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Hamptons day laborers' campsites sign of poor economy

BY DAVE MARCUS | dave.marcus@newsday.com

9:53 PM EDT, April 20, 2009

The latest sign of money troubles in the Hamptons can be found amid the makeshift tent, mattress and remnants of a camp fire in a stretch of woods near downtown Southampton: A few day laborers are living outdoors because they can't pay rent anywhere, according to village officials.

Mayor Mark Epley warned Monday that day laborers are having trouble finding work in Southampton, one of Amer-ica's wealthiest enclaves. "They're not being hired, they're falling behind on the rent and they're becoming homeless," he said in a news conference.

Southampton Village Police Chief William Wilson put the number of homeless day laborers at "a half dozen" in three or four locations near the railroad tracks.

The mayor, who has often spoken out against undocumented workers, said the village has been inundated with people from Central and South America looking for jobs in landscaping and construction at a time when the economy is in dire straits.

In the village, building permits were down 50 percent last month compared with the previous March, the mayor said. During the same one-year period, real estate sales plummeted 80 percent.

The mayor and the police chief said they can do little about the problem, other than appealing to churches and community groups to provide housing and calling on the federal government to tighten immigration laws and borders.

Telesforo Serafico, 58, a carpenter from Mexico who arrived in the United States 18 years ago, said he has watched as immigrant friends in the Hamptons have lost jobs in construction and given up one meal after another.

"I've seen a few of the guys out here give up on apartments and go live under the trees," he said. He led a reporter and a photographer to a mattress and homemade tent just a few dozen yards inside the woods from a middle-class street, Hillcrest Terrace.

The site was littered with empty soda cans, beer bottles and potato chip bags, as well as what appeared to be a deer carcass. Epley, too, identified that area as one favored by homeless immigrants, although none were present. It is set on a slight elevation less than a mile from Southampton standbys such as the Lilly Pulitzer store and the Golden Pear restaurant.

"It's very hard for all working people in the East End, especially immigrants," said Michael O'Neill, co-chairman of the East Hampton Anti-Bias Task Force. "These guys from Latin America will stop eating rather than stop sending money home to their families."

Epley said he's heard from residents complaining about the trash from the encampments. But his police chief said there's little that can be done unless a property owner files a trespassing complaint. "We can't just go up to anybody and ask for identification," he said.