BROOKS, ALTA.—Mohmed Mohmed can’t leave his job at the slaughterhouse — even though he’s not sure when he’ll get his next paycheque.

He has trimmed, grated and cut beef at the XL Foods Inc. Lakeside Packers plant in Brooks, Alta., for about $18 an hour since he came to Canada six years ago. Without better English, he said, he could never find the same pay elsewhere.

But after an E. coli scare forced the plant to close last week, a worried Mohmed, 35, sips on a double-double at Tim Hortons instead of earning money to support his family in Somalia, where he sends half of every paycheque.

“We hope they reopen again very soon,” he said. “A lot of people depend on it.”

Whether they’re temporary foreign workers cutting meat on XL’s kill floor or born-and-bred ranchers fattening cattle on feedlots, Brooks residents are anxious for the boomtown’s largest employer to restart operations.

But XL must wait for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to give it the go ahead after 10 people — seven in Alberta, two in Quebec and one in Newfoundland — fell ill after eating products directly linked to the plant.

The company admitted last Thursday its food safety protocols were “not enough” and took responsibility for the contaminated products. It has recalled more than 1,800 meat products since Sept. 16, but production didn’t stop until Sept. 27.

XL refused to meet the Star at their facility, where a reporter was followed off the property by security. Dozens of transport trucks, some labelled “XL, Proudly Canadian,” sat in the field.

In the meantime, people speaking Spanish and English, Somali and French, streamed in and out of a coffee shop just south of the Trans-Canada Highway on what should have been a work day.

Most of them work five kilometres down the road at the XL plant, a sprawling facility that employs more than 2,200 in the Prairie town with a population of 13,500, according to the 2011 census.

Immigrants and refugees, many from sub-Saharan Africa, flooded into Brooks after the Lakeside plant’s massive expansion into boxed meat in 1996. At first people from the Maritimes were recruited to fill the physically demanding, repetitive jobs, but high turnover required the company to cast a wider net.

But if XL doesn’t reopen soon, there may be an exodus as temporary workers search for work in Calgary or Edmonton.

“If they don’t open next week, 50 per cent of the staff? Gone,” said Ethiopian Abdi Farah, who packaged meat at the plant until a shoulder injury made the hard labour impossible. Most people can’t afford to stay if next Friday’s payday doesn’t come, the 42-year-old said. “There’s no saving; it’s paycheque to paycheque.”

Any interruption in pay is a huge problem for the majority of families living in Brooks, said Mayor Martin Shields. Known as the “city of 100 hellos,” it’s one of the most multicultural places in Canada. People from all over the world — Colombia and the Philippines, China and Nigeria — work to slaughter about 4,500 cattle each day the XL plant is open, he said.

“It’s really stressful,” Shields said. “They have to wait for the radio to know if they’re working tomorrow.” (XL is broadcasting updates on local station 101.1 FM.)

Dressed in a thick coat on a frosty morning, Farah said he wasn’t surprised bacteria was found at the plant. The line speed has increased in the past few years, he said.

“That’s the problem — it’s too fast,” he said. “They want to save money, there’s more bacteria.”

The union, which was created in 2005 after a violent wildcat strike led by Sudanese workers, agrees. The line speed needs to be regulated to protect the public, said Tom Hesse, who represents Local 401, United Food and Commercial Workers Canada.

“It’s not like taking a foot stool home and the leg falls off,” Hesse said. “If you eat contaminated meat, you can die.”

The demands on workers to process cattle more quickly means less regard for food safety principles, he said. Coupled with high employee turnover, no protection for whistleblowers and “barely trained” workers, “no one is surprised” E. coli was found, he said.

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Hesse doesn’t want to be unfair to XL and said he supports the industry — killing cattle and packing meat is inherently “one of the most dirty, dangerous and demanding jobs.” Yet the industry needs to be scrutinized more openly so consumers can slap “I (heart) Alberta beef” stickers onto their bumpers with more confidence, he said.

But some people in town, where African women wearing head covers sit beside Caucasian women in embroidered jean jackets, argue the confidence in XL’s meat shouldn’t have been shattered in the first place.

For every shift at the plant, there were 20 CFIA inspectors overseeing production. If the problems at the plant were such a big deal, they said, the inspectors should have caught it.

The town’s biggest fear, still said only in whispers, is that the Nilsson brothers, XL’s owners, will decide the plant isn’t worth the hassle and close operations permanently. The Nilsson brothers bought the packing plant from U.S. giant Tyson in 2009.

The shutdown — an “overreaction” — has already cost the beef industry millions, said feedlot owner Rick Paskal.

There are only two major packers in Canada — XL’s Lakeside plant and the Cargill plant in High River. With XL’s plant closed, Cargill is operating at capacity and Paskal said he had to ship his steers and heifers as much as 1,000 kilometres.

Cattle prices are down between $100 and $200 a head and, with no one to buy them from him, Paskal said he has to keep feeding his cattle expensive grains.

“It’s already cost me between $2 million and $3 million. You’re damn right I’m angry.”

Feedlots are hurt first, but the problems could trickle down to the auctioneers and grain producers soon if production doesn’t restart. People are afraid it could get as bad as 2006 when mad cow disease rocked the industry.

Paskal questions why XL is bearing the brunt of responsibility when four cases of E. coli in Alberta have been linked to a tenderizing machine at Costco. (It’s unclear where the bacteria came from.) E. coli originates not only from slaughter, but also from poor food handling or improper cleaning.

“E. coli is a reality that’s always going to be there, no matter what you do,” Paskal said. XL and the CFIA are doing “the best they can,” he said, as they have so much to lose. It’s “outlandish” to suggest they would tolerate unsanitary conditions, he said.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing for Paskal is that E. coli O157: H7, a bacteria found in human and animal intestines, doesn’t hurt people if meat is cooked at hot enough temperatures.

“We don’t want anybody to get sick, but everybody has to use some common sense,” he said. “Wash your hands. Cook your meat.”

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