It's Sunday afternoon in West Asheville. The city is living to the rhythm of a new normal and at this time of the afternoon the goal of those walking or driving is the same: to get drinking water and non-drinkable food, eating at distribution centers or helping with community efforts to ease the burden on a town still trying to measure and mitigate the damage left by Hurricane Helene in its wake across the southern United States. Appalachian Mountains.
At Doble Crown, one of the oldest and most popular bars in the area, there is a community help center: the tables where drinks used to be served are now filled with donations. They also have non-potable water. Hot food. And sometimes, free gasoline.
In several cars parked on Haywood Road, in front of and near this bar, Latino workers are also looking for help: food, water, maybe gasoline. They are Venezuelans and have not been in the United States for very long: some two years, many just a couple of months.
Einar Rojas has been living in the country for a year and a half, in the city of Chicago. But now he has been in Asheville for almost two weeks, working more than 10 hours a day from Sunday to Sunday. Hurricane Helene is the second natural disaster in which he has participated as a worker in devastated areas. The first was Hurricane Helene. Hurricane Ian, in Florida.
How did they end up in Asheville, in western North Carolina? “There's someone in charge of organizing workers, and through him, they're always contacting us,” Einar explained, referring to the contractors who recruit Latino workers, many of them undocumented, to transport them to disaster areas.
“They’re always contacting us. Anything, any event like this one right now, like this hurricane, we’re in that part, in the reconstruction,” he told Enlace Latino NC .
Both Einar and his colleagues are known as "disaster workers": immigrants—mostly undocumented—who work in cleanup, demolition, and reconstruction after severe weather events, such as hurricanes.
Their involvement in these tasks became especially visible after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when thousands of immigrants arrived in the affected areas to work on recovery efforts. They are also known as "second responders" because they take on crucial tasks after the initial response from emergency services.
A dangerous job
Einar Rojas (50 years old, has been in the United States for a year and a half), Yofran (1 years old, has been in the country for a year and preferred not to give his last name) and Fabio (42 years old, has been in the country for a month and also chose not to give his last name): all three are Venezuelan and did not know anything about Asheville until they arrived here as natural disaster workers.
At the Doble Crown donation center, they looked for water and food and hoped, perhaps, to receive gasoline. The three shared a red car with two other Venezuelan immigrants who, like them, work cleaning up debris in the disaster zone.
“It's normally a dangerous job because of the disaster that occurred. We're in charge of clearing the debris. And it's tough because you have to work ten hours a day. But that's what we're here for, to help,” said Einar Rojas.
According to him, there are about 100 Venezuelan workers in his group who are staying in a hotel paid for by the contracting company. Since Enlace Latino NC We weren't able to find out the name of the company, but Einar told us that they will be staying in Asheville until November 20th and that they are using protective measures: "yes, everything, helmet, gloves, masks, boots."
The report "Recovering from climate disasters: Migrant day laborers as 'second responders'The National Day Laborer Organizing Network's "Report on Temporary Immigrant Workers" highlights that temporary immigrant workers play a crucial role in cleanup and rebuilding after natural disasters, facing dangerous working conditions and, in many cases, a lack of protection.
According to the report, only 15 percent of these workers have received any type of safety training on working in natural disasters, and only 20 percent have been informed about mold-related risks.
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Latino Workers in River Arts District
In the River Arts District area - one of the areas most impacted by the French Broad River's flooding during Hurricane Helene in Asheville - a group of Latino workers cleans a building that had been completely submerged. They are a group of about 10 people, all from Winston Salem, a city in North Carolina about 3 hours from Asheville.
While Enlace Latino NC I was trying to talk to them to ask about their help clearing debris after the hurricane, when an American man approached and asked us to leave. "I'm the one who pays their salaries," he argued. He clarified, "This is a free country, but they're working for me."
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No data from the County
Enlace Latino NC asked about this issue at the daily press conference held by Buncombe County and the city of Asheville at 11 a.m. each day. The county said contractors are responsible for the safety and treatment of workers, and that it does not have data on how many temporary workers have come to the city to help with the cleanup and reconstruction of the area.
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Hello Patricia, my name is Fernando. I am Argentine and I am trying to go to work in the hurricane disaster zone. I live in Miami and I have been out of work for 3 months. I am American. I worked for 10 years painting houses and buildings, 13 years in the nautical industry.
My phone number is 786 290 2754. If you want to call me for any reason, please send me a text message first. Thank you.