In Maine, a Minimum Wage Law With a Surprise Inside
A staff member at The Grill Room in Portland seats patrons on July 7.
Photographer: Carl D. Walsh/Portland Press Herald via Getty ImagesOn July 6, the City Council of Portland, Maine, voted 6 to 3 to establish a local minimum wage of $10.10, a $2.60 increase over the statewide minimum. The next day, the mayor and several council members said they’d made a mistake. The law, which they thought would let restaurants and other businesses keep paying tipped employees $3.75 an hour, actually gave such workers a giant raise—to $6.35 an hour.
Fearful of hurting the city’s restaurant industry, Mayor Michael Brennan and his colleagues on the City Council are working on a new ordinance that would undo the increase for tipped workers before it takes effect on Jan. 1. “I don’t know what else to tell you, other than that when we voted on it, we felt we were voting on what the intent of the council was,” says Brennan, a Democrat. “It was clear afterwards that what we had voted on and the intent of the council were not the same thing.”