“Cip” Garza remembers the Everglades Labor Camp when hundreds of migrant families stayed in broken down trailers with leaky roofs, sagging floors and no electricity.
Read the article Farm Laborers Getting New Housing Complex
Former Gourmet editor and James Beard award-winner Barry Estabrook traces the supermarket tomato from Immokalee, FL and presents a who’s who cast of characters in the tomato industry. This New York Times best-seller includes The Builder, a chapter highlighting Rural Neighborhood’s role in improving agricultural housing.
Ten years ago, hundreds of migrants who harvested Homestead’s winter vegetables lived in dilapidated trailers at the Everglades Labor Camp near Naranja. The camp was set up in 1974 with 400 mobile homes provided by the U.S. Labor Department.[Steven Kirk]’s nonprofit association has spent the past 10 years using more than $40-million in local, state…
In Homestead, farmworkers have a choice of living in what one resident calls paradise. The community is called Everglades Village. The housing project was built by an organization called the Everglades Community Association, a public-private group whose goal is to build decent and affordable housing for farmworkers. Read the article Group to Build Housing for…
Magali Perez, 25, remembers coming home from her job at a plant nursery, hoping she was next in line to use the kitchen shared by four families living under one roof. They shared one stove, so they had to cook and eat in shifts. She and her husband, Ramiro, and their five children now have…
The challenges of site acquisition, land use, and competitive financing are no different in communities targeting agricultural workers than in other affordable rental communities, said Kirk. “The added complexity in serving farmworkers is to understand agricultural markets and wages, and to layer sufficient subsidies to reach affordability.” Read the article Seeds of Change
Miami-Dade Parks kicked off the opening of its newest addition Saturday with mariachis, Mexican food and a hot-air balloon – all while fighting off rain and mosquitoes. But the dreary day did not stop residents from enjoying the celebration. “We came to see the opening,” said Vanessa Godinez, 12, who went with her family. Read…