National

U.S. companies see opportunity in exodus from storm-ravaged Puerto Rico

By Chico Harlan January 1 at 4:45 PM

HURON, S.D. — The airport terminal doors slid open and out came 22 people from Puerto Rico, walking a few weeks ago into the whipping South Dakota wind, not quite ready for what was ahead. One person still wore shorts. Another zipped up a hoodie. The group climbed into three waiting vans.

“You guys good?” asked one of the drivers who would be taking them to their new home. “Does anybody speak English?” ... “No,” one person said, and the driver let the van go silent before turning up some country music.

Through the windows, there were miles of emptiness, and Gretchen Velez, 21, looked at the others in the van and was quiet. She’d started the day on an island that was desperately short on electricity and clean water and jobs because of Hurricane Maria. Now, 10 hours later, she was in South Dakota — a place she knew almost nothing about, other than what a job recruiter had told her, that he had a position for her at a turkey processing plant in a rural town nearly 3,000 miles away.

Velez had never left Puerto Rico, but after years of economic crisis and then a natural disaster, almost everybody she knew was wondering whether they had any choice but to go. By some counts, nearly 2,000 Puerto Ricans were leaving every day, and in that exodus, some mainland U.S. companies were starting to see an opportunity of their own — a new answer in their ever-evolving struggle to find workers who would perform lower-rung American jobs. “Off to my new life,” Velez had told her mother that morning, but now she was wondering: What am I doing here? Is this the right thing?
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Chico Harlan is an enterprise reporter and part of The Post's financial team. Follow @chicoharlan