By Pamela Martineau, The Sacramento Bee, Calif. Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
May 21--Gathering in front of a statue of legendary farm labor leader Cesar Chavez, more than 500 activists rallied Sunday in Sacramento demanding that city leaders boost the pay of employees who work for companies that take city subsidies.
Saying the state's current minimum wage does not provide workers with enough money to live, ralliers asked city leaders to adopt a so-called 'living wage' ordinance. The ordinance would require businesses that receive city tax breaks or other subsidies to pay employees $10 an hour and provide health insurance.
'Often, the wages of people who work for businesses in new development projects are just at or above the poverty level,' said Sacramento City Councilman Dave Jones, a supporter of the ordinance.
A broad coalition of groups assembled downtown Sunday in Cesar E. Chavez Plaza across the street from City Hall to support the ordinance, which advocates hope will be presented soon to the City Council.
Bob Balganorth, of the International Longshore and Warehousemen's Union, said employees are forced to work two and sometimes three jobs to support their families when they are paid the minimum wage of $6.25 an hour.
'In Sacramento, can you imagine trying to live on $6.25 an hour in a town where rent is $700 a month?' he said.
Members of the Sacramento County Central Labor Council, as well as dozens of individual labor unions, civil rights groups and religious organizations attended the rally. The Sacramento chapter of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) is one of the primary backers of the ordinance.
Under the proposal, a private business project or operation that receives a subsidy, contract, tax break or any other financial benefit from the city would be required to pay its workers $12.84 an hour if no health benefits are offered with the job. Employers who pay health benefits would be required to pay workers $10 an hour.
About 50 cities across the nation have such ordinances, including Los Angeles, San Jose, Berkeley and Santa Cruz.
Sacramento resident Sandra Yates said she supports the ordinance because too many workers can't support their families despite toiling long hours at sometimes more than one minimum-wage job.
'If we are a family-oriented state, we should take care of our people,' she said. 'Sacramento is the capital. We need to take the lead on this.'
Ahmadia Thomas, a member of ACORN, traveled from Oakland for the rally. She said the campaign is fundamentally about survival.
'The city knows people need a decent wage in order to be able to survive,' she said.
About 30 percent of the city's residents make less than half of the region's median income of $52,000 a year for a family of four, which is income classified as 'very low' by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Supporters have recruited Jones and Sacramento City Councilwoman Lauren Hammond to present the ordinance to the council. Jones said Sunday that he hopes the living-wage debate will expand to other communities throughout the Sacramento region.
'It won't be sufficient for just the city to adopt this,' he said. 'It's important to take a regional approach.'
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(c) 2001, The Sacramento Bee, Calif. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
