LANSING, MI (MPRN)-- Activists have turned in petition signatures to raise Michigan’s minimum wage to $10.10 an hour by 2017. That’s despite a new minimum wage law signed by Governor Rick Snyder just one day earlier.
That new law raises Michigan’s minimum wage to $9.25 an hour by 2018. It also repeals the old minimum wage law the Raise Michigan Coalition hopes to amend in its attempt to boost the wage to $10.10 an hour. That provision could make the group’s campaign moot.
But Raise Michigan’s attorney, Mark Brewer, says the group will continue to fight to get its proposal on the November ballot.
“This is about much more than this initiative,” said the former Michigan Democratic Party chair. “If the Legislature is allowed to undermine and essentially gut the right of initiative, it will affect everybody in this state. No matter what your political background, no matter what your ideology, it will undermine that right.”
Brewer says he does not believe the new minimum wage law should prevent the initiative from taking effect if it’s successful.
“If and when the voters vote ‘yes,’ in our view it raises the minimum wage in this state as set out in these petitions,” Brewer said.
Raise Michigan says it turned in almost 320,000 signatures to the Michigan Secretary of State’s office Wednesday. The state will have to rule that at least 258,088 of those signatures are valid for the $10.10 an hour initiative to have a chance of moving forward.
Brewer did not rule out a court battle if state officials try to keep the initiative from advancing or refuse to enforce a $10.10 an hour minimum wage if it’s approved by voters.
Both the new law and the Raise Michigan campaign would allow the minimum wage to rise with inflation after a new rate takes full effect. But under the Legislature’s version, the wage could not rise more than 3.5% in a given year.
The petition drive would end assigning a lower minimum wage to workers earning tips, such as waiters. Those workers would also make at least $10.10 an hour under the proposal. The state’s new minimum wage law keeps a lower rate for tipped workers at 38% of the regular minimum wage.