Williams: Opposition to Bill Raising Minimum Wage Remains “Significant”

Time is running out for a bill that would raise Connecticut’s minimum wage by a modest 50 cents over the next two years, Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams said Tuesday.

“We still are significantly short of a majority of Democrats to pass it,” Williams said during a late afternoon news conference. “I support it, Sen. Looney supports it, but to date we have simply not had the votes to pass it.”

The legislative session ends at midnight on Wednesday.

The proposal to increase the $8.25 hourly rate is the brainchild of House Speaker Chris Donovan, a Democrat from Meriden who is running for Congress.

As initially crafted by Donovan, the bill would have set the minimum wage at $9 an hour on July 1, and to $9.75 an hour in July 2013.  After that, it would have been linked to the Consumer Price Index to help low-wage workers’ salaries keep pace with inflation.

But the amount of the proposed increase was trimmed, first by a legislative committee and later by the House. The bill now calls for the minimum wage to increase to $8.50 an hour on Jan. 1 and $8.75 in 2014.

Williams said he has been in “constant contact” with Donovan. But he said the basis of the opposition to the increase from members of his caucus is largely about timing.

“Folks have almost uniformly supported increases in the minimum wage when they’ve come up before,” he said. “When we have increased the minimum wage in year’s past, it’s almost always been in good economic times or in times when the state of Connecticut has fallen behind surrounding states.

“Conversely what we have now are pretty challenging economic times with employers struggling and the fact that Connecticut’s minimum wage is higher than New York, it’s higher than Massachusetts, it’s higher than Rhode Island,” Williams said. “Add to that the fact that just last year we did a very robust earned income tax credit.

“These caucus members believe we have done substantial things to help those who are struggling at the lower end of the economic ladder,” Williams added. “And they’re open to minimum wage increases in the future but they just feel that this is the wrong time.”

When asked how many members oppose the bill, Williams characterized the opposition as “significant.”