Supervisors Enact Minimum Wage Enforcement Ordinance
On Tuesday, July 17, 2006, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted to enact the Minimum Wage Implementation and Enforcement Ordinance. The ordinance (sponsored by Supervisor Maxwell and co-sponsored by Supervisors Ammiano, Daly, Mirkarimi, and McGoldrick) expands the powers and duties of the City to implement and enforce the San Francisco Minimum Wage Ordinance. The Board voted unanimously 11-0 to pass the legislation. In a related action, the Board of Supervisors added four new wage enforcement staff positions and funding for a community-based worker outreach program to Mayor Newsom’s 2006—2007 City budget.
The Minimum Wage Implementation and Enforcement Ordinance was originally proposed by a coalition of community and labor organizations who have been frustrated by widespread violations of the City’s Minimum Wage Ordinance, which was passed by San Francisco voters as Proposition L in November, 2003.
“Proposition L promised to raise the income of the city’s 54,000 lowest paid workers by a combined $100 million per year. Unfortunately, no additional resources were allocated to the City agency responsible for enforcing Prop L, and employers who are determined to violate labor laws have learned how to exploit deficiencies in the law and enforcement procedures,” stated Alex T. Tom, Campaign Coordinator of the Chinese Progressive Association.
Over the past year, Supervisor Sophie Maxwell worked with the coalition of community and labor organizations and City staff to craft legislation intended to ensure comprehensive employer compliance with Prop L.
“I am pleased to partner with Mayor Newsom to ensure that the City fulfills its promise to San Francisco’s workers,” Supervisor Maxwell stated. “This effort is about working people. It is about immigrant workers. It is about our city ensuring the fair and equitable treatment of all of our residents, particularly those who are most vulnerable.”
The legislation clarifies and expands the powers of the City’s Office of Labor Standards Enforcement (OLSE) to enforce the wage law by:
- mandating that OLSE create a community-based worker outreach program,
- giving OLSE the authority to issue administrative citations to employers that fail to maintain, retain or allow OLSE to inspect payroll records, or that retaliate against employees for exercising their rights under the Minimum Wage Ordinance,
- clarifying that a violation for unpaid wages continues from when the wages were due to when they are paid for the purposes of calculating penalties, and that interest on unpaid wages accrues during such period at the same rate that applies to unpaid wages under state law, and
- granting OLSE discretion to enforce provisions of the State labor code including violations of meal and rest breaks and collection of unpaid wages owed to employees which exceed the MWO rate.
The original version of the legislation also proposed a new fee on businesses to cover the City’s costs of enforcing the Minimum Wage Ordinance. Even though the proposed fee was nominal, ranging from $0 to $111 per year depending on the size of the business, employer groups lobbied members of the Board of Supervisors to remove the fee from the legislation.
Over the past two weeks, negotiations between the Mayor’s office, Supervisor Maxwell and community and labor groups led to an agreement to allocate an additional $615,000 per year from the general fund for enforcement of the Minimum Wage Ordinance. The additional resources will add four new OLSE enforcement staff and create a $195,000-per-year community-based worker outreach program.
Staff Attorney Hillary Ronen from La Raza Centro Legal explains, “Almost every low-wage worker in the Latino community is someone or knows someone working in San Francisco who is not earning the minimum wage. Since many of these workers do not understand or trust government agencies, they come to organizations like La Raza Centro Legal to seek information and for help exercising their rights. This legislation creates a partnership between the City and community-based organizations to reach the most exploited and marginalized workers and facilitate comprehensive enforcement.”
Partial list of endorsers: Supervisors Maxwell, Ammiano, Daly, Mirkarimi, and McGoldrick, Asian Law Caucus, Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco Office of Public Policy and Social Concerns, Chinese Progressive Association, Filipino Community Center, La Raza Centro Legal, People Organized to Win Employment Rights (POWER), People Organizing to Demand Environmental and Economic Rights (PODER), San Francisco Day Labor Program, San Francisco Labor Council, SEIU Local 790, School of Unity and Liberation (SOUL), UNITE HERE Local 2, Women’s Employment Rights Clinic at Golden Gate University School of Law, Young Workers United.
For interviews with low-wage workers and/or advocates, contact:
- Alex Tom, Chinese Progressive Association
510.449.1172 - Hillary Ronen, La Raza Centro Legal
415.425.9785 - Sonya Mehta, Young Workers United
415.621.4155 - Terry Valen, Filipino Community Center
415.333.6267 - Marisa Franco, POWER
415.864.8372 x301
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