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History of the
Living Wage Campaign
THE FIRST ORDINANCE
In
the fall of 2001, Jimmie Martinez learned that his employer, Furr’s Super
Market, was going out of business. Soon after, he learned that his particular
store, in
Jimmie
was angry. He had been a member of the United Food and Commercial Workers,
Local 1564 in
Jimmie
asked a long time community activist, Jerilou Hammet, to help him. She attempted
to rally people to support the ordinance. Labor and community activists began
to get involved. When Frank Montano declared for Mayor in the March, 2002
elections, he came out in support of a living wage. Jimmie was up for
re-election.
A
hastily put together campaign, with limited union and community support, did
produce results. A few weeks before the March, 2002 election, then Councilor
Frank Montano steered a traditional living wage ordinance (adopted by over 100
localities around the country) through the City Council unanimously. It applied
to City of
Additionally,
the City Council established a “Living Wage Roundtable” to be made up of four
“labor representatives,” four “business representatives,” and one neutral. The
Roundtable’s purpose was to explore ways of extending the Living Wage to the
private sector. The Roundtable was to start meeting in the spring of 2002 and
report their results by the fall.
Councilor
Jimmie Martinez lost his election to David Pfeffer in March, 2002. In the 2002
campaign Pfeffer said he did not favor a living wage, but did not make a big
point of it. Councilors Montano and Patti Bushee, who were both running for
Mayor, both lost to Larry Delgado, who was reelected for a second term.
THE LIVING WAGE ROUNDTABLE
Councilor
Matthew Ortiz was involved with the appointments to the Living Wage Roundtable
for Mayor Delgado, as he was also one of the sponsors of the original Living
Wage Ordinance. Each City Councilor was asked for recommendations for
appointments. Councilor Ortiz appointed Carol Oppenheimer. She is a labor
attorney and educator and Councilor Ortiz had previously practiced law with
her. The other three labor appointments were Pat Chavez, a staff representative
of the National Education Association-New Mexico; Stan Rosen, a retired labor
educator from Chicago; and Kenneth Pin, an employee of the Eight Northern
Pueblos. The four business representatives were Jerry Easley, the head of the
Santa Fe Chamber of Commerce; Sam Goldenberg, a business broker; Lou Shapiro,
the owner of a Santa Fe taxi cab company, and Al Lucero, the owner of Maria’s
Mexican restaurant. The neutral representative was Diane Pinkey, who teaches at
the
The
Roundtable was quickly at loggerheads. It became clear early on that the
business representatives would never agree to any increase in the wages of
their employees. They were trying to bog down the process and exploit any
mistakes the labor representatives might make.
THE LIVING WAGE NETWORK;
After
the initial Roundtable meetings, it became obvious that there was a need to
start putting together a broad community/labor alliance to build real support
for a Living Wage. The Roundtable asked for an extension of time, until the end
of 2002, in which to report back to the City Council. This gave more time to
organize support for a strong pro-worker ordinance..
The
first organizational meeting of what was soon to be termed the “Santa Fe Living
Wage Network” took place in August, 2002. Several people became key in the
Network. Pat Chavez, who was on the Roundtable, was very active throughout and
brought in-kind support from NEA, such as copying of materials and use of the
NEA facility. Charlotte Roybal, a Democratic Party activist and Chair of Frank Montano’s
unsuccessful mayoral effort, brought in a wealth of knowledge about important
supporters and the current City Councilors. David Thompson, a Green Party
activist, had enormous knowledge of donors to the City elections, as well as
very good campaign organizational skills. Bob Samuel, a labor pension
specialist, became very involved, had a good strategic sense, and is a good
writer. Carol Oppenheimer, also on the Roundtable, and her husband, Morty
Simon, became actively involved. Their background as labor attorneys was
helpful to the group. Reni Storm, an operating room nurse and local union
activist, has remained a committed member of the Network and took on the
daunting task of producing living wage buttons for all to wear in the
community. About a dozen other people from housing groups, environmental
organizations, unions, gay and lesbian organizations, and Somos Un Pueblo
Unido, a Santa Fe immigrant rights group, played important roles as second
level leadership. Many became more active as the campaign gained strength. A
local artist, Mariannah Amster, designed the logo. Her partner, Frank Ragano, a
local general contractor, has been a fervent supporter of the living wage and
brings to the table a progressive small business perspective. Jo Kenny, previously
with the Coalition for Equality in
THE CAMPAIGN
The
campaign started with the holding of two large meetings, one a general
organizational meeting and one specifically to discuss what the “labor
proposal” of the labor representatives on the Roundtable should be. About 50
people showed up at each meeting. Several of the labor representatives on the
Roundtable were there at the second large meeting to learn about people’s
concerns. This started the buzz and gave the labor proposal some legitimacy.
About
the same time members of the Network started going to “progressive” events,
such as an evening with Arundhati Roy and Howard Zinn, part of a series of
speakers brought to
Using
those interest cards, we enlisted the help of numerous volunteers to contact or
call hundreds of people to ask them to sign on to an ad which would be run in
the
The
Network collected over 1,500 names of individuals, unions, and community
organizations. Fifty businesses signed on. We had most of the union locals in
the state sign on. Several of them made contributions. The principles in three
local foundations signed on, including Patrick Lannan of the Lannan Foundation.
The Catholic Church gave us $500. We got the unanimous endorsement of the Santa
Fe County Democratic Party. We collected a 750 person email list.
In
the final stages of the campaign, volunteers phoned every one of the people on
the list of supporters. Our core of activists phoned everyone they knew to urge
them to come out the night of the vote. A union group personally called 800
union members in
Six
hundred people came out the night of the vote, the biggest crowd ever at a City
Council meeting. Two-thirds wore an “I support a Living Wage” sticker with
logo. With only one minute per person, living wage supporters spoke for over 2
½ hours. The living wage speakers there, and at two City committee meetings in
the weeks before the council meeting, included a prominent local priest,
Catholic lay activists, two rabbis, a number of Protestant ministers, several
doctors, a dentist, the New Mexico AFL-CIO President and Executive Director,
the head of the New Mexico Hispanic Roundtable, Dr. Sam Bowles – now head of
the Economics Department at the Santa Fe Institute, Dr. Robert Pollin from the
Economics Department at the University of Massachusetts- Amherst, many low wage
workers, struggling single mothers, many business owners, lawyers, college
students, high school students, teachers, politicians, and many, many others.
Speakers also included representatives from a number of unions: the
Communications Workers of America, the American Federation of State County and
Municipal Employees, the American Federation of Teachers, the National
Education Association, the International Association of Fire Fighters, the
United Food and Commercial Workers, District 1199NM of the National Union of
Hospital and Health Care Employees, the New Mexico Building and Construction
Trades Council, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, the
Plumbers & Pipefitters, the Ironworkers, and the Sheet Metal Workers. It was
an impressive display of democracy in action.
THE FINAL VOTE
The
final ordinance passed the City Council 7 to 1. Like the original proposal, the
ordinance passed that night phases in from $8.50 to $10.50 per hour, but does
it over four years rather than two. It goes into effect on
The
Council also added another requirement. The City agreed to hire a firm to
establish an economic “base line” before the ordinance comes into effect, so
that it can be compared to data to be collected in July of 2005, right before
the step up to $9.50. The comparison will judge the effect of the law. The base
line study was awarded to labor economists at the University of New Mexico
Bureau of Business and Economic Research in
The
ordinance also contains a novel enforcement mechanism. In addition to the City
having authority to enforce the law either civilly or criminally, any
individual aggrieved, or organization whose
members are aggrieved by a violation, will have a private right of action
against the violating business. The remedies include treble back wages and
attorneys fees. The private right of action can also be used if a person is
retaliated against for advocating or exercising rights under the Ordinance.
THE LAWSUIT
Immediately
after the Ordinance was enacted, in early March of 2003, the Chamber of
Commerce and several local businesses filed a state lawsuit challenging the
legality of the living wage. The
The
Plaintiff businesses then appealed Judge Sanchez’ ruling. It is currently in
the New Mexico Court of Appeals. Of note in that appeal is that in March, 2005
two amicus (friends of the court)
briefs were filed in support of the City’s position. One was a brief explaining
the social justice and economic principles involved. That brief was filed by
Phil Davis, an Albuquerque attorney, on behalf of the Santa Fe Partnership for
Social Justice of the Catholic Church, the New Mexico Conference of Churches,
the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, the Hispanic Roundtable of New
Mexico, Somos Un Pueblo Unido, the Mexican-American Defense & Education
Fund, the New Mexico Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, the National Education
Association – New Mexico, the Democratic Party of Santa Fe County, the Green
Party of Santa Fe County, the Human Rights Alliance of Santa Fe and Northern
New Mexico, the New Mexico Voices for Children, the Hunger-Poverty Network of
Northern New Mexico, the New Mexico Human Needs Coordinating Council, the Santa
Fe Living Wage Network, and the New Mexico Public Health Association.
A
second amicus brief on the issue of
home rule was filed by Duff Westbrook and Maureen Sanders, Albuquerque
Attorneys, and Professor Richard Briffault of Columbia Law School and behalf of
the New Mexico Municipal League, the City of Albuquerque, and 29 law professors
from around the country, including law professors at the University of
California at Los Angeles, the University of Oregon, Pennsylvania State
University, Harvard University, the University of New Mexico, the University of
Hawaii, Georgetown University, Duke University, the University of Illinois,
Stanford University, the State University of New York at Buffalo, New York
University, Georgia State University, the University of Michigan, the
University of San Francisco, Washington University, the University of
Baltimore, the University of Pennsylvania, Chicago-Kent College of Law, Albany
Law School, Saint Louis University, and University of Virginia.
The
case was argued before the New Mexico Court of Appeals on
The
Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Santa Fe also filed a federal law suit against
the Santa Fe Living Wage Ordinance in late 2003. However, they abandoned their
law suit in the fall of 2004 after Judge Sanchez’s ruling.
THE LEGISLATURE
The
Santa Fe Chamber of Commerce and some other business associations also arranged
to have a pre-emption bill introduced into the New Mexico State Legislature in
February of 2003. The bill would have taken away Santa Fe’s right to pass a
living wage law. The attempt passed in the State Senate. However, the bill was
killed in the House Labor Committee by a straight party line vote. Senator
Roman Maes, who helped get the pre-emption bill passed in the Senate, was
subsequently defeated in the June, 2004 Democratic primary when he ran for
re-election. The Santa Fe New Mexican attributed
his defeat to his opposition to the living wage.
Another
pre-emption bill was introduced in the 2005 legislature. This time Governor
Richardson, the Albuquerque Journal,
the New Mexico Municipal League, the City of Albuquerque and many other
entities were opposed to the bill because it would take away powers of cities
across the state. Once again the bill was killed in the House Labor Committee
by a 5 to 3 vote. All Democrats voted against it and all Republicans voted for
it. An attempt to “blast it out” onto the House floor was defeated by another
straight party line vote. In the State Senate, the Corporations Committee never
heard the bill and Democratic members of the Committee who voted for the
pre-emption bill in 2003 changed their position and opposed it in 2005.
THE RAISE TO $9.50
In
the summer of 2005, months before January 1, 2006, when the Living Wage was to
rise to $9.50 per hour, Councilor David Pfeffer – the one Councilor to vote
against the Living Wage in 2003 – introduced an amendment to delay the
increase. His amendment to the Ordinance provided that the $9.50 be delayed
until the completion of the study of the effects of the Living Wage being done
by the Bureau of Business & Economic Research of the University of New
Mexico. The BBER was to give a preliminary report on the Living Wage prior to
January, but the final report was not to be completed until June, 2006.
The
Network was happy that all the State economic data – number of new jobs, rate
of poverty – looked very good and did not want a delay. The BBER issued their
preliminary report on December 12, 2005, two days before the City Council was
to vote on the Pfeffer Amendment. The report showed that there did not seem to be any damage
caused by the Living Wage. There were, in fact, 1,700 new jobs created in Santa
Fe since the law came into effect and the number of recipients of Temporary Aid
to Needy Families fell 10% in Santa Fe while remaining the same in the rest of
the state. The unemployment rate was much lower in Santa Fe than in other major
New Mexico cities and the State as a whole. Although there were some reports of
increases in prices and curtailing of overtime, in all the report was positive.
Prior
to the December 14th City Council meeting, hundreds of calls were made
to Councilors urging them to go through with the $9.50. Additionally, the
Network submitted petitions with the signatures of 2,000 Santa Feans asking
that the Council reject the Pfeffer Amendment. The evening of the City Council
meeting, hundreds of supporters of the Living Wage filled Sweeney Convention
Center; 75 spoke in favor; and only 4 people spoke against the $9.50. In fact,
many more businesses testified in favor of the $9.50 than against it. At the
end of the evening, the Council voted 7-1 to proceed to $9.50. However, they
also amended the ordinance so that any future increases would need to be
approved before going into effect.
RAISING THE STATE MINIMUM WAGE
In
January of 2006 the Speaker of the House and Governor Richardson proposed raising
the state minimum wage from $5.15 per hour to $7.50 per hour over two or three
years. Both the Speaker and the Governor promised that
In
January of 2007 the Speaker introduced a bill in the House that would raise the
minimum wage to $7.50 in 18 months, did not provide for preemption of the power
of any local governments to have a higher wage, and contained a cost-of-living
adjustment each year. The President of the Senate introduced a bill that would
raise the minimum wage to $7.50 by
A
week before the end of the 2007 legislative session, Barbara Ehrenreich spoke at
a Santa Fe Living Wage Network fund-raiser at the Lensic Theater in downtown
A LIVING WAGE FOR EVERYONE – NO
EXCEPTIONS
On
The
agreement proposed three things. First, the living wage would be extended to
cover all employees in
Mayor Coss
announced that this compromise was in a proposed ordinance sponsored by himself
and Councilors Matthew Ortiz, Miguel Chavez, Rebecca Wurzburger, Carmichael
Dominguez, and Ron Trujillo. Councilors Ortiz, Chavez, and Wurzburger had been
on the Council when the original ordinance was passed and were instrumental in
that success
The Living
Wage Network ran a campaign over the next few months entitled “A Living Wage
for Everyone – No Exceptions.” There was particular activity with young people
as there were rumors that the City Council was considering an exemption for
young people or young people who dropped out of school. Seventy-five young
people attended a rally a couple of weeks before the City Council considered
the changes.
The Network
also circulated a petition that received almost 4,000 signatures. Thirty
volunteers did phone banking to living wage supporters for six weeks leading up
to the vote. The phone bankers asked supporters to call their councilors. In
the final week before the vote, a newsletter was mailed to 4,000 supporters
urging them to come to the Council meeting and pro-living wage yard signs were
distributed around the City.
The City
Council considered the proposed changes on November 28, 2007. Over 250 people
overflowed the Council chambers. After hearing from 75 supporters of the
changes and one opponent, the Council approved the changes unanimously.
info@santafelivingwage.org
505-983-9563