Just after Ala Moana Boulevard becomes Nimitz Highway, there is a hard left turn that borders Honolulu Harbor. Makai of the roadway are state piers 17 and 18 with a picturesque fishing fleet snug in the harbor.
The 140 or so boats tied up at the docks are the subject of a devastating expose by The Associated Press.
Reporters Martha Mendoza and Margie Mason detail how the hundreds of foreign fishermen come in and out of port, fishing from here to the West Coast, but are unable to leave the piers and held in what are dubbed “floating prisons” in downtown
Honolulu.
The story Opens in a new tab is troubling on many levels.
First, there are the inhumane working and living conditions of the boats, as the undocumented men — who, because of a federal loophole — are allowed to work without any normal labor law protections. Second, because they have no visas, they can’t leave their boats and are essentially wards of the boats’ captains.
Finally, there is the disparity in price. The fish caught are $1,000 prizes, with the Hawaiian swordfish and tuna valued around the country and sold by Costco and Whole Foods for more than $20 a pound — caught by men making maybe 70 cents an hour.
“The investigation found men living in squalor on some boats, forced to use buckets instead of toilets, suffering running sores from bed bugs and sometimes lacking sufficient food. It also revealed instances of human trafficking,” read the report.
“Under the law, U.S. citizens must make up 75 percent of the crew on most commercial fishing vessels in America. But influential lawmakers, including the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye of Hawaii, pushed for a loophole to support one of the state’s biggest industries. It exempted commercial fishing boat owners from federal rules enforced almost everywhere else,” AP said.
Maui Democratic state Rep. Kaniela Ing, chairman of the Ocean, Marine Resources and Hawaiian
Affairs Committee, said
the news story read like a
labor abuse case from 1916, not 2016.
“There are reports of horrific labor conditions coming from foreign countries, but to see this happening in our own backyard — shocking,” Ing said in an interview.
Ing is calling for an investigation. First, he wants an attorney general opinion into what he called “the alleged unfair labor and business practices conducted at … Honolulu Harbor.”
If that opinion can trigger an injunction, good. But Ing said if that doesn’t work, he plans committee hearings and legislative scrutiny.
Ing cautioned, however, that because it is a case of undocumented workers, government must be careful that it doesn’t hurt the workers by causing them to both lose their jobs and be tossed out on the street.
The irony in all this is that, as the AP report notes, “Hawaii’s fishing industry is otherwise one of the most tightly regulated for catch limits and sustainability.”
So far, Hawaii’s U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono has recognized the abuse and is proposing an amendment that would at least allow the fisherman to legally fly into Hawaii that would remove the illegal alien problem.
Any solution will be complex, but the injustice and cruelty is simple for anyone to see.
Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.
