People rally at Rep. Conor Lamb’s Penn Hills office in support of $15 minimum wage increase

Joy Darden-Pipkins has been taking care of her godmother for around 20 years without being paid.

“It’s a labor of love,” she said, adding she is grateful to be married to a man who makes enough money to pay the bills and the mortgage.

Darden-Pipkins was one of around 30 people who gathered in the parking lot of the Penn Hills office of U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, D-Mt. Lebanon, on Tuesday. The group gathered to thank Lamb for his support of raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. They also urged him to keep fighting by pressuring colleagues who do not support the change.

The rally was sponsored by Pennsylvania United, a political action committee that describes itself as a grassroots organization with chapters in seven Western Pennsylvanian counties, including Westmoreland and Allegheny.

Several vehicles honked their horns in support as they passed the small, cheering crowd gathered along Duff Road. Many held signs, some of which read “Pennsylvanians Need Unions” and “Pittsburgh for $15 and a Union.”

A group of people have gathered in Penn Hills to thank @ConorLambPA for voting for the $15/hr minimum wage and urged him to keep fighting. pic.twitter.com/bOoRqGuOvc

— Dillon Carr (@dillonswriting) March 2, 2021

The Penn Hills rally was one of seven happening throughout Pennsylvania on Tuesday, days after President Biden’s $1.9 trillion covid-19 stimulus bill passed along party lines the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill included gradually raising the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to $15.

The plan now heads to the Senate, where it seems certain the wage increase will be omitted after the Senate’s nonpartisan parliamentarian said last week the increase runs afoul of the chamber’s budget rules.

In the last year, Darden-Pipkins started getting paid for the work she does to take care of her 70-year-old godmother. At $10 an hour and about 10 hours a week, it’s not much.

“I can’t imagine living on this,” she said.

That’s why she got involved in, and ultimately joined, the United Home Care Workers of PA union.

“I didn’t know there were so many people that are out there doing the same thing as me,” she said.

Erica Payne, 44, of Pittsburgh’s West End said she’s barely able to keep up with bills while working two jobs, looking after her mother and a quadriplegic client.

“I can’t pay my student loans, and half the time I can’t pay my bills,” she said.

Payne said she showed up to the event to help people understand that health care workers are modern-day heroes.

“But to not pay them $15 an hour or what they’re worth – that’s disrespectful,” she said.

Jennifer Rafanan Kennedy, managing director of PA United, said raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour would give 1.5 million Pennsylvanians a raise. So even though the provision in Biden’s covid relief plan might not come to fruition, she said the group will continue to fight for it as a standalone bill.

“We’ve got to show that we need ($15 an hour), we need to keep the pressure up,” she said.

Stephanie Fello, 37, of Plum has worked at the Giant Eagle in Monroeville for 10 years. When she started out, she made $7.35 an hour as a part-time staffer.

Through the years, she has had her utilities shut off because she couldn’t pay the bills. At one point, for a period of six months, she didn’t have enough money to buy groceries, she said.

“I had to rely on family and my boyfriend. How could I not afford to buy groceries while working at a grocery store?” she said.

She decided to get involved in a union that helped negotiate a higher starting minimum wage, which now sits at $11 an hour.

“That’s good – but it’s not enough,” she said. “We want $15. In fact, we want more than $15. And we’re not being greedy, we just need to survive out here.”

She said the $7.35 an hour wage meant delaying buying a house, getting married and having children.

“It was like a hamster wheel. It was like I was running and running and not getting anywhere,” she said. “So for the next generation coming up, they should not have to live like that.”