Final wording of minimum wage initiative released
Maine's Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap has unveiled the final wording of a number of citizen-initiated referendum questions that will be heading to ballots in November, including the ballot measure to raise Maine's minimum wage.
According to a release from the Secretary of State’s office, the final wording of the question will be:
An Act to Raise the Minimum Wage: “Do you want to raise the minimum hourly wage of $7.50 to $9 in 2017, with annual $1 increases up to $12 in 2020, and annual cost-of-living increases thereafter; and do you want to raise the direct wage for service workers who receive tips from half the minimum wage to $5 in 2017, with annual $1 increases until it reaches the adjusted minimum wage?”
The release of the final question wording on Thursday comes less than a week after a coalition that includes the Maine State Chamber of Commerce, the Maine Restaurant Association and the Maine Innkeepers Association voiced its opposition to the draft of the question.
The coalition said the wording doesn't include key points like the inclusion of indexing the minimum wage after 2020, and the use of the phrase "tip credit," or noting that the "tip credit" will be totally eliminated, when describing the full impact of the question to voters.
“We try to capture as much of the essence of the legislation as possible when we draft the ballot questions,” Secretary Dunlap said in a statement about the ballot question wording. “That was a real challenge with these five initiatives because these are not simple pieces of legislation, and I feel like we owe it to the voters to try and make sure they really understand the ramifications of each one.”
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