What’s FAIR?

Pro-Business Group to Campaign For Referendum on Living Wage

Clara Sturak
Associate editor

   A newly formed group of retailers, restaurants, hotels and others, including the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce, has been formed to oppose the pending Living Wage ordinance in Santa Monica, and is preparing to mobilize a drive to gather signatures in order to put the measure to a public vote via referendum.
   After the approval and first reading of an historic living wage ordinance by the Santa Monica City Council last month, members of FAIR (Fighting Against Irresponsible Regulation) were spurred to action by concerns that the ordinance would cause undue hardships for local businesses. 
   At last night’s City Council meeting, prior to the second reading and adoption of the ordinance, Council requested several minor changes in its language. The amended ordinance will come back to the Council for approval and first reading — possibly as soon as its June 26 meeting. 
   Attorney Tom Larmore, member of both the Chamber of Commerce and FAIR, said that, “Assuming the Council does pass the measure, we will be circulating petitions to get the referendum on the ballot.” According to Larmore, the ordinance, which would set the minimum wage for workers in Santa Monica’s Coastal Zone at $10.50 per hour with health insurance coverage or up to $13.00 without insurance, would “have a devastating impact on local businesses,” and that the people of Santa Monica should be “allowed to decide” if they want the ordinance passed. Under the ordinance, only businesses located in the Coastal Zone, and grossing over $5 million per year would be affected. 
   Larmore confirmed a statement in an ad paid for by FAIR that both “volunteer and professional petition circulators” will be gathering signatures. This statement seems to be in direct response to accusations by Living Wage supporters that only paid signature gatherers were used for the petition drive in last year’s successful attempt by luxury hotels to place Proposition KK on the ballot. The proposition, which would have severely limited the living wage ordinance and prohibited the City Council from making further changes without a vote of the people, was defeated by a large margin last November, paving the way for approval of the current ordinance.
   Of FAIR, UCLA law professor and member of the pro-living wage coalition, SMART (Santa Monican Allied for Responsible Tourism) Richard L. Abel, said, “They’re exercising their legal right, and I have no problem with that. But what troubles me is that we already know what the people [of Santa Monica] want from their response to proposition KK. The hotel industry spent millions of dollars [in support of KK], and yet the voters rejected it 4 to 1. I’m troubled by the fact that the hotels are willing to spend hundreds of thousands more dollars...it’s like trying to win a second lottery when you’ve already lost the first one.”
   In response to FAIR’s insistence that it will proceed with a law suit to prevent the living wage ordinance from going into effect should the referendum attempt fail, Abel stated, “[one member of FAIR] is saying ‘we want the people to decide,’ while another is saying, if they decide wrong, we will sue. That’s inconsistent, and it’s not really letting the people decide.”
   FAIR will have 30 days following final passage of the ordinance to collect the 5,700 signatures needed to qualify for a public referendum.