Pandemic halts the minimum wage fight

Coronavirus slowing movement toward $15 an hour for workers

TALLAHASSEE — First, the coronavirus shut down Florida’s restaurants. Then it shut down the restaurant industry’s fight against steadily increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Save Our Jobs Inc. is a political committee set up in January to fight the amendment on the Nov. 3 ballot by the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association, whose board members include representatives of Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando, Darden Restaurants and McDonald’s. The organization raised just $2,000 in April and May.

In the three months prior it raised more than $194,000, including $100,000 from the National Restaurant Association.

“This industry is hurting really bad,” said FRLA president and CEO Carol Dover. “We’re not even billing for dues — how are we going to say, ‘guys, we’ve got to raise $4 [million] or $5 million?’”

Dover said she thinks hiking the minimum wage will deal a killer blow to many restaurants barely managing to survive the pandemic-induced shutdowns, raising their costs at the worst time.

The amendment would raise the minimum wage to $10 per hour by Sept. 30, 2021, then increase by $1 every 12 months until it reaches $15 per hour on Sept. 30, 2026. After that the minimum wage would be adjusted for inflation each year. The current minimum wage in the state is $8.56 per hour.

At least 60 percent of voters must approve the measure for it to become law.

John Morgan, the Orlando lawyer who put more than $4.5 million behind the petition gathering effort to get the amendment on the ballot, hasn’t been raising large amounts recently, either. Since De

cember, his Florida Fair Wage political has pulled in $16,000.

Morgan said he’ll be putting more money towards the cause, but he also expects to have unions and outside labor groups donate as well.

Besides, he said, “you really don’t need money until September, October,” to run ads ahead of the election. As of June 1, Florida for a Fair Wage had about $28,000 cash on hand.

Orlando’s biggest theme parks are already moving to $15 per hour wages for workers. Disney said in 2018 it would increase its lowest wage to $15 by October 2021. Universal Orlando followed the next year, hiking its lowest salary by $1 to $13, with plans to increase it to $15 in 2023, when its new Epic Universe attraction is expected to open.

Yet, Dover said she believes it would be “catastrophic” for the hotel and restaurant industries if the amendment passes. She said many companies have for a committee about taken out millions of dollars in Paycheck Protection Program loans from the federal government as part of the CARES Act, passed by Congress and signed by President Trump to blunt the economic impact of the coronavirus shutdowns.

Those loans are forgiven if the money is used to keep workers on the payroll or rehire workers laid off because of the shutdown. But restaurants have other expenses besides payroll, Dover noted, such as property taxes and the cost of unexpected supplies – masks, gloves, thermometers and hand sanitizer – needed to reopen amid the pandemic.

If owners choose to spend the loans on other expenses, the loans will come due in five years, just when the minimum wage is nearing the $15 mark.

The fallout within the industry as restaurants struggle to stay open is likely to linger even without a minimum wage increase that boosts costs, she said.

“Even if they’re open at 50% (capacity), they’re not going to be back to normal probably for years,” said Dover, referring to the maximum amount of space allowed in restaurants in the current Phase 2 of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ reopening process. “The income setback and the challenges that people are having getting back on their feet – it’s not an overnight fix.”

But for Morgan, it’s the workers in hotels and restaurants who deserve the economic boost. Laid off workers are struggling to get unemployment benefits, and the ones who are working are most at risk of getting COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

“Who are the people on the front lines in the middle of this pandemic?” Morgan said. “They’re the ones who are working in the restaurants and are in the streets and in the hospitals.”

Dover believes that’s short-sighted, and a “common sense approach” is needed to ensure Florida’s main tourism industry survives the pandemic and beyond.

“It’s Florida’s economic engine,” Dover said. “For anybody who lives in Florida they should want our industry to prop themselves back up.”