DC Dept of Employment Services Pressed on Living Wage Enforcement
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)Local worker advocates are
pushing the DC Department of Employment Services to enforce payment of a living
wage to employees of direct care providers in the city. When the Living Wage Law
was originally passed in 2006 certain employers were exempted, but under new
regulations this year, direct care providers are covered. “In these
difficult economic times, we are standing with our workers to make the point
that further delay in applying (the Living Wage legislation) is
unconscionable” said a local union political director, one of a delegation
(above) that included union representatives and DC Jobs with Justice and which
met earlier this month with Pamela Banks, Associate Director of the Wage and
Hour office. While Banks contended that developmental disability workers
continue to be exempted from the Living Wage Law, the local labor advocates say
this interpretation is contrary to the stated intent of the law’s chief
sponsor. “We are not going away,” added one of the labor advocates.
“Too many worked too hard to pass this legislation and too many of our workers
need and deserve a living wage.”
- Lillian Walker
Shelton