Cleveland City Council will begin consideration next week of legislation to raise the city’s minimum wage to $15.00 an hour. Yesterday, backers 'Raise Up Cleveland' filed enough signatures with the board of elections to put the issue before council. As WKSU’s Kevin Niedermier reports, at least one council member says the wage hike is not a done deal.
City Council has the option of passing the proposal as is, which would boost the hourly minimum wage to $15.00 in January from the state minimum of $8.10.
Councilman Zack Reed says paying workers in the city more would be good for them, but it could have some negative consequences as well.
“You look at the businesses, especially the small businesses that won’t be able to absorb it and pass those costs on it could be detrimental to those small businesses. And it could be detrimental to jobs as a whole. So I think it’s one of these things we’ve got to look at, we need to evaluate it.”
Reed says he favors in phased in approach to a wage increase of this size. Council can amend or reject it. If it’s amended or rejected, supporters could put it on November’s ballot and let the voters decide if it should jump to $15.00 in January.
Mayor Frank Jackson tells WKYC he's against the increase because it would hurt businesses.
