GL_021419

More documents

Recommendations

Info

6 | February 14, 2019 | The glenview lantern news glenviewlantern.com Trustees opt into Cook County minimum wage, sick leave ordinances Chris Pullam Freelance Reporter Glenview will align with Cook County’s minimum wage and paid sick leave ordinances beginning July 1. The Glenview Village Board voted 4-0 in favor of compliance during its Thursday, Feb. 7 meeting. As a result, the village’s minimum wage for employees who do not receive gratuities will match Cook County’s rate of $12 per hour, with that rate set to increase to $13 on July 1, 2020, followed by annual increases based on the Consumer Price Index each July. Employees who receive gratuities will earn $5.10 per hour and will receive subsequent CPI-based increases each July. In addition, any employee who works at least 80 hours within any 120- day period will accrue one hour of paid sick leave for every 40 hours worked, up to a maximum accrual of 40 hours per year. Employees can carry over up to 50 percent of their unused paid sick leave from one 12-month accrual period to the next 12-month accrual period, up to a maximum of 20 hours. Multiple Glenview business owners, as well as representatives from the Glenview Chamber of Commerce, urged the board to delay action until Democratic Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker approves a state-wide minimum wage. “There was a vote today by the Illinois State Senate to approve an increase in the minimum wage,” said Karen Patterson, president of the Glenview Chamber of Commerce. “Governor Pritzker is pushing to have this bill voted on by February 2020. On behalf of the business community, which contributes up to $17 million — or 24 percent of the village budget — allow us to have a level playing field with regard to wages with our close neighboring counties. Hit the pause button for now pending the state legislation, or set the implementation date to 2020.” Less than 12 hours before the Glenview Village Board meeting, the Illinois Senate approved increasing the state’s minimum wage to $15 over six years. The proposal would increase the current $8.25-an-hour minimum wage by $1.75 in January 2020 and $1 more each Jan. 1 until 2025, when the minimum wage would reach $15. While that would eventually max out at $2 higher than Cook County’s minimum wage, it wouldn’t catch up to the county rate until 2023. Ultimately, trustees chose not to count on the state. “The State of Illinois may in fact enact something that impacts Glenview, and in this ordinance and at the last meeting, we acknowledged that might happen,” Trustee Kerry Cummings said. “We don’t know how [the state law] will overlay, whether it will be statewide or exclude Cook County. As it is right now, it looks like it’s statewide, but at the state level, a lot can happen between now and a final vote.” As adopted, Glenview’s minimum wage would default to the state’s rate, so long as the final version didn’t carve out an exception for Cook County, as some statewide bills do. Other business owners, such as Rocky Sapienza of Glenview’s LLC Hallcrest, voiced his worries that local businesses weren’t being given enough time to adjust for the new financial reality. “When Cook County enacted the ordinance, they gave businesses more than eight months to deal with a $1.75 raise,” he said. “The motion that passed last meeting would require Glenview businesses to implement a $3.75 raise in less than five months. “Any increase to our costs this year will drop straight to our bottom line, and our bottom line determines bonus pools, it determines portions of compensation packages to many employees in our company, so enacting this … in July would hurt our employees, not help our employees, or our company.” Ultimately, all four trustees in attendance voted in favor of adopting both Cook County ordinances: Michael Jenny, Deborah Karton, Karim Khoja and Cummings. All ordinances require four votes to pass. Trustees John Hinkamp and Philip O’C. White were absent, but there’s votes wouldn’t have swayed the decision. During the Jan. 15 meeting, Hinkamp cast the lone dissenting vote, with the same four trustees supporting the ordinances. “I don’t feel this helps workers,” he said at the time. “It’s proven to eliminate jobs. … This is a bad law. It’s always been a bad law.” White missed the last meeting due to an injury. During that meeting, trustees were originally scheduled to vote on the first consideration of the same ordinance — but with an effective date of July 1, 2020. However, the board reduced the timetable by one year during a public debate that followed nearly an hour of resident input. While Jenny, Karton, Khoja and Cummings all seemed to support adopting Cook County’s ordinances from the beginning of that meeting, Khoja, himself a business owner, preferred implementing the new rules on July 1, 2020, to give Glenview businesses more time to adjust. Prior to the vote, he told Jenny, Karton and Cummings he would compromise by supporting a Dec. 31, 2019 implementation, but ultimately conceded when Jenny called a vote incorporating the earlier date. The path to $12 an hour Last year, the Glenview Village Board opted out of Cook County’s new minimum wage and sick leave ordinances, but during the Nov. 6, 2018 General Election, Glenview residents voted overwhelmingly in favor of changing course. According to Cook County election results, approximately 76 and 82 percent of voters in the precincts that include at least a small section of Glenview, respectively, voted ‘yes’ to these questions: • Shall the minimum wage in your municipality match the $13 per hour Cook County minimum wage law for adults over the age of 18 by July 1, 2020, and be indexed to the Consumer Price Index after that? • Shall your municipality match the Cook County earned sick time law, which allows for workers to earn up to 40 hours (5 days) of sick time a year to take care of their own health or a family member’s health? As a whole, approximately 84 and 89 percent of Cook County voters, respectively, supported opting into the ordinances. The questions were posed to voters in every municipality in Cook County, regardless of whether their elected officials opted into the ordinance, but local governing bodies were not obligated to opt in or out based on their constituents’ votes. For towns like Evanston and Skokie that did go along with the county last year, the minimum wage increased to $10 an hour in July 2018 and will increase by $1 each year until it reaches $13 hourly in 2020. In municipalities that opted into the sick leave ordinance, any employee who works at least 80 hours within any 120- day period accrues one hour of paid sick leave for every 40 hours worked, ROUND IT UP A brief recap of Village Board action on Thursday, Feb. 7: • Trustees approved a payment of $2,100,471.65 to cover bills across more than a dozen Village budget funds. • Trustee Deborah Karton said the Village secured a $500,000 grant that will help with flooding mitigation on the eastern side of Glenview. • The board also considered an ordinance granting approval of a conditional use for the Dance and Music Academy at the DiPaolo Center; an ordinance for a comprehensive plan amendment, rezoning and conditional use for Canaan Church, 1255 Milwaukee Ave.; and an ordinance for a conditional use, final site plan review and environmental plan for The Grove, 1421 Milwaukee Ave. up to a maximum sick leave accrual of 40 hours per year. During the Glenview Village Board’s Dec. 4 meeting, the board’s second meeting following the November election, Patterson directed staff to include an advisory item on the Jan. 3 meeting agenda so the board could explore several options: stick with their original decision, Please see village, 10
glenviewlantern.com glenview the glenview lantern | February 14, 2019 | 7 SPREAD THE Selling or buying a home? Provide a tear out of this ad when you sell or buy a home with Shaun, and he will donate 10% of his commission to the @gives back Community Fund * . atproperties.com/atgivesback REAL ESTATE *To redeem this offer, present this ad at the first meeting with Shaun Raugstad by May 14, 2019. The closing of your purchase, sale, or both must be finalized by February 14, 2020 while represented by Shaun Raugstad. Presentation of this offer is not an obligation to purchase or sell a home. Interview Shaun Raugstad to hear what he can do to help you sell or buy your home 847.331.3288 | spr247@gmail.com | shaunraugstad.com
Page 1 and 2: ® ® BALLOT INSIDE THIS ISSUE VOTE
Page 3 and 4: glenviewlantern.com news the glenvi
Page 5: glenviewlantern.com glenview the gl
Page 9 and 10: glenviewlantern.com glenview the gl
Page 13 and 14: glenviewlantern.com news the glenvi
Page 19 and 20: news Mama Glass Scholarship to hold
Page 24 and 25: 24 | February 14, 2019 | The glenvi
Page 44: the glenview lantern | February 14,

GL_021419

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?