It seems like only yesterday that I was buying a green bell pepper for 79 cents.

"This time of year, Hilaria Santiago typically picks bell peppers in the California desert.

But after a pair of unusual back-to-back summer storms washed vegetable seedlings out of fields in the eastern Coachella Valley, Santiago had to find another seasonal job. She’s now sorting dates in a small packinghouse, working just 20 hours a week, with at least 21% of the date crop damaged.

Santiago had already been struggling to support her nine children, ages 3 to 24, even with help from her oldest son, who works in the fields by day and a restaurant by night.

'There are times when the kids want a pizza, or hamburgers, or Chinese food, and if I don’t work, I don’t have enough money to buy these things,' said Santiago, an immigrant from Acapulco."

~ Rebecca Plevin

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-10-21/coachella-valley-agriculture-workers-still-recovering-from-tropical-storm-hilary