Columbus uses income tax incentives to encourage employers to create jobs. On Friday, City Council member Elizabeth Brown is announcing a measure requiring those jobs to pay at least $15 an hour.
For the past year, Columbus leaders have been demanding a living wage for the positions they create through tax breaks. Brown says so far it鈥檚 been an informal policy, and she wants to ensure it鈥檚 written permanently into city law.
鈥淒oesn鈥檛 matter who the department director is. Doesn鈥檛 matter who the mayor is. Doesn鈥檛 matter who city council is,鈥� Brown explains. 鈥淭his is in code, this is an expectation. And Council has to review it every three years to decide if it鈥檚 time for an increase.鈥�
Brown says it doesn鈥檛 make sense to use tax dollars to create jobs, if the employee won鈥檛 be earning enough to support themselves.
"Sending a tax dollar after a job that then needs to turn around and rely on tax dollars or public assistance to support their family鈥攖hat logic doesn't compute for me," Brown says.
State law pre-empts Columbus and other cities from approving a broad-based local minimum wage different than the Ohio rate of $8.30, but the city can include the requirement in its rules for tax incentives.
