Why do we even bother, in some instances, to elect Democrats from places like Orange County, California. In so many instances, we end up with tools like California Assemblyman Tom Daly, D-Orange County, who has proven that, yes Virginia, some neanderthals come in Democratic clothing.
As many of you know, California is one of a handful of states (Alaska, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New York, Oregon and Washington being the others) that pay tipped workers their states minimum wage instead of some the federal minimum of $2.13 to $5.00 range. In California, service workers including wait staff collect the $9.00 hourly minimum plus their tips.
Legislation will raise the state minimum wage to $10 hourly in 2016, but that increase will not apply to tipped workers if California Assembly Bill 669 gets passed. The California Restaurant Association has sponsored this bill bill and their tool of the month in the assembly, California Assemblyman Tom Daly, Democrat of Anaheim, has introduced the bill.
How bad is this bill? Really bad:
Daly’s bill would cap the minimum wage for California’s tipped workers at $9 if they earn a total of $15 hourly. Far more disturbing to low-income service employees, however, is a passage embedded in the bill that could undo local minimum wage ordinances previously approved by voters in Oakland, Richmond, San Francisco and San Jose.
Yes, you read that correctly. The legislation would effectively overturn these existing local minimum wage laws enacted by voters across California through a preemption clause. The bill introduced by Daly would require cities that have enacted minimum wage laws to amend their ordinances, with explicit language stating the laws’ intention to include tipped workers. Otherwise the ordinances would be superseded by the new state statute. So cities like San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose that raised the minimum wage through a voter approved ballot initiative, the wage hikes would be nullified until another initiative with AB 669’s required language on tipped workers was approved by voters.
It's such bullshit - Daly and his hacks at the California Restaurant Association basically want another crack at stopping propositions across the state that raise the minimum wages for low income tipped workers by nullifying these laws through AB 669, and forcing these votes a second time, in hopes they can beat the proposition a second time, costing the taxpayers even more money.
“Even if a city council wants to fix this, the lawyers may tell them they can’t – that only a vote of the people can fix it,” said Andy Kahn, a partner at the Bay Area law firm Davis, Cowell & Bowe. “It’s an outrageous interference with the people’s right to initiative. The burden on localities to have to go back to the ballot is enormous.”
The burden on workers could be equally onerous. “All of a sudden workers’ wages could be cut for as long as it takes for there to be an effective new ordinance – and then the restaurant industry could referendize the [new] ordinance, delaying it even further,” said Kahn.
While Daly’s efforts to cap wages for tipped employees has received media attention, the retroactive impact of AB 669 has not. The clause in question states, “This section shall preempt local ordinances setting forth a minimum wage in excess of the minimum wage established by this subdivision, to the extent the ordinance is applicable to qualifying tipped employees, unless the ordinance specifically references this section and states the local jurisdiction’s intent to establish a higher minimum wage for qualifying tipped employees.”
“It’s a Restaurant Association sneak – what they really want is to preempt legislation,” says veteran labor attorney Margo Feinberg, who has helped draft wage legislation.
And the executive director of the National Employment Law Project believes that Daly’s bill poses a threat not just to wage increases passed by California cities but in municipalities across the country"
“This legislation could undo wage hikes approved by voters in any California locality, including those cities that passed increases last year, and would set a dangerous and damaging precedent for local efforts to raise wages and end tip credits across the country,” Owens told Capital & Main.
And Daly could have a partner in crime ramming this bill through the California Assembly in House Democratic Majority Leader Chris Holden, D-Pasadena. Chris Holden proved himself a tool of the California Chamber of Commerce and The California Restaurant Association last year, when Holden abstained on a decisive vote that thwarted an effort to raise California’s minimum wage. By abstaining, he killed a proposal to raise California’s minimum wage to $13 an hour in 2017.
Daly has already sponsored eight bills that have been signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown since his election to the assembly in 2012. Daly, the former mayor of Anaheim, has also sided with the GOP on key legislation, such as a bill that would have made it harder for large companies to deny health care coverage to employees. Daly was one of eight Democrats who either voted against the proposed law or abstained – which had the same effect of killing the measure. And of course, no surprise here, Daly receives tons of support from the state’s largest business interests, including Disney, with their theme parks in Anaheim, and the California Restaurant Association. and Disney is also one of the most aggressive opponents of minimum wage increases in California and elsewhere.
Clearly, Tom Daly is doing the bidding of The California Restaurant Association in the assembly by introducing this bill, but his end run around voter approved ballot propositions by invalidating them through his bill is despicable. So, call your or email your assembly members this week and tell them to vote against AB 669. We can talk about a primary challenge to Daly after we defeat this bill.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...