Russ Eoff, an employee of Cornerstone Farms Joint Venture, works on a tractor at the Melville family-owned operation just outside of Enterprise on Thursday, March 10, 2022. Eoff is one who will be negatively affected by the passage of HB 4002 which will limit the number of overtime hours he can work.

WALLOWA COUNTY — Farmers and ranchers in Wallowa County won’t be seriously affected by the Legislature’s recent elimination of the overtime exemption for agricultural workers, but they see it as another example of the urban-rural divide in Oregon.

“I’ve been following it all along. The thing people don’t understand is it’s different out here,” said Mike Coppin, who raises cattle and hay near Joseph. “People in the city don’t understand it. We’re going to have to hire more help. It’s going to hurt the worker, not us so much. It’s more government regulations.”

House Bill 4002, passed by the Democrat-controlled House on March 1 and the Senate March 3, reduces incrementally over a five-year period the number of hours a farmworker can work without being paid time-and-a-half for overtime. In 2023-24, the cap on hours is 55, dropping to 48 hours per week for 2025-26 and then 40 hours per week beginning in 2027.

The bill awaits the signature of Democrat Gov. Kate Brown.

Few ag workers here

The reason the bill doesn’t affect many producers in Wallowa County is simple: Not many here have many employees on their farms and ranches.

Coppin said during the summer, he has three to four employees. This time of year, he has one full-time worker along with his son.

“You wonder what their motive is. The workers are going to suffer because they’re going to get cut back on their hours. … It comes down to hiring more people,” Coppin said. “It’s different out here, and they don’t understand it.”

Kevin Melville, who is partners with his father, Tim, and brother, Kurt, in Cornerstone Farms Joint Venture, said the change likely won’t affect Cornerstone this year.

“It probably won’t affect us this year because of the 55-hour threshold,” he said, adding that they will monitor employee hours. “We will not be paying overtime.”

Cornerstone, which largely grows wheat and hay but also has other crops, has six to eight employees during the peak season. They have only a few full-time employees year around.

But there are times Cornerstone has people working long hours, such as during the peak planting and harvest seasons.

“It hurts,” Melville said of HB 4002. “There are times we’ve had people working over 60 hours a week. … By the time we get down to 40 hours in couple years, it’s going to hurt.”

How to get around it?

He said he and brother Kurt have been discussing how to get around the regulations. One way is to become more mechanized, chiefly by installing more automated center pivots for irrigation to eliminate the need for the hand-moving of wheel lines.

Another way would be to give up valuable farmland, which Melville said was virtually out of the question.

Dan Butterfield, of Butterfield Farms east of Joseph that raises mostly hay and wheat, agreed.

“We will be mechanizing more. We’ll put more pivots in,” he said. “The equipment will get bigger so less hired help is needed for that, but that’s been going on last 50 years or so.”

He employs four to five workers during the peak summer season, but has worked things around to avoid overtime.

“We try keep it down,” he said. “But it will definitely harm some people.”

He and others interviewed said the producers in Oregon the law will most likely hurt are ones such as dairies, which require 24/7 care of cows, and row-crop producers, which are labor intensive.

Coppin said another option would be to change the way workers are paid, such as putting them on salary rather than an hourly wage.

“That’s one way everybody’s’ talking. … There are other ways around it,” he said. “It’s just a regulation that’s been thought up by bunch of city people who are not business people.”

Or, Butterfield said, split the work between more workers.

“We’ll have to hire two people to do one person’s job,” he said. “I don’t know as the employees will be happy about that.”

Several farmers said they just have difficulty finding those extra employees.

Can’t pass along costs

Melville said agricultural producers can’t just pass along their increased costs, as they have to accept whatever the market offers.

“Oregon’s already a high-labor state. That’s another thing that puts an Oregon producer at a disadvantage,” he said. “I have to take whatever price they offer.”

Butterfield said lawmakers just don’t seem to understand rural life.

“The problem with farming is it’s so seasonal. If they could, we could average the time out, but there are times they have to work more than 40 hours a week,” he said. “It’s too bad they don’t understand that when they pass these laws.”

Melville and the other producers agreed they don’t want to see their workers put at a disadvantage because of the new law.

“You want to make sure your workers are well paid,” Melville said. “I think it’s going to work out little differently than most people expect.”

Russ Eoff, one of Cornerstone’s few year-round, full-time employees, agreed with his boss.

He spends much of the winter working on equipment in preparation for the growing season. He also drives tractors and trucks for the farm all year long.

He had one simple statement on HB 4002:

“It’s not right,” he said, adding that it hurts both the farmers and their employees.

It won’t leave him unemployed, but it will cut his wages as the Melvilles have to curtail overtime.

“If I wasn’t doing this, I’d be home with my feet up,” he said.