Missoulian - Flathead Valley employers search the globe for workers

WHITEFISH - Once upon a time, that young fellow in the handmade Peruvian wool hat loading chairlifts at Big Mountain ski resort was just another ski bum.

This year, chances are good he might actually be Peruvian.

“We have brought in workers from Peru and Brazil,” said Brian Schott, spokesman for the resort. “It's sort of a test program for us.”

Others in the Flathead Valley's hospitality industry also have been testing international waters in recent years, bringing in foreign workers to handle low-wage jobs.

The reason, Schott said, is simple: “We have had some labor issues in the past couple years.”

With unemployment at record lows - near 3 percent in Flathead County - pretty much everyone who wants work has work. That makes it tough for those offering service-industry wages to attract quality employees.

Last fall, Angela Pitts told the Missoulian the Flathead is experiencing a “tighter labor market than we have ever faced. There just aren't enough workers to fill the jobs.”

Pitts is manager at LC Staffing, a private job placement center in Kalispell.

Since then, “we certainly have continued to carry a significant number of job openings,” said Job Service manager Mike Shoquist.

McDonalds now offers double digits for an hour's work, and fast-food health insurance is not unheard of. Burger-flipping signing bonuses are now a reality.

Even Plum Creek Timber Co., a strong employer offering long-term benefits, has been forced to increase its starting wage by a full 20 percent to better compete with high-paying construction jobs.

And according to Jim Sylvester, that's generally how it works.

“When labor constrains,” he said, “wages go up. That's the standard theory.”

It's happening all across western Montana, the University of Montana economist said, down in Bozeman, out in the oil fields.

“A tight labor market traditionally results in higher wages,” he said.

But there is another alternative in today's world. Instead of raising wages to meet the workforce, businesses can raise a workforce to meet the wages.

At Whitefish Lake Lodge, general manager Scott Ringer has imported Asians onto his staff, as well as Brazilians and Eastern Europeans. Many of those same Eastern Europeans also have found work at Glacier Park Inc., the private company that operates hotels and other concessions in Glacier National Park.

Some of the area's hotels and related businesses have even joined forces, hiring employment companies to bring a small army of foreign workers to handle the height of the tourism season.

“You contract with the companies and they provide the service,” Ringer said. “Basically, they deliver employees to your doorstep.”

That's what Big Mountain did this year, Schott said, for the first time ever. He calls it “a sort of cultural exchange.”

But how does that exchange affect the tourism economy, if it keeps wages artificially low throughout the industry?

“There's probably no real big impact,” Sylvester said. “If local people were lined up looking for those jobs, that would be something else. But everyone's working. You'd have to bring in a lot of people to push down wages in the overall economy.”

And as it turns out, the move toward foreign workers may, in fact, have more to do with the turning of the seasons than it does with wage controls.

At Ringer's lodge, staffing peaks during the summer months, only to fall off dramatically in spring and autumn. He keeps a core group employed year-round, but the rest of the work is seasonal.

It's risky, he said, to gamble that a seasonal workforce will be available locally when the time comes, especially in a remarkably tight labor market. A better bet is to contract with a guaranteed workforce months in advance.

“This sort of thing is absolutely common in a seasonal economy,” he said, “anywhere you have these huge fluctuations between summer and the rest of the year.”

“Seasonality is a big factor in this type of imported workforce,” agreed Larry Swanson, economist at the Center for the Rocky Mountain West. “The seasonal businesses nationwide have really gone to a foreign market for labor.”

But even at the peak, Ringer said, only about 5 percent of his workforce is imported.

At Big Mountain, the immigrant labor “test program” will hire about 60 workers this year, from Peru, Brazil and South Africa. They live several to an apartment, Schott said, in housing set up by the employment agency.

So far, there is no plan to build employee housing for the crews.

There is, however, a “great opportunity to bring an international aspect to the mountain,” Schott said. “I think it's kind of cool to bring a little more cultural depth to the work experience up here.”

And if you're itching to get your own Peruvian wooly and become a lifty, don't worry, he said. “There's still plenty of opportunities for locals to come up and work on the mountain.”

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