LAKE COUNTY — Washing, sorting, packing and cooling, more than 200 people filled positions at the Scully Packing Company in Finley processing pears at jobs that didn”t exist a few weeks ago.
The company is packing pears from the Sacramento Valley and will soon take in the fruit from Mendocino and Lake counties, necessitating the company to open its Scotts Valley plant for more processing, owner Toni Scully said. Company employment will double.
“Our employees are wonderful,” Scully said. “They”re diligent and they really care about their work.”
The farm industry added 500 jobs in June in Lake County as unemployment fell 0.3 percentage points to 16.8 percent, according to the Employment Development Department. While California and U.S. unemployment inched up 0.3 percentage points each to 12.2 percent and 9.6 percent, respectively, Lake County”s dropped at the same rate. Dennis Mullins of the Labor Market Information Division of EDD said the numbers show a seasonal trend, with farm jobs up alongside leisure and hospitality, which added 80 jobs in June.
Scully said they are taking work applications.
“It”s heartbreaking to see the people out of work now,” Scully said. “Some people come in who worked last year and say they haven”t had a job since. We”re glad we can help some of them.”
Chuck March, executive director of the Lake County Farm Bureau, said he thinks the increase in June farm jobs might have been in the vineyards suckering grape vines by picking leaves and pulling undesirable branches off the vines.
The harvest season has the pear-packing houses fired up employing hundreds in Lake County, March said. But the Lake County fruit harvest might be delayed a few weeks.
“A big factor is the late spring,” March said. “A lot of operations didn”t get kicked in as usual.”
He thinks the pear season will continue up until the grape harvest that might start in early September, keeping hundreds of seasonal jobs in the Lake County farm industry.
“It”s really hard to plan for a labor force,” March said. “You don”t know exactly what day the sugar content will be right in the grapes.”
Scully Packing Company might have a few weeks lull between Sacramento fruit and that from Mendocino and Lake counties, but Scully expects to be busy through August. The company processes 1.25 million pounds of pears, or 625 tons, a day. They pack mostly Bartletts, but also Red Crimson, Bosc and Comice. About 20 percent to 25 percent of California pears are grown in Lake County.
Scully is also the president of the Lake County California Women for Agriculture.
She said the company takes the pears from the orchard to the bank, through grading, packaging, storing, selling and collecting the money to disburse back to the growers. She estimated about 50 percent of pears they receive are packed fresh and the others are sorted for canning, fruit cocktails, dried pears, baby food and juice. Workers move pears with brown markings to a separate conveyor belt for processing. Scully said those fruits would be “dandy when the peel comes off.”
Contact Katy Sweeny at kdsweeny@gmail.com or call her directly at 263-5636, ext. 37.
