Like it or not, the territory is preparing for a massive influx of foreign labor that could begin as early as this fall and last about a decade.
An estimated 7,000 imported laborers will be needed to augment local workers, in order to complete all the federally funded construction projects now in the pipeline, according to V.I. Labor Commissioner Gary Molloy, who spoke with the Source Friday.
All are intended to be temporary residents and are likely to overlap, so the numbers may fluctuate over the years. Even so, they will not go unnoticed in a territory with — according to the 2020 Census — a total population of just 87,000 and a domestic workforce of 35,300 across all sectors, according to 2022 estimates.
Molloy said some international companies that have indicated an interest in contracting for V.I. projects have a pool of non-U.S. workers they want to be able to use for the jobs.
Earlier this month, Government House announced that Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. has approached the U.S. State Department to ask about a Visa waiver that would make it easier for contractors to bring laborers from other countries into the territory to work in construction.
“That’s the long game,” Molloy said, referring to the Visa waiver request.
More immediately, his department has been working with the U.S. Labor Department to tap into its H-2B program, which is a more limited gateway for importing temporary non-U.S. workers.
Molloy presented the move not just as necessary but as inevitable.
The federal government has committed $12 billion to $15 billion of disaster relief funds to the territory. Each individual project that money supports must meet federal standards and federal deadlines. “There’s no way” all of the deadlines can be met with the existing local workforce, he said.
“Gov. Bryan’s been sounding the alarm for a long time,” Molloy said. “The time has come.”
In 2020, the RAND Corporation, the think tank and public-sector consulting firm, issued a report on the territory’s progress toward hurricane recovery. It cited the Virgin Islands’ labor shortage as one of the major challenges facing rebuilding efforts. At that time, it said the islands needed more than 5,000 additional workers. But Molloy said that number has since grown closer to 7,000.
“This labor shortage is throughout the world,” Molloy said.
It is especially acute in the Virgin Islands, where the 2020 Census showed an 18 percent drop in population, much of it affecting working-age people, a factor Molloy said is “a major part” of the V.I. labor shortage.
With the territory already more than six years out from the double hurricanes that precipitated the disaster funds, the administration doesn’t want a labor shortage to delay things further, and drive up costs.
“We’re exploring every way we can to get these projects moving,” Molloy said.
The H-2B may be the most immediate.
As described on the the U.S. Labor Department’s website, it is a way to bring non-immigrant laborers into the U.S. on a temporary basis, for a pre-determined limited amount of time. It can be used for seasonal workers, to meet a peak-load need, on an intermittent basis, or as a one-time occurrence.
“The H-2B program also establishes certain recruitment and displacement standards in order to protect similarly employed U.S. workers,” according to the website. The employer bringing in workers must attest that they will be paid at least the minimum wage as it is set by federal and local law. (The V.I. minimum wage is $10.50 per hour, so trumps the federal, which is $7.25.) Further, it says the employer must offer wages at the prevailing rate.
Molloy said the Virgin Islands is proposing using H-2B under the standard of a one-time occurrence, with a time limit of three years. There is a provision within the program for an extension of up to two additional years, but Molloy said if there were an extension for the territory it would be nine months.
“We’re going to help facilitate” the process, but it is up to the contractor(s) actually to apply to participate in the H-2B program, Molloy said. “We need to get a firm list from these contractors” of what workers they want to bring and from what country or countries.
The administration is also looking for ways to ensure there is housing for an influx of workers.
“We have to be creative,” Molloy said. Considerations include everything from converting unused housing units or setting up a version of the “man camp” that once served the former Limetree Bay refinery to docking a cruise ship and using its staterooms as housing units.
If contractors get their applications in by July, they could be bringing in workers as soon as October, Molloy said.
Meanwhile, the Bryan administration is also trying to get the U.S. State Department to grant it a Visa waiver for workers somewhat similar to that which Guam enjoys, Molloy said. Because of the heavy U.S. military presence in Guam, it has a basically open-ended waiver.
The V.I. is seeking a waiver that would be more restricted, according to Molloy, who described it as “open-ended, based on demand.”
Sensitive to misgivings the V.I. community may have, Molloy noted this would not be the first time the territory had a Visa waiver. Under Gov. Ralph Paiewonsky in the 1960s, there was a waiver for workers setting up the Hess Oil refinery on St. Croix.
“Back then there wasn’t a lot of safeguards in place,” Molloy said. But now, the U.S. is more careful about people entering the country (including its territories) from other countries. “The screenings are going to be in place.”
In the past, the V.I. also had special immigration provisions to facilitate bringing workers from other Caribbean islands to staff its growing tourism industry. The territory’s population increase from 32,099 in 1960 to 96,569 by 1980 is generally attributed to the substantial inter-island migration of that period.
The current move is not expected to make such a change since it is time-limited.
Given all the possible factors involved — including political, bureaucratic or disaster occurrence delays — it’s difficult to say just how long foreign workers may end up being in the territory.
Each construction project has its own timeline. Most have a completion deadline of between two to five years from the start of work, Molloy said.
“So I’d say 10 years is a very good window” for the full timeframe, he said.
