L&I issues Order of Immediate Restraint against Gebbers Farms

The order specifically states that the company is directed to “come into compliance with the additional requirements to protect occupants in temporary worker housing from 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) exposure (emergency farm worker rule), WAC 307-16102, for all of your locations.”

The order adds that “the employer should strongly consider following the cohort provisions.”

“There is no lack of clarity,” said L&I Director of Communications Tim Church. “You are ordered to do it this way.”

The notice was issued following several inspection visits to Gebbers Farms housing sites where investigators cited non-compliance with the worker separation mandates as specified by L&I and the Health Department.

Church said groups allowed to share quarters must be either an individual family or a cohort of no more than 15 workers.

“That means the group must stay together separate from everybody else during living, eating, working and traveling,” said Church. “That means transport on separate busses and work in separate fields.”

Gebbers Farms spokeswoman Amy Philpott said that Gebbers was proactive in early implementation of worker safety measures to meet COVID-19 restrictions.

Philpott pointed out that before the L&I emergency order was applied Gebbers had already created “pods” of workers who lived, ate, traveled, and even recreated together. Each pod was comprised of seven cabins with six workers per cabin for a total of 42 workers per pod, Philpott said.

“They allow one person per cabin to go grocery shopping,” said Philpott. “Each cabin chooses that person. There is limited interaction and we strongly encourage and remind them to maintain the pods during off-work hours.”

Philpott said that in addition to every worker receiving a COVID kit with mask, gloves, sanitizer, information and directions about the disease, a 30-35 person cleaning crew outfitted with suits, masks, shields, and gloves cleans every housing site on a daily basis.

“This was all before the emergency rule,” Philpott said.

Gebbers Farms CEO Cass Gebbers hosted a July 15 telephone conference with Okanogan County Public Health officials, seven days prior to the L&I action to discuss the COVID-19 situation in the Brewster area, where positive cases of the pandemic have recently spiked.

In a July 18 letter following that conference call, health officer John McCarthy, M.D., credited Gebbers Farms for its proactive response to the COVID outbreak noting that the company implemented protocols to address the disease before any other growers in the Okanogan area.

In his letter McCarthy said that Community Health Director Lauri Jones informed him “that Gebbers Farms COVID-19 protocols and the implementation of those protocols have been impeccable.”

“It is clear that Gebbers Farms has gone to great lengths and expense to keep its workers safe during the current COVID-19 pandemic,” McCarthy said.

Church characterized the Order of Restraint as a rare action by his agency.

“We don’t do this very often, maybe five to 10 times a year across a variety of businesses,” said Church. “This one is different because it involves a fatality,” Church said referring to the Hispanic farmworker who had been a Gebbers’ employee for more than a decade.

With the number of positive cases in the county approaching 700 as of July 31, testing is a major priority for health officials. McCarthy cited two public health goals in his letter to Gebbers:

1. “To obtain increased COVID-19 testing of individuals in the Okanogan County area, specifically those who are asymptomatic.

2. Based upon the test results, to have individuals who test positive to be isolated from those that are not knowingly infected.”

Philpott said Gebbers Farms has safety officers regularly monitoring workers, testing those showing symptoms and sending positive individuals to a dedicated quarantine area.

“If they refuse to be tested, they are automatically isolated in a separate location for 14 days,” Philpott said.

While she acknowledged that her information was several days old, Philpott said the number of workers testing positive was just under three percent (2.7) with another 3.5 percent isolated with symptoms.

“Those percentages out of our 4,500 employees and guest workers is significantly lower than the county ratio,” Philpott said.

Church said that by law, L&I now has six months to complete its investigation and make its findings public.

“Where it concerns coronavirus, we are trying to be much quicker,” said Church. “These are immediate safety and health concerns.”

At the conclusion of the L&I investigation a Citation and Notice will be issued. It will outline the nature and level of the violation(s) if any and, if a financial penalty is involved, what that penalty is, Church said.

Philpott said that Gebbers Farms is deeply invested in the community with a business that has spanned five generations and more than 100 years of operation in the area.

“Our challenge is to make the new system we are asked to use, work,” said Philpott. “Gebbers Farms has been doing everything it can to minimize the risk to its workers and the community before the emergency and will continue to do so during and after the emergency.”