The Madison City Council voted to raise the city's minimum wage Tuesday night, voting 12-7 to adopt an ordinance drafted by Ald. Austin King, District 8.
Ald. Mike Verveer, District 4, called the vote momentous, and said it is one of the first decisions of its kind in the nation.
There was a s split between supporters of a minimum wage increase between King's proposal and Mayor Dave Cieslewicz's proposed new plan that he announced Monday, which would increase the span of time over which a raise would occur, at the request of local business owners. The council rejected the mayor's proposal by a vote of 14-5.
At the meeting, Cieslewicz said the support of business owners is important in case the state takes action against an increase.
\I expect that we will get another challenge from the state, another attempt to preempt our ability to have a local minimum wage,"" Cieslewicz said. ""If we can undercut the argument that small business is opposed to this I think that will go a long way.""
King said his initial plan is stronger because ""it doesn't have two additional years of delay on the phase. That doesn't represent chump change for low-wage workers; that represents a significant chunk of change.""
Community members and business owners showed up to the City Council meeting to demonstrate their support for one of the two proposed ordinances.
Vicky Selkowe, a staff attorney at the Economic Justice Institute, Inc., said as a representative of low -wage workers in Madison, she opposes the mayor's new plan.
""My only problem with the mayor's changes is the delay in the payment schedule in the phase-in which I think costs my clients money,"" Selkowe said. ""For every year that they don't receive that pay raise the money is coming right out of their pockets.""
Tom Beach, owner of Pizzeria Uno, 222 W. Gorham St., supports and helped craft the mayor's plan. Cieslewicz's plan lowers the original wage requirement for tip workers, instead requiring employers to subsidize them if they do not earn the new minimum wage.
Beach said this approach fits his business plan.
""I would be able to increase my low wage earners to a wage well above the minimum wages proposed by either plan and I would be able to do that within my business structure,"" Beach said. ""Under a much higher minimum tip-wage it will be much harder to do that.\
