Fitzgerald vetoes $20 minimum wage proposal for Allegheny County employees

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald on Tuesday vetoed a bill passed by county council to establish a $20 minimum wage for county workers.

The executive said his veto message shouldn’t be taken as disagreement with the need to pay county employees a living wage, noting his commitment to increase wages for full-time employees to $18 an hour.

Fitzgerald added that council’s bill violates Allegheny County’s Home Rule Charter and attempts to usurp authority of the executive branch. He said council would need to amend the charter to change who has the power to set pay rates for employees.

The bill passed county council last week on a 10-4 vote, and would set $20 an hour as the minimum wage for county workers by 2026. There would be incremental increases to $18 an hour next year and to $19 an hour in 2025.

“Ultimately, this veto is about the separation of powers set up in the county’s Home Rule Charter,” said Fitzgerald in a statement. “When this government was set up and approved by the voters, it did not give the legislative body the authority to set pay rates.”

The Allegheny County solicitor and the county council’s solicitor have diverging opinions on the minimum wage bill. The county solicitor’s opinion said county council does not have the legal authority to install a minimum wage, while the county council solicitor’s opinion said the body does have the authority.

Fitzgerald said he also differed with council’s push to increase pay for part-time county employees. He said many part-time workers are in high school or college and those workers who make between $12-15 an hour are in a different category of worker than full-time employees, as they work seasonal jobs at county-operated pools, golf courses, and parks.

He said his office analyzed the effects of giving up to a $6 an hour raise for these seasonal workers, and said that would cause “a ripple effect with a greater price tag than originally presented.”

Fitzgerald said raising their wages would lead to substantial raises for full-time employees and that would lead to an estimated increase in the county’s operating budget of about $30 million. He claimed that would lead to a “significant” property tax increase on residents.

The county’s operating budget for 2022 was about $1 billion.

Allegheny County Councilwoman at-large Bethany Hallam, D-Brighton Heights, voted for the bill, and has pushed back against the arguments. She said during last week’s meeting that she is confident that council can find the money in the budget to provide the wage increase without increasing taxes.

On Tuesday, Hallam said it is council’s job to fight for working class residents of Allegheny County. She said Fitzgerald is out of touch with those constituents .

“He came into office as a millionaire, and that is who he’s spent the past 12 years fighting for — not the working class employees of Allegheny County whose backs he’s built his legacy upon,” said Hallam.

Council members who voted for the bill said it will help the county compete with the private sector and attract more workers to fill many of the county’s unfilled positions.

Ten votes are required to override a veto. If every council member that voted for the bill on first passage votes the same again, council will have enough votes to override Fitzgerald’s veto.

Hallam said she is confident council will have enough votes to override Fitzgerald’s veto and will “put a stop to the games this administration is playing with workers’ livelihoods.”