Iowa Republicans move ahead on initiative to strike down local minimum wage increases

DES MOINES - Iowa House Republicans pressed ahead Thursday with an effort to pre-empt local governments from usurping state authority in business and civil rights areas, rejecting a Democratic effort to raise the statewide minimum hourly wage to $11 by 2019 in the process.

Members of the House Local Government Committee voted 12-9 along party lines to approve legislation to bar cities and counties from establishing minimum wage levels or employment regulations, invoking marketing or consumer merchandise sales restrictions or adopting civil rights ordinances that go above and beyond what the Legislature and governor have set as a statewide standard.

'The only thing that we're doing here is asking them not to exceed what's already set out in the state code,” said Rep. John Landon, R-Ankeny, 'not to establish their own standards. We're not taking the rights away from anyone. We're trying to provide a seamless business climate in the state of Iowa.”

Landon said House Study Bill 92 merely ensures 'a level playing field” in all Iowa communities by reasserting that Iowa's minimum wage is $7.25 per hour statewide and by preventing cities and counties 'from establishing broader protected classes than are already protected under state and federal law.”

Officials in Johnson, Linn, Polk and Wapello counties have approved hourly wage minimums in their jurisdictions already in effect or slated to take effect in the future that exceed the state standard, but those actions would be rendered 'void and unenforceable” if the bill is adopted by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Terry Branstad.

Rep. Brian Meyer, D-Des Moines, said the ultimate affect of the legislation would be to eliminate home rule and local control and he opposed the measure. He offered an amendment to strike the GOP language entirely and replace it with provisions to raise Iowa's minimum wage in increments to $8.75 on July 1, $9.75 on Jan. 1, 2018, and $11 on Jan. 1, 2019, along with cost-of-living increases and training wage raises.

Meyer said the proposed changes would meet the GOP objective 'to create consistent uniformity and not a hodgepodge of different minimum wages from city to city,” but Landon said the Democratic amendment 'changes the total meaning of the bill” in recommending Republicans defeat it, which they did by a vote of 12-9.

'They're basically taking away the raises in the counties that have already done it,” Meyer said after the meeting. 'We have local communities trying to do something and they're pre-empting them.

'I think it's interesting that they preach that for schools the best decisions are made by local school boards, but with everything else we're just going to tell them what to do,” he added. 'We don't like mandates from Washington but we're going to give mandates to our local communities.”

Committee chairman Jake Highfill, R-Johnston, shrugged off talk from local officials of bringing legal challenges to the state pre-emption bill if it becomes law, telling reporters, 'I already believe they can't do it, so if they do sue they'll probably lose that, too.”

Earlier in the day, House Speaker Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake, said the issues covered in HSB92 have always been the functions of state and federal government and not the responsibilities of local entities.

The House speaker said she did not know whether there would be a separate bill to come before representatives to raise the state minimum wage, but added, 'I have no doubt that there will be people talking about that during the pre-emption debate.” She added that majority Republicans were not interested in 'grandfathering” in higher minimum wages that have been passed in four counties.

'No employer is required to lower whatever they're paying,” Upmeyer said. 'Employers can pay whatever they wish and whatever competition requires. We've got among the lowest unemployment that we've ever had in this state. It's a wonderful competitive market for people seeking jobs.”

Rep. Phyllis Thede, D-Bettendorf, said the civil rights pre-emption concerned her because Iowa communities can be 'quite different,” especially those in rural and urban areas.

'I've been here, this is my ninth year, and we've always talked about allowing cities to have local control and to take that away from them, I am concerned about that,” Thede told committee members. 'We're taking that solid piece away from them.”

Landon said the provision is not directed at anything specifically taking place in Iowa, but is a response to 'head off” situations that have occurred in other states where local entities developed ordinances that were not specifically disallowed under state law.

'We're trying to bring this to say this is a statewide issue. We are trying to protect everyone at the level that's uniform across the state of Iowa,” he said.

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