"There is nothing but a lack of social vision to prevent us from paying an adequate wage to every American citizen whether he be a hospital worker, laundry worker, maid, or day laborer. There is nothing except shortsightedness to prevent us from guaranteeing an annual minimum and livable income for every American family. There is nothing, except a tragic death wish, to prevent us from reordering our priorities."

-- Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The sixty Dutchess County residents below have gone on record over the last few years to echo the strong call Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made for a living wage in his book "Where Do We Go From Here" and the Poor People's Campaign by endorsing the local drive for a Living Wage Law in Dutchess County:

The late great Lateef Islam, Rev. Gail Burger (Presbyterian Church USA), Rabbi Paul Golomb (Vassar Temple), Fr. Frank Alagna (St. Margaret's Episcopal Church), Rev. H. Dwight Bolton (Smith Metropolitan A.M.E. Zion Church), Rev. Philip Carr-Harris (St. Paul's Church), Rev. Kay Greenleaf (Unitarian Universalist Fellowship), Mae Parker-Harris, Willye Bromfield, Fred Bunnell, Richard Carlson, Pete Conklin, Dori Dangerfield, Richard Dennison, Julia Dutton, Vicki Fox, Larry Freedman, Nick and Gayle Garin, Daniel Gatto, Sandy Goldberg, Patti Gordon, Linda Greenblatt, Jennifer Harper, John Hausam, Suzy Hieter, Roger Higgins, Manfred Holl, Margaret Human, Deborah Ignaffo, Gwen Johnson, Doris Kelly, Patrick Kelly, Gary Kenton, Susan Kirby, Cary Kittner,Tim Kleeger, Frank Knobloch, Evelyn Krueger, Pat Lamanna, John Lawrence, Barbara Lindsey, Joanne Lukacher, Bruce Luske, Carola Madrid, Jim Mearns, Sue Moshier, Fred Nagel, Diane Nash, Chris Petsas, John Pietaro, Bill Quinn, Linda Rice-Mandigo, Penny Rinaldi, Lauren Rose, Duane Smith, Karl Volk, Maggie Von Vogt, Catherine Watters, and Camilla Wygan.

A living wage law mandates that all companies who do business with the county have to pay their workers a living wage-- otherwise, people end up working forty hours a week yet living in poverty.

"If you're making $6.75 an hour and you work 2,000 hours over the course of the year, you're earning less than $14,000 a year. If you're a single parent with a child, you're at the poverty level. You have a very hard time in that situation paying rent and putting enough food on the table."
-- Alex Navarro of the Working Families Party
["State Minimum Wage Takes a Step Up" Alan Wechsler/Albany Times-Union 12/31/05]

It's also noteworthy that without living wage laws in place, county taxpayers end up making up the difference when workers being paid poverty wages come to the county DSS or other agencies for needed assistance in health care, food, or housing.

Finally, over a dozen studies on the effects of living wage laws across the country have proven that living wage laws actually help-- not hurt-- local economies (see LivingWageCampaign.org).

Help remember Dr. King's dream here in Dutchess County.

Sign/forward this petition to all you know.

Contact our County Legislature at 486-2100 and CountyLegislature@co.dutchess.ny.us to help make the dream reality here.

Joel Tyner
County Legislator
Clinton/Rhinebeck
324 Browns Pond Road
Staatsburg, NY 12580
joeltyner@earthlink.net
(845) 876-2488

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Living Wage Resource Center: Living Wage Successes in New York
[LivingWageCampaign.org/index.php?id=1958]

Local living wage laws tying wage and/or benefits requirements to government contract eligibility or other government financial assistance (there are at least 130 all over the country).

Syracuse NY - May 2005

On May 23rd 2005 the City of Syracuse Common Council unanimously passed a Living Wage Ordinance mandating covered employers pay a wage of $10.08/hour to employees receiving healthcare benefits and $11.91 for those without (to be eligible to pay the lower wage, employers must pay at least 64\% of their employees health care costs). The ordinance applies to contractors with the city and their sub-contractors, working on city contracts worth at least $20,000 and who have more than 5 employees. Only employees working 30 years or more are covered. City employees are not covered by the ordinance. The ordinance also indexes the wage rate to the CPI-U with annual increases to be effective April each year, and mandates employees receive 12 paid days off. A Living Wage Advisory Board will be set up to monitor the ordinance which takes effect 120 days after passage (passed 23 May 2005) and applies to all contracts new or renewed after that date.

New York City NY - November 2002

On November 27, Mayor Bloomberg signed into law a living wage ordinance that covers more workers than any other such law in the country. The law will apply to about 50,000 employees of service contractors doing business with the city, principally health care workers, as well as a handful of day care, food service and disability service workers. The current living wage is set at $9.50 plus health benefits or $11.10 if benefits are not provided by the employer (05/05). The wage rate will rise in two steps until it reaches $10.00 an hour in July of 2006 (ACORN, Working Families Party with assistance from the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law).

Westchester County NY - November 2002

In November, the County Legislature approved a law will ensure pay of at least $10 per hour plus health benefits, or $11.50 an hour without benefits (7/03) for most service contractors doing at least $50,000 of business with the county, mainly those providing home healthcare workers, janitors, and security guards. The bill also covers firms receiving $100,000 or more in economic development assistance from the county in the form of loans, grants, tax abatements, etc. The living wage will kick in January 2004, rise to $10.75 base wage plus $1.50 for benefits as of Jan. 1, 2005, and $11.50 an hour with $1.50 for benefits in 2006. For the more than 1000 child care workers in county programs, the law establishes a task force which will examine different models for implementing the living wage and will submit a proposal to the county legislature by August 2003 (Working Families Party, assisted by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law).

Hempstead (Long Island), NY - October 2001

[Repealed 12/01] In October, the Board of Trustees of the Village of Hempstead passed a living wage law that requires recipients of city service contracts and economic development assistance to pay employees on city projects at least $9.00 an hour if health benefits are provided or $10.25 if not (ACORN, Working Families Party).

Oyster Bay NY - August 2001

In August, the Town Board passed a living wage law requiring service contractors and subcontractors performing at least $50,000 worth of janitorial or security services for the town to pay at least $9.00 and hour, or $10.25 an hour if health benefits are not provided. (05/05)(Working Families Party)

Suffolk County NY - July 2001

In July, the Suffolk County Legislature adopted a law establishing a living wage for the county. Under the law, recipients of county assistance in the form of loans, grants or tax abatements valued at $50,000 or more, and service contractors at more than $10,000 must pay a living wage of $9.64 an hour. If health benefits worth at least $1.25 an hour are not offered, the applicable living wage rate is $10.98. (05/05) The law extends to tenants and leaseholders of beneficiaries, as well as their subcontractors. Youth employment programs and small businesses with fewer than 10 employees are not covered. Non-profits can be exempted for up to a year after passage of the law, if the ratio of pay from the highest paid employee to the lowest does not exceed 6:1, or the non-profit can demonstrate that its budget will increase more than 10\% as a result of the living wage requirement. Child care employees have a seperate living wage rate of $9.00, or $7.75 if health care is provided. (Long Island Federation of Labor, Working Families Party, NY Labor and Religion Coalition)

Buffalo NY - August 1999

In August, the Buffalo City Council approved an ordinance requiring city service contractors and subcontractors working on contracts greater than $50,000 to pay workers (including workfare workers) to pay a living wage. Required wages are to be phased in over three years starting at $6.22/hour in 2000, $7.15 in 2001, increasing to $8.08 in 2002 for employers providing health benefits. Currently the rate is $9.03, or $10.15 for employees not receiving health benefits. (7/04) In addition, the ordinance requires that applicants for contracts submit information on projected hiring and wage goals prior to award, and submit quarterly reports on hiring and wages after securing a contract (Coalition for Economic Justice, Citizen Action of NY, Buffalo AFL-CIO). The ordinance is enforced and managed by a volunteer commission.

New York City NY - September 1996

September City Council ordinance requires that employees of city contractors for security, temporary, cleaning and food services be paid the applicable prevailing wage for the industry to be determined by the City Comptroller. Currently the wage is $9.50/hour, or $11.10 without benefits (05/05) (Industrial Areas Foundation, Councilmember Albanese)

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"King's Dream Included Decent Wages" by Holly Sklar
[MS.foundation.org/wmspage.cfm?parm1=279]

Did you know that raising the minimum wage was a demand of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I have a Dream" speech?

King, A. Philip Randolph of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
and other leaders of the 1963 March on Washington demanded "a
national minimum wage act that will give all Americans a decent
standard of living."

They didn't dream that four decades later, the value of the minimum
wage would go down as the cost of housing, food, health care and
other necessities went up.

They didn't dream that four decades later, 36 million Americans would
be below the official poverty line -- far below a decent standard of
living.

They didn't dream that four decades later, the black poverty rate
would still be triple that of whites.

At the time of the march in 1963, the minimum wage was $7.80 an hour, adjusting for inflation in 2004 dollars. Today's minimum wage is far lower -- just $5.15 an hour.

In "Where Do We Go From Here?" King wrote, "There is nothing but a
lack of social vision to prevent us from paying an adequate wage to
every American citizen whether he be a hospital worker, laundry
worker, maid, or day laborer."

The minimum wage reached its peak value in 1968, the year King was
assassinated.

Today's $5.15 minimum wage is 41 percent less than 1968's
inflation-adjusted minimum wage of $8.78.

Full-time, year-round minimum wage workers made $18,262 in 1968,
adjusting for inflation. Today's full-time minimum wage workers make
just $10,712 a year.

The minimum wage sets the wage floor. As the floor sinks, millions of
workers find themselves with wages above the minimum, but not above the poverty level.

Business Week observed last year in a cover story on the working
poor, "Today more than 28 million people, about a quarter of the
workforce between the ages of 18 and 64, earn less than $9.04 an
hour, which translates into a full-time salary of $18,800 a year --
the income that marks the federal poverty line for a family of four."

One out of three black workers earns less than $9.04 an hour --
barely above the value of the minimum wage of 1968.

Certainly, King didn't dream that four decades after the March on
Washington, the U.S. Conference of Mayors would find in its annual
"Hunger and Homelessness Survey" that 17 percent of the homeless were employed, as were 34 percent of adults requesting emergency food assistance.

The last minimum wage increases in 1996-97 were followed by rising
incomes and falling poverty and unemployment nationwide. We need
another boost to the minimum wage, and the economy.

Most Americans believe a job should keep you out of poverty, not keep
you in it. Most Americans want to raise the minimum wage
significantly.

Yet Congress has had seven pay raises since 1997, when the minimum increased to $5.15, while approving none for minimum wage workers. This month, congressional pay rose to $162,100 -- way up from $133,600 in 1997. That cumulative $28,500 congressional pay hike is more than the total earnings of two minimum wage workers.

At the time of the 1963 March on Washington, members of congress
earned nine times the pay of minimum wage workers. Now, they earn 15 times as much. To reverse that growing gap, Congress should tie their pay raises to raises in the minimum wage.

Georgia Congressman John Lewis, a leader of the March on Washington, has said if King were alive, "he would be in the forefront of
reminding the government that its first concern should be the basic
needs of its citizens -- not just black Americans but all Americans
-- for food, shelter, health care, education, jobs, livable incomes
and the opportunity to realize their full potential."

A. Philip Randolph introduced King before the "I have a Dream" speech
as "the moral leader of America."

Congress and the White House should stop taking a holiday from King's dream and enact "a national minimum wage act that will give all
Americans a decent standard of living."

Holly Sklar is co-author of "Raise the Floor: Wages and Policies That
Work for All Of Us" (RaisetheFloor.org). She can be reached at
hsklar@aol.com.

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December 31st Albany Times-Union article website referred to above:
[TimesUnion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=435048&category=BUSINESS&BCCode=HOME&newsdate=12/31/2005]