The rule that gives California unions access to private property was put in place for good reason. “It takes account of who farmworkers are, how they work, and the fact that they are really hard to reach,” says Daniel Costa, director of immigration law and policy research at the Economic Policy Institute.
Costa says that many farmworkers live on the premises where they work, meaning that in order to speak to them at all, union organizers need to be able to access private agricultural property. In other cases, such as at Cedar Point, workers live in housing that is rented out and therefore effectively controlled by their employer.
On top of being physically hard to reach, Costa says there are often language barriers, with many workers speaking a primary Indigenous language rather than Spanish or English. “They also sometimes work unusual hours because of the heat, and usually live and work in far-off rural places,” says Costa.