D.C. voters have overwhelmingly approved Initiative 82, which phases out the tipped minimum wage and will require business owners to pay tipped workers like bartenders and servers the city’s full minimum wage by 2027 without relying on gratuity.
Now, bar and restaurant owners are weighing how to respond, both within their establishments — by raising menu prices or adding service charges to offset increased labor costs, for example — and externally. Some owners and their advocates are already trying to persuade D.C. lawmakers to pass legislation that will ease small businesses’ transition away from the tipped minimum wage.
And there’s an appetite among the D.C. Council and the mayor’s office to hear them out.
“I think that we should hear any suggestions, as long as they’re not intended to undermine the initiative,” Council Chairman Phil Mendelson tells DCist/WAMU. He made clear he is not interested in repealing Initiative 82 — as happened in 2018 — and he does not suspect a majority of councilmembers would support a repeal or a delay either. But a standalone bill that addresses concerns? He’s open to it; after all, he was on the record as being against Initiative 82.
Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development John Falcicchio echoes Mendelson’s comments, and confirmed that, despite some confusion on that point recently, the mayor is not interested in repealing the initiative.
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