Arizona minimum wage ballot initiative effort scrapped

A ballot initiative to have tipped service workers get paid the same minimum wage and bump the minimum wage to $18 an hour has been scrapped.

The group, known as “Raise the Wage AZ,” is pulling the signatures they submitted to the Arizona Secretary of State’s office, as the petition was challenged by the Arizona Restaurant Association over the number of signatures obtained.

However, the group plans to push for legislation in the next session through Rep. Mariana Sandoval, D-Goodyear, with similar provisions.

In addition to pushing for the legislation, the group said they’re going to try at the county and local level for similar proposals, and campaign against the “Tipped Workers Protection Act” that will be on the ballot in November, which would allow for a 25% decrease in the wage a worker takes given that they make back that amount in tips. It would also create a “pay floor” of $2 or more above minimum wage for those same workers.

“Over the coming weeks and months, we will turn our attention to mobilizing tens of thousands of service industry workers, and voters of all backgrounds across the state, to support elected officials and candidates who pledge their support to advancing One Fair Wage as legislation - both in the AZ State Legislature and in Congress - and to defeat the ‘Tipped Workers Protection Act’ — a deceptively named ballot measure supported by the Arizona Restaurant Association and its corporate lobbyists,” Saru Jayaraman, President of One Fair Wage, said in a statement.

‘This sham initiative is nothing more than a shameless attempt to trick voters into cutting the wages of tipped service industry workers across the state by 25 percent,” Jayaraman continued.

The Arizona Restaurant Association said that the signature challenge centered around the group possibly not getting the 255,949 needed and that the initiative would have hurt small businesses that run on razor-thin margins to stay afloat.

“The One Fair Wage initiative has always been a front for union bosses and out-of-state activists,” Steve Chucri, president & CEO of the Arizona Restaurant Association, said in a statement. “The radicals who want to force a new pay structure down the throats of Arizona small businesses and tipped workers were never honest about their true motivations, so I’m not surprised they also lied about their number of signature petitions for the ballot.”