Council proves no decision is a decision

By Zsombor Peter
Staff Writer

GALLUP — If the City Council decided anything about a local minimum wage increase last night, it's that any decision to raise the minimum wage should be left to the voters.

By a narrow 3-2 vote, the council chose to place two proposals before the voters come March 6: one plan drafted by the Gallup Committee for a Minimum Wage Increase, and a variation on that plan as amended by the council.

"Let's put both of them out," said Councilman Bill Nechero. "Both of them have good and bad, and I think the people should decide."

Whether they personally favored one version of the other — or neither — the rest of the council agreed. Besides the crowd of opponents and — mostly — proponents of a local increase that packed the City Council Chambers Tuesday evening, Armijo said, there were thousands of other city voters who also deserved a say.

So here's what the voters will get to chose from.

Both plans propose raising the going minimum wage in Gallup — as set by the federal government at $5.15 an hour in 1997 — to $7.50. But the similarities end there.

The committee's plan would first raise the minimum wage to $6.75 within 60 days of its passage and to $7.50 by 2008. But it wouldn't stop there. The minimum wage would go up in proportion to any change in the consumer price index beginning in 2009 and every year thereafter.

The council's plan would take a slower approach. It would raise the minimum wage to $6.50 by July, to $7 by 2008, and $7.50 by July of 2008. It would also do away with the annual adjustment to the consumer price index.

Also unlike the committee's plan, the council-amended version would allow for a lower training wage for up to 90 days, not exempt businesses with fewer than 15 employees, include 15- to-18-year-olds, and demand active enforcement from the city or additional record keeping from businesses.

The council also realized it was not acting in a political vacuum, adding a sunset clause to its plan. Both state and federal lawmakers are talking loudly about passing their own minimum wage increases. If either follows through, Gallup's plan would be automatically repealed; however, at Mayor Bob Rosebrough's request, the council's plan would only sunset if the state or federal plan called for a higher minimum wage than the city's.

"I do not want the voters' will of Gallup to be repealed by a state or federal action that is less than what the voters wanted," Rosebrough said.

Neither the committee nor the city's business owners, who squarely lined up in opposition to its plan, got quite what they wanted from the City Council Tuesday evening.

The committee had to collect 980 signatures from registered Gallup voters just to get the council to look at its plan. It had hoped the council would approve its plan outright Tuesday, negating the need for a referendum, and mounted a last-minute lobbying effort — it e-mailed potential supporters the phone numbers of each city councilor — to demand at the very least a "fair" up or down vote.

They got neither. By unanimously tabling the committee's plan, the council forced it on to a referendum — and gave itself the chance to put its own plan on the ballot, the one it approved 3-2. Councilors Pat Butler and Frank Gonzales voted against.

If the committee didn't get what it wanted, neither did business.

The Gallup-McKinley County Chamber of Commerce floated its own plan to the council a few days ago, proposing to raise the minimum wage to $6.50 by July, to $7 by 2008, and $7.50 by 2009. Like the council-amended version, it also did away with an annual adjustment.

City Manager Eric Honeyfield called the council-amended plan, which he largely drafted, a "balance" between the chamber's plan and the committee's. The committee, on the other hand, called it a chamber-backed, "watered down" version of its plan meant to confuse voters on March 6.

The chamber did in fact back the council-amended plan Tuesday. But just because both plans will appear on the ballot does not mean that either is guaranteed to pass.

According to City Clerk Patricia Holland, it won't be an either-or decision. Voters will get to chose "yes" or "no" on each plan. The one with the most "yes" votes at the end of the day wins.

But there's a catch: Either plan must garner more "yes" than "no" votes to take effect.

If support for its petition was as deep and broad as it's said, Gonzales told the Gallup Committee for a Minimum Wage Increase, the group should have nothing to worry about March 6.

Like the rest of us, it will just have to wait and see.