Ottawa Citizen: Advocacy group pushes for city to adopt living wage policy
- Details
- Category: Ottawa Living Wage Campaign
- Published on Monday, 26 April 2010 15:00
June 6th, 2010 by Neco Cockburn - Ottawa Citizen
OTTAWA-An advocacy group for low- and moderate-income families is calling on municipal candidates to support a “living wage” policy, as well as increased affordable housing, stronger tenant protection and geared-to-income transit fares.
Members of Ottawa ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) on Tuesday released a list of issues they want hopefuls to support during the election campaign, including a “living wage” policy that would increase the minimum pay for anyone doing city work, whether they’re staffers or contractors, to $13.50 an hour.
“For most people who are the working poor, what it does is it gives them hope,” ACORN member Nadia Willard said.
Without a living wage, “you are constantly jeopardizing your health or trying to pay bills and make ends meet,” Willard said.
City staff are researching such a policy, which was supported by a few municipal candidates who were among about 50 people at the ACORN event outside City Hall.Greg Ross, a candidate in Bay ward, said the City of Ottawa’s adoption of a “living wage” policy could pressure other employers, including the federal government, to do the same.
Willard and other ACORN members said the city should reinvest into a poverty reduction strategy and social programs the money that is to be saved by uploading some social services programs to the province.
Housing is another priority, the group says, citing the Alliance to End Homelessness’s call for the city to increase the number of affordable housing units by 1,000 each year.
Improving conditions for tenants is also important, since many low-income families face problems such as insect and rodent infestations, broken-down elevators, and lack of heat, ACORN says.
