The Yakama Nation of Washington has approved a guest-worker program to keep track of non-citizens who work on the reservation.

Former council member Wendell Hannigan came up with the idea out of concern for crime and the large number of migrant workers on the reservation. Most come to work on orchards, farms and vineyards.

Hannigan plans to talk to business owners on the reservation to register guest workers in what is believed to be the first program of its kind in Indian Country. "I haven't heard of another tribe trying to do this," Matthew Fletcher, the director of the Indigenous Law and Policy Center at Michigan State University, told The Yakima Herald-Republic.

The tribe probably won't be able to enforce its laws on non-citizens, a spokesperson for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.

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Weighing in on workers (The Yakima Herald-Republic 10/21)