CITY FIGHT ON WAGE LOOMING COUNCIL OKS PAY MEASURE COURT CHALLENGE IS VOWED.

Byline: RICK ORLOV

Staff Writer

Setting the stage for a legal showdown with the business community, the Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday gave final approval to a measure that imposes a "living wage" on hotels adjacent to Los Angeles International Airport.

The 10-3 vote, without comment, came in sharp contrast to the bitter and vociferous debate that has surrounded the issue for the past six months.

The measure -- a compromise reached earlier this month to avoid a costly May election fight with a united business community -- includes an infusion of taxpayer investment and incentives for business in the area.

The measure now goes to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, and aides said he will sign it.

But the measure has drawn a sharp outcry from the business community, which now has vowed to challenge the effort in court.

"I think within 72 hours of the mayor signing it, you will see a legal challenge," said Harvey Englander, spokesman for the Century Corridor hotels affected by the measure.

"I think everyone realizes that litigation is the next step. It's unfortunate that it has come to this, but the council is basically ignoring what 103,000 residents said they didn't want to see."

The new measure would require 13 hotels in the area to phase in the higher wages for most of their 3,500 workers. Employees would see their pay go to $9.39 an hour with health benefits or $10.64 an hour without benefits.

The measure also promises $1 million for street improvements and $50,000 to develop a marketing plan for the area -- which would be designated as an Airport Hospitality Enhancement Zone.

Voting against it were Councilmen Bernard Parks, Greig Smith and Dennis Zine.

Councilwoman Janice Hahn, the driving force behind the effort, said she believes the council acted fairly on behalf of the 3,500 workers in the Century Corridor.

"We rescinded the earlier ordinance to comply with what the business community wanted," Hahn said. "We made significant changes in the ordinance to accommodate that.

"To be honest, I feel like (the business community) betrayed us by threatening us with legal action."

The measure also calls for studies into a possible conference center and business-tax reductions for the area, as well as various studies on the impact of the living wage.

The city concessions came after the City Council rescinded an initial measure that only required the hotels in the area to pay workers the higher living wage.

Businesses unite

A broad business coalition united to spend more than $800,000 to collect more than 103,000 signatures to force the council to back down or put the measure on a ballot referendum.

Officials had estimated that a May referendum on the issue could cost the city and business community as much as $15 million.

On Wednesday after the vote, Hahn said she would have preferred to see the election.

Election preferred

"I wanted to have an election on this," Hahn said. "I think the voters of Los Angeles would have sided with the workers on this.

"I just hope the hotels now come to realize that this is the right thing to do, the fair thing to do with their workers."

But the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce also continued to voice its opposition to the proposal.

"The substitute ordinance is unacceptable to the business community," it said.

"The new law is not substantially different from the original ordinance -- it unfairly mandates the wages of specific businesses that must pay employees and provides no long-term assurance that this unprecedented government control will be limited to these businesses."

Hahn said the new measure contains language designed to limit the expansion of the living wage to other business sectors.

The city has had a living-wage requirement in effect for more than a decade, but it had only been applied to firms doing direct business with the city.

Benefits argued

In expanding it to the Century Corridor hotels, the council argued that the hotels benefit directly from their proximity to LAX and the amount being invested in its modernization.

But the business community raised concern that it could set a precedent and lead to such ordinances being expanded to include other industries as well.

Villaraigosa spokesman Matt Szabo said the mayor supports the plan because it limits the ordinance to the LAX area.

"He believes it is a careful compromise with the business community to quarantine living wage to this area," Szabo said. "He would not support any effort to impose it elsewhere in the city."

James Elmendorf of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, which urged the living wage, also said there were no plans by his organization to target any other sectors of the business community.

"It is nothing anyone is contemplating," Elmendorf said. "We think the hotels' statements in that regard were out of touch with reality.

"We did agree to the set of requirements that must be followed before a living wage is contemplated. It is all a matter of what is good policy."

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New living-wage zone

SOURCE: Gateway to L.A.

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