Raise The Minimum Wage, Yes On Measure G!

By Steven Argue

Santa Cruz California often comes in second as the most expensive place to live in the country. Here, the poor that are working for the current minimum wage of $6.75 an hour often suffer homelessness and hunger and are constantly forced to make hard financial decisions about necessities that cause constant stress.

Measure G will not solve all of this, but it will help. It will raise the minimum wage to $9.25 an hour.

Opposing this minimal raise for some of the poorest local residents are City Council candidates Mike Rotkin, Cynthia Matthews, and Lynn Robinson (three seats are open in this election). These three anti-worker and anti-poor candidates have raised the following amounts for their campaigns:

No on G: Cynthia Matthews: $25,000
No on G: Mike Rotkin: $22,000
No on G: Lynn Robinson $18,000

City Council candidates supporting the higher minimum wage are Simba Kenyatta, Chriss Cobb, and Bruce Van Allen. Here is the funding their campaigns have received.

Yes on G: Bruce Van Allen $10,000
Yes on G: Chriss Cobb $600
Yes on G: Simba Kenyatta $90

As usual in Santa Cruz “progressive” politics the most anti-poor candidates are getting the most funding from local business interests and are the most likely to win.

Mike Rotkin has a particularly rotten record on the issue of the minimum wage. When I ran for City Council in 2000 and in 2002 part of my platform was to raise the minimum wage, actually to double it. In one public discussion Mike Rotkin went so far as to laugh at me and say that the minimum wage cannot be raised on a municipal level, that state and federal law take precedent. He then went further in his lies stating that if the city government could raise the minimum wage, they would have done it a long time ago. Yet ever since activists started petitioning to put the issue on the ballot Mike Rotkin has been one of its most vocal opponents.

Grass roots activists petitioned and got the 6,000 signatures that put Measure G on the ballot. Contributing to this effort financially was the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW).

Those opposing measure G are mostly local businesses. Included among these is the Seaside Company (the super-exploitative employers at the Beach Boardwalk). They have contributed $7,300 to the campaign against measure G. Other rabid anti-poor businesses that have given money to defeat Measure G include Kelley’s Bakery’s donation of $2,000, the Santa Cruz Motel Hotel Association contributed $5,000, and the California Restaurant Association contributed $2,500. In addition the poverty pimps at Goodwill industries donated $1,000 against raising the minimum wage.

Another way that businesses are opposing the minimum wage increase is by putting up signs in their windows saying, “No on Measure G, it hurts family businesses”. Yeah, anti-racketeering laws also hurt “family” businesses and anti-slavery laws drove a few family plantations under. The point is if you can’t pay your workers remotely close to what it takes to live you shouldn’t be in business. Yet even a study commissioned by the anti-G Santa Cruz City Council showed that there would be very little impact on businesses or employment if measure G passes.

The businesses that are promoting this anti-worker message are now being boycotted. We ask that nobody under any circumstances buy anything from: Bookshop Santa Cruz, Kianti's, Hoffman's Bakery Café, Fresh Prep Kitchen (on Front Street), Bad Ass Coffee Company, Pacific Cookie Company, Rosie McCann's, The Hat Company, Rogue, Zoccoli's Deli, Cafe Brazil, Fedex Kinkos, Avanti's, Goodwill, Costa Brava Taqueria, Walnut Ave. Café, 99 Bottles of Beer, Kelley’s Bakery, and the Beach Boardwalk.

In addition Liberation News asks that nobody vote for Cynthia Matthews, Mike Rotkin, and Lynn Robinson. Liberation News cannot endorse Bruce Van Allen, Chriss Cobb, or Simba Kenyatta either, even though they may be slightly better than the “No on G” candidates, because we will not spread illusions in candidates that have no clear program for the kinds of far reaching changes that are needed in Santa Cruz.

Yes on G!

No on Cynthia Matthews, Mike Rotkin, and Lynn Robinson!


Liberation News:
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