The minimum

by David Forbes September 22, 2015

City government will finally pay a living wage to all its employees. But the worker who raised concerns in the first place was fired.

Above: Lauren Bacchus, a U.S. Cellular Center worker who raised concerns late last year about a lack of living wage for workers there. Shortly after going public with her concerns, Bacchus was fired. File photo by Max Cooper.

Since 2007, the city of Asheville has had a living wage policy, ostensibly committing it to paying a living wage ($12.50 an hour without employer health insurance or $11 with) to all of its full and part-time employees. But there was also an important exception, one that meant up to hundreds “temporary/seasonal workers” were paid less, sometimes far less.

Tonight that will likely change, with Asheville City Council set to extend a living wage to all city government workers. Council supported $250,000 to cover the cost of the raises when it passed the annual budget. In the ensuing months, it was for some time unclear if city staff would actually go through with a living wage rate for all city workers, or if exceptions would remain.

The move comes after a Blade investigation late last year revealed that, due to that exception, at least 140 city workers were paid below a living wage, sometimes well below (a staff report would later put the number of workers affected by this lower wage rate at 150-350 depending on the time of year). Despite the name, many of the “temporary or seasonal” workers were neither: everyone who worked for the city for 20 hours or less a week fell into the category, regardless of how long or how regularly they’d worked. While workers at the U.S. Cellular Center were the largest single group affected by this, so were those outside the civic center as well: there were “temporary/seasonal” workers in almost every city department.

In a few cases, workers at the civic center who had been there since the ’70s and ’80s still made less than $8 an hour. Soon, all of them should see raises up to at least $12.50 an hour.

Back and forth

In the months following our initial story, the issue was raised increasingly in public, and in January a majority of Council members committed to changing the policy, including supporting additional funds for the raises. Vicki Meath, director of Just Economics, the organization that calculates WNC’s living wage, expressed concern about the exemption. During the budget process, she called for all city workers to get a living wage, noting that the amount is a “more just minimum” for local workers.

But there was some pushback from senior staff. During a May budget hearing, a consultant hired by the city to assess its pay structure criticized even the idea of paying a living wage to all city workers, claiming that it would “would falsely inflate your position in the marketplace.” City manager Gary Jackson referred to the consultant’s opinion as a professional one and noted that he would work to “distinguish within the pool” of which workers might be eligible for a raise and which might be left out. Over the ensuing months, Jackson and Finance Director Barbara Whitehorn repeatedly noted that they intended to separate which workers would get a living wage.

As recently as July, city staff floated the idea of only extending the living wage to some workers. In emails between Meath and city staff obtained by the Blade, a draft policy that would have left employees hired for three months out of the living wage policy. The discussions noted that Just Economics criteria allowed a living wage employers to pay less than a living wage to workers during their first 90 days of employment (i.e. while they were training) or if it was temporary help hired to deal with an emergency.

But Meath replied that those exceptions were generally intended for people who would shortly receive a raise to a living wage or a “short term need to hire a few extra workers to complete a big job” and “was not originally intended for regular seasonal positions and it has not been used this way by other Living Wage Certified Employers.” While an employer with those practices might be able to apply for living wage certification, she emphasized that approval would be uncertain.

However, earlier this month, speaking at the state AFL-CIO’s convention, Smith said the city was ready give all its workers a living wage.

The proposal reflects that, and it also extends those wage rates back to July 3, meaning those workers employed by the city this summer will get a boost. Meath notes in an email to the Blade that she’s happy about the results.

“On behalf of Just Economics, I am very pleased to see the City of Asheville extend their living wage policy to include all people working for the City regardless of status as a full-time, part-time, seasonal, or temporary employee,” she writes. “We commend the Asheville City Council for continuing to value work and workers and being a leader in helping in establishing a more just wage floor than the minimum wage.”

When asked, city spokesperson Polly McDaniel said that no hours or positions were cut to produce the raises: the $250,000 covers them.

However, the proposal before Council notes that in the coming year, the raises — specifically for civic center workers — will leave a $24,000 shortfall.

“The Civic Center Commission recommends consideration of adjustments to billable hour rates, box office hours and staffing to offset the cost increase,” the report notes. “Fee increases and staffing adjustments would be considered in the process of planning the FY 2016-17 budget.”

Backlash

Late last year, Lauren Bacchus, who worked at the U.S. Cellular Center box office, spoke up about wages at her workplace, first mentioning her low pay at a September Asheville City Council meeting and then talking at more length about the issue with the Blade. Like many Ashevillians, Bacchus worked multiple part-time jobs to make ends meet. She felt that the lower pay for herself and her colleagues at the civic center was hypocritical on the city’s part and contributed to the hard times faced by many Ashevillians, rather than setting a model for alleviating them.

By the time the Blade story ran, Bacchus had found a full-time job elsewhere, but she still worked at the Civic Center occasionally, usually about once a month.

That wouldn’t last for long. While the city was deliberating a change on the very issue she’d help raise publicly, and some of her co-workers were talking about the story, Bacchus was fired. Her offenses, apparently, were “uniform violations,” i.e. not wearing the official civic center shirt during her shift, and leaving the box office without authorization. The first uniform violation, she says, was a simple error. During the second, she wore business attire to work an Asheville Symphony event, something she claims had never been a problem before, but was reprimanded because the attire was not black.

In the third case, on March 23 Bacchus says there was an elderly blind couple, dropped off early by Mountain Mobility, who were trying to find food and she temporarily left the box office, after notifying her colleagues, to help them. Bacchus’ account of that incident is backed up by a co-worker who confirms the details. That night, she says she left her position at the usual time, after checking with her co-workers and, following common practice, delivering the remaining tickets in the “will call” box to the ushers.

According to city records, Bacchus was fired April 1. On April 28, Chris Corl, the civic center’s general manager, emailed her about her termination, apologizing for contacting her so late and noting he thought HR had notified her earlier. Corl claimed that Bacchus was let go for the uniform violations ad for leaving her spot on March 23.

“You left your station without a radio for longer than 10 minutes multiple times without notifying your supervisor during the event,” he wrote. “This caused delays in closing the box office for the night of the show and delays in settling with the event promoter.” Bacchus claims that this would not have been possible, as she didn’t have any cash that night, wasn’t logged into the Ticketmaster computer system, was only handling “will call” tickets and checked with her supervisor before departing.

“We decided that it was time to conclude the temporary status of your employment here as a Ticket Seller,” Corl wrote. She was paid $7.81 an hour and, by that point, had been a “temporary” employee of the city since late 2013.

The Blade contacted Travis Payne, a Raleigh-based attorney who specializes in the rights of public employees (he represents Asheville’s firefighters union) for more context on the firing and the labor protections for such workers. In addition to often receiving lower pay, Payne notes that “temporary/seasonal” workers don’t receive the same protections full-time city workers do under civil service rules. But because they’re public employees, they also don’t have many of the rights that private employees have under federal law.

Even so, Payne notes that there are some protections that apply. Specifically, an employee’s speech on a matter of public concern is protected. That, he believes, is key in Bacchus’ firing, as is the timing.

“If it’s already been in the press, it’s hard to argue it’s not a matter of public concern,” Payne says. “It appears, based on the facts, that this discharge violates her constitutional rights.”

Further, Bacchus says she observed other employees engaging in the same actions — both leaving the ticket counter and not wearing the official shirt during work duties — without any repercussions.

At press time, the city of Asheville had not responded to requests for comment from the Blade about Bacchus’ termination.

While the end of her civic center job didn’t threaten her livelihood, she emphasizes that more than her particular firing, the larger problem is the message it sends to workers in a similar spot who might feel the need to raise issues with city wages or working conditions in the future.

“I believe my termination from the position of ticket seller at the US Cellular Center to be unfounded and unfair,” she tells the Blade. “I don’t want this to happen to other people who decide to talk about living wage policy.”

“We can’t just say ‘yay, living wage, let’s move on now.’”

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