Ask Aliana Varvaloucas what her colleagues have seen in the homes of the dairy farmworkers she represents and she will say “broken everything.”

The managing attorney for the Legal Aid Society’s Farm Worker Law Project ticks off a list of damage, decay and vermin that compromise human health and safety: broken windows, doors, floors, walls, stoves, water heaters, heaters, roofs, cabinets; slanted floors, sewage in showers and going into the ground around the housing; soft wet spongy floors, no locks on doors or windows; flies and bugs, broken steps; rooms with no windows, wall-to-wall rugs that haven’t been cleaned in years, filthy furniture, beg bugs, mosquitos, skunks living under housing, mice, rodents and rats.

While many who aid farmworkers find the conditions shocking, she said workers rarely complain about their employer-provided living accommodations in aging mobile homes and farmhouses or, in some cases, dormitories in the barns themselves. If they do speak up, the workers could be fired and then evicted. And without work or a place to live, they may be deported, as advocates estimate 90 percent are from outside the U.S. and a vast majority of those are undocumented. There seems to be no easy answer for workers whose bosses are also their landlords. The problem is exacerbated by a lack of oversight for dairy worker housing due to limitations in existing law — something advocates are pushing to change.

“There are six different farmworker statutes on housing and none of them apply to dairy housing,” said Varvaloucas who works out of New Paltz. “Dairy farmworkers fall through the cracks. There is a massive loophole in the law.”

There is some effort to create oversight for housing — both in Albany and Washington. The New York Farm Bureau is asking Gov. Kathy Hochul to restore $400,000 to its budget to support farm-provided housing inspections. And in Washington, lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bipartisan Farm Workforce Modernization Act, which would move year-round dairy workers out of the undocumented shadows and into the H-2A visa program, which requires the state Department of Health to inspect worker housing.

Advocates like Varvaloucas say those measures are just the start of a necessary overhaul for dairy farmworkers, who are isolated on the vast stretches of the state’s rural landscape.

Ideally, she would like to see overall immigration reform, but for now, she and other advocates for farmworkers would like, at the very least, to have the state require inspections of all employer-provided housing.

“Inspections aren’t perfect and there are bad conditions at H-2A camps, too,” Varvaloucas said. “But at least with those camps there is a visit, there is some sort of third-party authority overseeing things.”

Of course, not all farms offer dilapidated, unsafe or unsanitary housing for their workers. Immigrant advocates admit that some farm owners welcome workers with adequate housing. Among them is one Saratoga County farmer who has been identified by county social workers as maintaining worker apartments as “well as his own home.”

He spoke to the Times Union recently, asking to remain anonymous to shield his workers, who are undocumented, from being deported. He said providing decent and safe housing is a good investment.

“They are good people,” he said. “It’s worth it. They are a big value to us.”

Terry Diggory, with the Saratoga Immigration Coalition, agreed. He said these workers are specialized in the care of animals.

“What the farmers really value is the people who already have that experience and can supervise a herd,” said Diggory, who frequently drives workers to appointments and on errands. “They take care of the medical problems that show up, identify diseases, attend at birthing of calves, there is a whole range of things that the workers need to be a specialist in.”

They also have to milk the herd two or three times a day.

On the one Saratoga County farm, the workers care, feed and milk the herd of more than 1,000 cows. That dairy man is in full support of the bill in Washington to bring these year-round workers into the seasonal or migrant worker H-2A program. That program currently allows workers to travel from their country to work during a limited time period, for example, during an apple orchard harvest or over a summer at a hotel in Lake George. Dairy farms, as year-round operations, aren’t currently allowed to participate.

“The country needs the help,” the farmer said. “We are anxious to get the help. We can’t find it locally. … I’d loved to convince the government to do something that was easy to follow and effective. Right now, there is no program available to us.”

But Emma Kreyche, director of advocacy for the Worker Justice Center of New York which operates in 33 counties, says the act creates a new problem. It will force the worker to be tied to one farm. If they leave or are fired, they not only lose their home, but will be deported.

“As a worker’s rights organization, we are categorically opposed to the expansion of the H-2A program, not because we have anything against the H-2A workers but because the H-2A program is historically rife with labor abuses,” she said. “It is true H-2A housing is more closely regulated. But for an employer to say if we have access to the visa program, we will improve our housing is just very backwards. It’s a very problematic solution to what is really a problem that could be solved through greater improved regulation on state level and oversight in worker housing more broadly.”

This is an important issue in rural areas throughout the state, which, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is one of the nation’s top five dairy producers. The state Farm Bureau estimates there are more than 3,600 dairy farms that produce 15 billion pounds of milk from 625,000 cows each year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that nearly 26,000 laborers work 150 or more days on farms, including dairy farms. A breakout figure for dairy farm laborers was not available.

A 2019 study on New York dairy farmworkers from Kreyche’s Workers Justice Center noted that 97 percent of dairy farmworkers live in farm-provided homes. Of those surveyed, 58 percent reported bug or insect infestations in their homes, 48 percent said they had no locks on their doors, 32 percent said they had holes in their walls or floors and another 32 percent complained of poor ventilation.

Among other recommendations, the report called on the state to “ensure that all farmworkers live in safe and dignified housing.”

“Dairy housing must meet all housing requirements and should provide safe, sanitary housing regardless of immigration status,” Steve Ammerman, spokesman for the Farm Bureau said in an email. “Local code enforcement and departments of health have jurisdiction and can be called in if there is a complaint. If there is a problem, New York Farm Bureau encourages a worker to notify proper authorities. The same goes for worker justice organizations. They cannot make allegations without reporting them to authorities. If they fail to do so, I would question why.”

Kreyche said dairy farmworkers don’t even want their advocates to report the conditions because they fear punishment.

“I visited a farm not far from Albany, where workers were housed in basically a cesspool without proper sewage,” Kreyche said. “There was a broken window, exposed wiring and electricity running through extension cords. None of this is legal. … Your remedy is to call the local building inspector. But, the problem is, what is the outcome? First, you have to feel supported or empowered, empowered enough that you will not have to worry about what will happen.”

Even supportive farmers find that their workers are reluctant to report a problem with the housing.

“They are not good at telling me what is wrong, so I have to go through and check the house every so often,” the Saratoga County farmer said.

He recalls a time when the heat wasn’t working in the apartment for one of his workers.

“I asked how long was this the case and they looked at you like they didn’t want to admit it or bother me,” he said. “We have to keep track of everything.”

That is one of the recommendations from Cornell College of Agriculture and Life Science’s Farmworker Program’s report, “Creating Positive Workplaces: A Guidebook for Dairy Producers.” It suggests a monthly inspection that includes a 27-item checklist that includes ensuring the stove works, the cabinets aren’t broken and the toilet doesn’t need repair. It also includes making sure there are enough beds for worker, locks on doors, heat and electric.

“Good housing contributes to worker satisfaction and greater productivity on the farm,” the guidebook notes. “Some farmers place a high priority on providing good-quality housing, while others find housing to be a necessary but challenging aspect of farm management. This situation can create challenges for those that own the housing as well as the occupants. Given that dairy farmers typically provide housing to their employees, it is important to have clear housing expectations for standards of care, maintenance, visitors and security issues.”

Cornell is also training inspectors who will visit farms and collect data on housing in a “non-subjective, non-regulatory” way.

Still, Varvaloucas said the power dynamic between the worker and the farmer keeps the workers vulnerable.

“Even with an anonymous complaint, it can be easy for an employer to figure out who called a lawyer or local code enforcement,” Varvaloucas said. “This is why annual inspections would be so helpful. They take the burden off the worker to come forward because now there is a third-party enforcement agency that lays eyes on the housing at regular intervals. If housing is up to code, owners should not have any problem passing inspection.”

Note: This story was updated on Sunday morning to note that the number of farmworkers comes from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the state Farm Bureau seeks funds to support inspections of farmworker housing.