The compensation the Mexican government promised to former "braceros" or farm workers who toiled in U.S. fields decades ago in now available but thousands of men have not claimed it.
That's according to María Elena Espinoza, from the non-profit agency Casa Familiar, which began registering the former workers who live in San Diego County in 2001 to receive the payment.
The Mexican government is offering a payment of around 38,000 pesos, around $3,000, to the former workers, or if they have died, to their widows and children.
The bracero program allowed Mexican laborers to work temporarily on U.S. farms from 1942 and to 1960 during manpower shortages.
A portion of their wages were withheld in the United States and sent to Mexico, which decades later agreed to pay the former farmworkers. To claim that payment, they had to present documentation to the government, paperwork Casa Familiar helped to organize.
Periodically, the Mexican government announces when payments are ready for the workers, which then must go claim them. In May, the government said that payments for nearly 36,000 people were ready.
To date, 852 people have turned to Casa Familiar, in San Ysidro, to seek help in making a claim, Espinoza said.
She said the process for making the payments has been slow. Complicating matters, the ex-workers are in their seventies and eighties, and some don't even know they are eligible to receive them.
Espinoza said that her agency organizes trips to the office of Telecomm in Tijuana, where the former workers can pick up their payment.
The former workers or their families may obtain more information about this compensation program at Casa Familiar, 619.428-1115.
Alexandra.mendoza@sandiegored.com
