Las Cruces City Council is set to vote on amendments to a minimum wage ordinance Monday. With that date quickly approaching, City Councilor Nathan Small is introducing new changes to the minimum wage law that some are calling drastic. Samantha Sonner has more.
Nathan Small’s new plan would delay the minimum wage increase to $10.10 an hour from 2017 until 2019. He says the frequent increases don’t allow for enough planning.
“What we have now, I think in many ways is uncertain ground,” Small said. “Where there are shifts I think it seems too frequently to have good planning, good policy. The uncertainty that is really kind of introduced into the environment, I think cuts against economic investment. And so the dialogue that we are trying to have right now prior to Monday’s meeting is about finding a solid, comfortable path forward.”
The plan would change wage increases based on Consumer Price index from every year to every two years after 2019. And eliminates increases for tipped workers after 2015. Executive Director of Café, Sarah Nolan says that if Small can do this, so can anyone on the council.
“He has basically opened the floodgates to any kind of amendment that any city councilor is interested in proposing,” Nolan said. “We felt that the Mayor and others, including Nathan, had helped align and bring together a vision for all of council, and all of that is completely gone. So we expect it to be a little bit of chaos on Monday, where we’ve calmed the waters and now we can see all of that just completely undone.”
Nolan says tipped workers especially are very concerned after reading Nathan’s new proposal.
“I think it’s hard to hear for a lot of our workers,” Nolan said. “It’s hard to hear for a lot of our clergy that someone who was so close, who helped craft in some ways our ordinance is now completely undermining the entire process.”
Small says he spoke with several businesses that had concerns about how fast the process was moving, and felt their voice wasn’t heard.
“It finds a way for some of these private sector leaders to be a substantive part of this final conversation,” Small said. “It gives us all comfort where we can move forward. We can work, all of us together, to attract investment into our community, to help businesses grow, and fundamentally to help the worst of in our community.”
Nolan says she doesn’t know what led to Small’s sudden change of heart.
“There could be a number of things that are clouding his judgment right now,” Nolan said. “It’s unfortunate that he has demonstrated himself as such a strong ally for the last 12 months, and so we are unclear about his true self-interest and motive’s to change right now in the moment.”
Small says his political future had nothing to do with the decision.
“The election timelines have to be seen separate from the effort to find good policy, to work closely with different members of the community to try to move the community forward, or be part of a community that moves forward.”
Nolan says they are already working on a response, if Small’s plan is the one to pass on Monday.
“We are already drafting our petition to reiterate the $10.10 that we did in the summer,” Nolan said. “We’re going to reintroduce that to the city clerk almost immediately if we see that happen. We’re also considering a charter amendment that would strengthen the petition initiative process, so we don’t go through any of this circus that we have seen this last few months.”
Small’s changes are not on the agenda for Monday’s meeting, but could be introduced if another Councilor second’s Small’s motion, and it is seen as close enough to the current ordinance to be considered an amendment. For KRWG, I’m Samantha Sonner.
