members know students were available for temporary work, from shoveling snow to answering phones. The jobs listings will be posted in a foreign student mailbox at the library.

The library has also become a meeting place for foreign students. After a librarian noticed communications problems and contacted Literary Volunteers of Flathead County, English classes have been held at the library twice a week since January.

Supply and demand

In addition to students, some local employers are bringing in foreign workers who are heads-of-households with work visas allowing them to stay up to three years in America.

Holiday Inn Express owner Patty Frye has been hiring foreign workers for at least a decade, which now represent 90 percent of her staff. She hires the workers through a labor supplier called Distributed Labor on Demand.

"We offer one of the highest wages in the valley, from $7.50 to $15 per hour, but we've run ads and never got one application," Frye said. "With housekeeping jobs, it doesn't matter what you can pay Americans, even $20 an hour, and they still won't show up. The wage isn't the problem. It's the work ethic. You pay somebody to clean a room, check it and have to send them back to re-do it."

Frustrated at the lack of reliable local workers to fill his shifts, Rocky Mountain Lodge manager Dennis Drumheller hired 10 men from Indonesia last summer.

Drumheller found a house to rent for his new staff and bought air mattress beds, household items and a 50-pound bag of rice. He even took the men to Kalispell to buy bicycles. In the winter, Drumheller moved the workers to rooms in the hotel, where electricity was paid for and they didn't have to commute to work.

"They're here on a mission — to make money and send it home," Drumheller said. "Some worked two or three jobs. Overall, they're great guys."

Drumheller is hooked. He says he's getting ready to order more workers for the upcoming summer.

Competition for

workers increasing

Grouse Mountain Lodge's human resource director Karen Baker said seven student laborers are working at the lodge. The lodge started hiring foreign workers in the 2003 winter season with six. That number increased to nine in 2005. She said they typically hire about 15 students in the summer.

"For the last two or three years, we've had positions open all year," Baker said. "We've added benefits, including a membership to The Wave, paid holidays and vacation, and still we have openings. If we didn't have the students here, I don't know how we'd get all 145 rooms cleaned."

With a Hilton hotel under construction in Kalispell, she's concerned the pool of local workers will be cut back even further in the coming year.

"I wonder if they did any research on labor before they decided to build here," she said.

Foreign laborers are not taking work away from locals, employers told the Pilot. All said they have job openings, including Big Mountain.

"Because of a seasonal labor shortage, we looked at this program as a necessary test for our business," Schott said.

Big Mountain is not cutting back on hours and is still hiring, he said, "so the debate about the international workers taking jobs from locals is ill informed."

Foreign students will be returning home in shifts. Some have already left Montana. The last group will leave Big Mountain in April.

Jan Richards, of Whitefish, is originally from South Africa. She bonded with several of the South African students on the ski slopes, and was touched when one gave her a scarf from his home, as a parting gift.

"Initially they were upset because they had to pay so much rent, but on the whole it was a great experience for them," Richards said. "It was a fabulous experience for us and for them."