Voters in November will decide whether Anaheim Resort-area companies that receive city subsidies should be required to pay their employees $18 an hour by 2022, after a split Anaheim City Council voted 4-3 Tuesday to place a union-backed initiative on the November general election ballot.
Council members Kris Murray, Lucille Kring and Stephen Faessel voted no, saying they want to ask for an economic impact report before placing the item on the ballot.
If approved by voters, the initiative would require any company within the Anaheim Resort district receiving a city subsidy – and potentially businesses with contractual relationships with those companies – to pay at least $18 an hour by 2022, with the minimum wage increasing each year after that based on cost of living increases.
A coalition of worker unions supporting the ballot measure gathered more than 21,000 signatures in less than three weeks for the initiative, with the county Registrar of Voters confirming at least 13,185 of those signatures are registered voters in Anaheim, the qualifying threshold to appear on the ballot. Verification of signatures stopped once that threshold was reached.
