Olympia defers conversation about minimum wage hike, worker rights, into 2025   

The Olympia Finance Committee plans for a comprehensive community engagement next year to discuss a city minimum wage and worker protections. 

During a special meeting on Monday, Oct. 7, committee members discussed extending the timeline for addressing a potential minimum wage increase and possibly combining those discussions with the broader Workers' Bill of Rights proposal. 

At its Sept. 16 meeting, the committee was presented with a proposed timeline to start the process of the minimum wage increase and develop an ordinance by the end of 2024.  (See related story.)

While expressing confidence that city staff are capable of making it happen, Councilmember Clark Gilman expressed his preference to extend the timeline. He noted that the compressed timeframe was not ideal for staff. He explained that they would need more time and the involvement of more voices.  

Gilman acknowledged that discussions on the minimum wage and worker protections would generate community and council dialogue. He emphasized the importance of an inclusive engagement process, similar to the efforts for creating the Social Justice and Equity Commission and the One Community Plan, which allowed for more input. 

He believed that the ordinance would be stronger and more resilient by consulting the community rather than just explaining decisions. "I think that if we have more voices and more conversation, we are likely to have a strong ordinance that will withstand challenges." 

Councilmember Jim Cooper echoed this sentiment as he cited previous efforts, like the Strong Olympia economic resiliency plan, which resulted from community engagements and balanced support for small businesses and workers.  

"It makes sense to extend a process and do more listening and more engagement," Cooper said. He proposed not to separate the wage conversation from the Bill of Rights conversation. "It makes sense to have this all at one time and get all of the feedback in the whole conversation all at once. Clearly, we can't do that by December." 

Expressing concern on the staff capacity, City Manager Jay Burney suggested a potential approach in moving forward the conversation on minimum wage increase and workers' protection bill. He said the city was in the middle of a budget process, with all hands on deck – including his assistants, department directors, and the council.  

He proposed to start engagement work in the first part of the year and not try to kick it off in the latter part of the current year. Burney said there might be some study work and economic analysis that could start immediately, and that he believed City Assistant Manager Stacey Ray had already begun.  

Burney also recommended getting into the more extensive engagement work after the new year. He made this request as he looked at the staffing and the current capacity, noting that the staff are maxed out at the moment.  

Expanding the process 

According to Councilmember Lisa Parshley, who chairs the committee, members agreed to expand the process, which aims to balance the needs of workers and businesses while addressing economic challenges like housing insecurity and inflation. 

She said they are potentially open to discussing the minimum wage with the Workers' Bill of Rights and Olympia Strong initiatives for the coming year.  

Gilman noted that this approach addresses the combined impacts on workers and the preparations required for employers.  

Gilman also expressed the hope that their outreach would reach out to the organizations listed in the initial document, but would also create opportunities to hear directly from workers and employers. Gilman explained that when the issue "kicked the hornet's nest," it had polarized the conversation. He believed it would take some work to get the discussion back to focusing on the "how to do it" rather than just a simple yes or no question. 

No Jan. 1 deadline 

Cooper addressed the misinformation circulating in the community. He said a flyer claimed the minimum wage would be raised to $24 an hour on Jan. 1. The councilmember added it was never part of the conversation.  

Cooper acknowledged that they had "thrown out numbers" during the previous discussions. However, he stated that the committee had made it clear they did not want to focus on numbers at that time - instead, they wanted to focus on the process. 

Although the proposed timeline presented in the last meeting indicated a potential approval by December, Cooper said nothing of this significance should take effect sooner than six months, and he thinks a one-year timeline would be a more reasonable timeframe to consider.  

"[But] I do think there's a blessing in disguise here," Cooper said, referring to the misinformation. "It also resulted in us getting more responses from business than we might have been able to get in any other kind of work." 

The committee plans to bring a proposed timeline and scope of work to the full city council on Oct. 22 to seek their input.  

The Finance Committee will likely schedule an additional special meeting before the end of the year to further refine the plan.