WAFLA Op Ed Pt 2

WAFLA Op Ed Pt 2

Bob Larson
Bob Larson
With today’s Fruit Grower Report, I’m Bob Larson. WAFLA took heat last month from the Governor’s office after executive director Dan Fazio’s Seattle Times Op Ed celebrating the successful year foreign ag workers had battling COVID.

Fazio says the data wasn’t refuted after Medical Teams International contracted with the state to administer vaccinations to 95% of the workforce, which is not the story labor activists want to tell …

FAZIO … “First of all, befuddled that someone would have a problem with it. Second of all, that the Governor’s office would choose to insert themselves. If Rosalinda Guillen doesn’t like what I’ve said in the Seattle Times, she should call up the Seattle Times and offer to do a rebuttal. But, I don’t think that the Governor’s office needed to get involved.”

But then ...

FAZIO … “And then the third, the implication that the Department of Health owns the data and would not want the data put out there unless it was the data that told the story that they wanted to tell.”

Which, Fazio says raises questions …

FAZIO … “If the Department of Health wants to tell a story, consistent with Rosalinda Guillen’s story, that farmworkers are being abused, I don’t think that’s a great idea that the government gets to control that story. Whether it’s a positive story or a negative story, I think my interest is that the story gets out there truthfully.”

That, Fazio says is all he’s asking …

FAZIO … “Putting these clauses in contracts that the government has, saying that you can’t release data, is concerning to me.”

Fazio says it’s a positive story, that’s it.

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