With visa program in limbo, seasonal businesses struggling

The program, which allows seasonal workers to return to the United States, expired in the fall. Attempts to renew it are mired in the national controversy over immigration reform.

Seasonal businesses that rely on foreign workers say they are struggling with skeleton staffs and may go out of business unless Congress renews the visa program, which allows 66,000 temporary nonagricultural workers into the country annually.

At Graham and Rollins, a seafood distributor in Hampton, 11 workers are processing crabs these days instead of the 100 foreign workers it typically hires.

At those levels, the business cannot continue.

"We've already set a date for July 1 to make a decision to pull the trigger to decide our fate," said Johnny Graham, president of the fourth-generation, family-owned crab processor. "One option is to close. There is no Plan B."

If the bill were to pass today, it would take at least a month to get workers here.

The business owners who rely on the seasonal help say the returning workers are being confused with illegal immigrants.

Many are experienced, such as most of the 30 to 40 employees at Pamlico Packing Co., said Don Cross, an owner of the Vandemere, N.C., seafood processor. "We need these workers."

Some businesses said they may attempt to hire the hundreds of foreign students who come to Virginia Beach and the Outer Banks each summer, many from Russia and Eastern Europe.