Because Congress failed to renew the H-2B visa exemption in 2007, circuses and carnivals thorughout America are facing a crisis
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A crisis is looming for circuses...
They've done everything in their power to hire US workers, but because the work entails traveling from community to community for up to ten months at a time as well as working holidays and weekends, there is a critical shortage of US worker applicants. Circuses therefore, have come to depend upon the foreign workers they have hired legally through the H-2B Non-Immigrant Labor Program.
Imagine a world without state and county fairs or your town's July 4th festival. They depend upon legal H-2B workers too.
In fact, it has been estimated that eighty percent of the circus and carnival companies in America are dependent upon legal H-2B workers for their survival. Unless Congress acts immediatley, the traveling big top circus, state and county fairs, even your local church carnival could all become things of the past. If you want our midways, you must take action now.
In 2004 seasonal employers across America found themselves on the brink of economic disaster when the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that that the 66,000 H-2B visa cap had been met. The H-2B Cap had the potential to cause severe economic hardship for circuses, carnivals and the hundreds of other small businesses that depend upon legal foreign labor. (One way around this, of course, might have been to hire illegal immigrant workers. But the circus and carnival industries do not want to do this.)
Then in 2005 and again in 2006 Congress approved the Save Our Small and Seasonal Businesses Act, legislation that exempted workers from the cap who held H-2B visa status in any of the three previous years.
In 2007 , however, Congress failed to renew the return worker exemption despite strong support from organizations like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Restaurant Association. On October 1st, 2007 the number of legal, non-immigrant visas available for those seasonal employers who are following the law was effectively slashed from about 180,000 per year to 66,000 per year.
You can find the name and Washington D.C. phone number of your Representative by clicking this link or by logging on to http://www.house.gov/writerep/.
You can find the name and Washington D.C. phone number of your Senator by clicking this link or by logging on to http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
Call, fax and demand that your Congressional representatives support an immediate passage of the H-2B visa fix by attaching the language of the Return Worker Exemption (HR 1843 or S 988) to other bills that are going to be passed by Congress this session.
We have some suggestions for effective talking points. But you can say whatever you want!
Circuses and carnivals occupy a special niche in the human heart. A live circus is one of the most personal and compelling experiences available in a world where entertainment franchises threaten to turn our imaginations into strip malls. Traveling circuses and carnivals are woven into the fabric of the American experience.
Inaction on the H-2B visa returning worker extension threatens many businesses, of course, from golf courses to hotels. But circuses are not a 43 billion dollar industry – like, say, the landscaping industry. Circuses are small businesses undertaken primarily for love of the art. Circuses throughout America have already begun canceling their 2008 seasons. They may never recover.
If you can take twenty minutes to find out your Congressional representatives' contact information, communicate with them about this issue and then ask three friends to do likewise, you will play an important role in preserving a beloved American tradition.
Thank you!