Workers Hired To Clean Up After Ike Robbed, Injured, Stranded
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Workers Hired To Clean Up After Ike Robbed, Injured, Stranded
Hundreds of workers who were hired to clean up the damage left by Hurricane Ike say they have been robbed of wages, injured on the job and left stranded with nowhere to go.
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(December 3, 2008)—Hundreds of workers who were hired to clean up the damage left by Hurricane Ike say they have been robbed of wages, injured on the job and left stranded with nowhere to go.

The pattern is the same as after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, and advocates for the workers say it is being repeated in Houston and other Texas Gulf Coast cities.

The Houston Interfaith Worker Justice Center said in some cases, employers cited for worker abuse in Katrina have also turned up in worker complaints in Texas.

It says one Florida-based company, Timberwood Carpentry, recruited 1,000 workers from Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia and Texas for clean-up work, offering offered lodging, food, transportation and months of work.

However, once workers got to Port Arthur there were no hotel rooms.

Instead, they had to sleep outside or in cars.

The center says about 160 workers reported wage theft with a total of $121,681 in pay withheld from workers.

Of that, only $35,770 has been recovered.

Timberwood did not comment.

Latest Comments

Posted by: yazmin Location: temple on Dec 3, 2008 at 12:34 PM

what is going on in galveston? the day before yesterday they said on the news that there is still a ton of debris, animals and possibly even people still scattered about the beach. a friend of mine helped in the inital clean up and said there were bodies everywhere! they don't tell you that on the news!
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