Crocktown

Across the area, migrant office workers are packing up their things and heading home as their traditional labor season comes to an end. Migrant office worker camps are emptying out now, with only a few post-it notes and empty 3-ring binders left behind as proof they were once occupied.

"We're really going to miss some of these guys," says Migrant Education worker Paulina Moreno. "Their visas only permit them to stay during the traditional report harvesting season from November to April, but I wish they could stay longer."

Office manager Hank Feldman agrees. "There are a lot of hard workers in this year's group. Whether they were filing papers, doing data processing, or answering phones, they gave 110 percent."

Feldman says he would like to see changes to the H-2B visa program, which only allows 65,000 people nationally to come each year for a defined season. Feldman says they could use a lot more help with tasks like making PowerPoint presentations and taking part in conference calls. He says they can't find enough help locally to fill the posts, and that companies like his would benefit if the workers could stay year-round.