Let Justice Roll: July 24 Minimum Wage Hike Is Just Step Toward Living Wage
|
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
JULY 16, 2007
1:44 PM
|
CONTACT: Let Justice Roll
Katy Heins, LJR Campaign Director 513-314-0074 (cell), letjusticerollohio@yahoo.com
Betsy Leondar-Wright, 781-704-4039 (cell), betsy@classmatters.org
|
| |
|
Wage On:
For Let Justice Roll, July 24 Minimum Wage Hike Is Just Step Toward Living Wage
|
| |
|
WASHINGTON - JULY 16 - The grassroots momentum to eliminate poverty wages will be energized, not quelled, by next week's federal minimum wage increase to $5.85 an hour.
Let Justice Roll, a national ninety-organization living wage coalition, will continue to organize campaigns to raise federal and state minimum wages, particularly in the South and Midwest where poverty-wage jobs are concentrated.
Let Justice Roll continues organizing campaigns in Georgia, Tennessee, Kansas, Oklahoma and Cuyahoga County, Ohio to enact higher state minimum and local living wage ordinances.
The impact of "new values voters" didn't begin or end on Election Day 2006. "Raising the minimum wage is not a blue state/red state issue, but a moral issue," says Rev. Stephen Copley, who led the Give Arkansas a Raise Now campaign. "We find overwhelmingly positive response to the Let Justice Roll message: A job should keep you out of poverty, not keep you in it."
Let Justice Roll's successes in conservative states like Arkansas and North Carolina helped make possible the minimum wage ballot victories in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Montana, Nevada and Ohio, which in turn paved the way for success in Congress.
Even while the Congressional debate was still going on, Let Justice Roll campaigns pushed through state minimum wage increases in Illinois, Kentucky, New Hampshire and Indiana. Also, Let Justice Roll organizing won three living wage victories in Tennessee.
"When the minimum wage goes up on July 24, it will end the longest period in history without a raise, but it won't end poverty wages. The federal raise from $5.15 to $5.85 is a long overdue way station on the road to a living wage," says Let Justice Roll Campaign Director Katy Heins.
When the federal minimum wage reaches $7.25 on July 24, 2009, under the painfully slow schedule legislated by Congress, minimum wage workers will still have less buying power than their counterparts in 1956.
Helen Norman, co-owner of the Garnett Dairy Queen in Kansas, says, "As a business owner, I believe we need to pay higher wages so that people can support their families. In Kansas, we have the lowest state minimum wage in the country, $2.65 an hour. With the cost of living constantly going up, even making ends meet at the new $5.85 federal minimum will be a struggle. How do we expect people to survive?"
"Let Justice Roll will work to raise the federal minimum wage to a living wage as fast as possible," says Heins.
Contact Information for Let Justice Roll Organizers:
Rev. Steve Copley, Arkansas: 501-626-9220, scopley438@aol.com
David Smith, Kansas: 785-842-2793, livingwageyes@hotmail.com
Heidi Zeller, Kansas: 310-415-9451, heidizeller@gmail.com
Karen Spradlin, Oklahoma: 405-213-3282, karen.spradlin@sbcglobal.net
Rev. Rebekah Jordan,Tennessee: 901-332-3570, msinterfaith@yahoo.com
Vicky Meath, Ohio: 330-523-0739, vicki@clevelandjwj.org
Additional information can be found at: www.letjusticeroll.org
Let Justice Roll Living Wage Campaign is a national, nonpartisan coalition of more than ninety faith, community, labor and business organizations.
### |
|
Printer Friendly Version
E-Mail This Article
