Publix “Neighborhood Grocer” image takes yet another hit…

News-Press report exposes Publix use of foreign students on temporary work visas (part-time, no benefits) to fill hundreds of local jobs in the face of 14% unemployment!

Editorial: Publix claim they can’t find local workers to fill jobs “insulting nonsense“

It’s been a rough few months for Publix and its public relations department.

First, there was the revelation in this space that Publix continues to purchase tomatoes from the very Immokalee-based growers tainted by the most recent slavery prosecution. The best answer Publix could muster for that particular disgrace was this:

“… the chain does purchase tomatoes from the two farms but pays a fair market price.” (“Farmworkers protest supermarket tomatoes,” 11/24/09)

Then, there was the story about Publix — Florida’s richest privately-held corporation — looking for taxpayers to foot the bill for their rent at a downtown Ft. Myers location. The fact that Publix, an economic powerhouse, would receive taxpayer-subsidized rent, at the rate of $50,000 per month, was too much for some city council representatives, one of whom called the deal “offensive.” It appears that deal, ultimately, didn’t survive public scrutiny and was killed.

Now comes this:

“At a time when Lee County’s unemployment rate is almost 14 percent and about 38,000 residents are jobless, Publix is paying people from South America to work at some of its Southwest Florida supermarkets. For the last three years, Publix has hired hundreds of Peruvians and Brazilians for its stores in south Fort Myers and Naples during tourist season because the company says it can’t find locals to fill those spots… … ‘Are you kidding?’ asked Rita Hursell. The 46-year-old nurse’s aide, who’s been out of work since 2007, is on food stamps and lives with her parents in Lehigh Acres. Hursell, who just completed a computer class at the Career and Service Center in Fort Myers, said she’d be happy to work at Publix even on a part-time, temporary basis. ‘I wouldn’t mind at all,’ she said.”

You can find the entire article here.

Here’s what the News-Press editorial board had to say about this latest revelation:

“It’s simply not acceptable for Southwest Florida employers to import foreign workers when the local unemployment rate is almost 14 percent. That’s especially so when they are using a cultural exchange program to get those workers visas without having to show that Americans won’t take the jobs. Publix and some other employers claim they can’t find Americans to do the low-paid, temporary jobs at issue. Since 2008, when unemployment was already 6 percent, Publix has hired hundreds of Peruvians and Brazilians for its stores in south Fort Myers and Naples in the tourist season, when it says it’s hard to find locals for the temporary jobs. What we are hearing from some of the county’s 38,000 jobless and the employment specialists who try to help them is that this is insulting nonsense. We agree.”

Thus far, the PR department has pledged to “revisit (the program) for 2011.”

Stay tuned, because from the sound of things, the 38,000 unemployed workers in Lee County — and tens of thousands more concerned consumers — may not be willing to wait that long for Publix to correct its course. In the words of one commenter on the News-Press story, “Let them ‘reconsider their hiring policy’. I’m ‘reconsidering my patronage policy’.”