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News :: Miscellaneous |
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Living Wage Moves Forward in Champaign County |
Current rating: 0 |
by Mike Lehman
(No verified email address) |
07 Feb 2002
Modified: 08 Feb 2002 |
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In a bi-partisan, unanimous vote, the Champaign County Board's Personnel and Public Officials Committee passed a Living Wage resolution up for consideration by the full County Board. The full board will vote on the resolution at its meeting on Monday February 25. If approved then, Champaign County government will be the third local governmental body to adopt a Living Wage policy. |
In a bi-partisan, unanimous vote, the Champaign County Board's Personnel and Public Officials Committee passed a Living Wage resolution up for consideration by the full County Board. The full board will vote on the resolution at its meeting on Monday February 25. If approved then, Champaign County government will be the third local governmental body to adopt a Living Wage policy. The Champaign-Urbana Public Health District and the Champaign County Housing Authority have previously adopted Living Wage policies last year for their staff.
Supporters of the Living Wage, which reflected the broad community sentiment that the Living Wage has received from a coalition of labor, human rights, religious, and activist organizations, filled the benches of Meeting Room 1 in the Brookens Administration Building in Urbana Thursday night. Although several members of the committee expressed reservations, in the end all voted to advance the Living Wage to the full board for consideration.
Current estimates of the costs of implementing the current proposed Living Wage of at least $8.49 an hour for Champaign County employees are about $80,000. Updated figures from the federal government on which the Living Wage is based will be released this month. Concerns have been raised about future costs of maintaining the Living Wage, which is indexed so that it matches the federal poverty level for a family of four. Historical data indicate that, although there are year-to-year fluctuations, the Living Wage has gone up less than 20 cents an hour on average per year over the last five years. Once the initial equity adjustment is made, future increases will be comparable to cost of living increases that workers typically receive, meaning that the primary fiscal impact on the county budget is in the first, "catch-up" year.
Employees of the Champaign County Nursing Home are the largest group of county employees currently not being paid a Living Wage, primarily in the food service and housekeeping departments. These departments, who are disproportionately staffed by females and people of color, have suffered from high turnover, with many workers leaving as soon as they can find work that better supports their families. Paying them a Living Wage is expected to improve retention and staff morale.
The Nursing Home has an excellent reputation for caring service, but has suffered through union-busting efforts and a dependence on expensive outside staffing agencies under previous administrations due to the problems that low pay had exacerbated. Jeremy Maupin, hired to replace past management that saw no problem in paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to the outside agencies while seemingly being unable to pay enough to attract and retain permanent staff at the home, has recently announced that the home had eliminated regular use of the staffing agencies. This alone should free up enough budget money to pay for wage increases that would be mandated is the County Board does adopt the Living Wage resolution on Feb. 25.
Supporters of the Living Wage, including the author, were thrilled that more than four years of hard work has resulted in important advances in the last year. The political pressures of the Living Wage campaign were part of the reason that the 2000 election resulted in the first Democratic-majority board within memory. But they were also pleased that the Living Wage is no longer seen in partisan terms by many Republicans. Rather, a strong case has been made that paying a Living Wage is not just a matter of public morality, but also that it makes good business sense because of the benefits of improved retention and morale have on the workforce.
The Champaign County Living Wage Association, the formal name for the local Living Wage coalition, is composed of nearly forty different local organizations. Its next regular monthly meeting, held on the third Saturday of every month, will be Feb. 16, at noon at the Illinois Educational Association offices floor above Pard's Western Shop, 304 N. Maple St., Urbana. We wish to thank all of our supporters for their assistance leading up to this historic vote and remind them to mark their calendars to attend and show their support for the full board vote on Feb. 25.
For more information on the Living Wage, visit our website:
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See also:
http://www.prairienet.org/livingwage/
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My heartiest congratulations..... |
by
JW
(unverified) |
Current rating: 0
08 Feb 2002
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.....to all those of you who have worked so hard for the
past four years to make this a reality! Only one more
hurdle....and then it's on to the next issue of social
justice! :) |
