Vigilance vital in wake of vote on minimum wage

This editorial was originally published in the Tuesday edition of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner.

Concern about the motivation of Alaska House members in their narrow passing of minimum wage increase legislation Sunday is understandable given how lawmakers behaved on the topic a decade ago.

What lawmakers did in 2002 was approve a minimum wage increase, thereby forcing off the ballot a citizen initiative that itself would have raised the minimum wage. What got supporters upset, however, is that lawmakers a year later, in a new Legislature and with the signature of Gov. Frank Murkowski, removed components of the law that supporters deemed essential.

Legislators do have the authority to overturn initiatives, but they must wait two years to do so.

The 2002-03 episode created bitterness and, quite naturally, skepticism about what some legislators intended this year by putting forward a minimum wage increase similar to one already scheduled to appear on the August ballot. Did they approve an increase only to work for it to be undone the next year by the next Legislature, a year ahead of when they would be able to overturn the ballot measure if the measure were left alone for voters to decide this fall?

House Majority Leader Lance Pruitt, Republican of Anchorage, made a pleading statement at a Sunday night House majority news conference, saying to the assembled press corps that “In two years, I hope you write about how we held our promise. Because we told the people tonight that we had an intent that we would not touch this.”

The problem with that statement is that, as demonstrated on the issue in 2003, one Legislature cannot prevent the next Legislature from changing a law. That’s the way our system is set up. Who knows what the intent of the next Legislature will be?

Some skeptics of the House vote to raise the minimum wage also see another underhanded reason for its passage: keeping low-income voters away from the polls by getting the minimum wage initiative off the ballot.

That, so goes the thinking, keeps those voters away from voting to repeal the controversial oil tax law put in place by Republicans and signed by Gov. Sean Parnell. A referendum of that law is also on the August ballot.

We can’t know the true motivations of those House members who voted this weekend in favor of raising the minimum wage. But we can remind them of that vote if necessary if they win re-election later this year to serve in the 2015-2016

Legislature.

Members of the Mat-Su House Delegation who voted in favor of the minimum wage bill:

• Rep. Eric Fiege, Chickaloon;

• Rep. Wes Keller, Wasilla;

• Rep. Mark Neuman, Big Lake.