Labor Leaders Back ‘Living Wage’ Law

Two national labor leaders on Friday urged the Los Angeles City Council to adopt a hard-fought “living wage” ordinance and at the same time blasted a measure that would result in lower business taxes for health maintenance organizations.

The wage ordinance, which would require some city contract holders and financial aid recipients to boost salary and benefits for their minimum-wage workers, has been hotly opposed by Mayor Richard Riordan and a broad spectrum of the city’s business community.

They believe that the measure, which is scheduled for consideration by the council’s Personnel and Budget and Finance committees Tuesday, would eliminate bottom-rung jobs while increasing costs to taxpayers and consumers and hurting efforts to improve the city’s business climate.

On the other hand, Riordan has pushed for tax cuts totaling $15 million for five HMOs threatening to move to other cities with lower tax rates, taking city revenues and thousands of jobs with them.

John J. Sweeney, president of the 13-million member American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations, who was in town for a meeting of leaders of the AFL-CIO’s affiliates, told the pro-labor council that passage of the proposed wage ordinance “will move the council one step closer to the laudable goal of economic security for working families.” Not adopting the measure “will cost the city far more” in problems stemming from workers who cannot support their families and depend on charity or public assistance, he said.

Sweeney blasted the HMO proposal as the wage measure’s “reverse image” that “grants city resources to those who already have more than their share.”

Noting that he was scheduled to meet with the mayor, who wants to drum up more business for the struggling Los Angeles Convention Center, AFL-CIO chief John J. Sweeney told the council: “I want to see if he’s willing to talk trade.”

The mayor has been courting labor endorsements in his bid for reelection against liberal state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Los Angeles), who strongly supports the wage proposal.

Sweeney and Gerald W. McEntee, international president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, who delivered a lengthy speech urging adoption of the wage ordinance, drew standing ovations from union members and pro-ordinance activists who packed the council chambers.

A few business leaders in the audience watched in grim silence. They were dealt a blow the day before, when city fiscal policy officials released a report estimating that the measure would cost city taxpayers relatively little and result in little or no job loss.

Although a UCLA study estimated the net job loss at 275, a city legislative analyst said the number is “at most 100. “We think it will be minimal,” Stephen Wong said.

However, a representative of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, which is heading a coalition formed to battle the wage measure, sharply contested both the city report’s findings and its thoroughness.

“I think they gloss over a lot of things,” Chamber of Commerce spokesman Ron Lamb said. “And I don’t see several things in here that [the council committees] specifically asked be addressed.”