Levy County Commissioner John Meeks said raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour is a terrible idea. He was commenting on a Florida Constitutional Amendment on the Nov. 3 ballot.
By Terry Witt -Spotlight Senior Reporter
A Florida constitutional amendment on the Nov. 3 ballot would raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour and could have “dire effects” on local government and small businesses, Levy County Commissioner John Meeks said Tuesday.
Amendment 2 on the ballot would gradually raise the minimum wage from the current $8.46 per hour to $15 per hour by 2026. Sixty percent of Florida voters would have to vote for the amendment to approve it.
Once the ballot measure is approved by voters it becomes law.
“When you sit down and think about it, it sounds like a good thing on the surface, but I think it’s a terrible idea. It’s terrible for small businesses,” Meeks said at a board meeting. “It’s going to hamper people trying to start out in their first job. The minimum wage is not at all a living wage. It was never intended to be a starting wage for people that are taking on an entry-level position or have a part-time position after school.”
Meeks, speaking in the portion of the meeting where board members can speak their mind on issues that aren’t on the agenda, said he is afraid people have been so concerned about the coronavirus pandemic that they haven’t given the amendment much thought.
“It’s not on their plate. If they get to the voting booth and vote emotionally this sounds good – everybody should get money, not realizing what the consequences are,” Meeks said. “This is pushed by attorney John Morgan of Morgan and Morgan. They want to get everybody high and put everybody out of work.”
Meeks, who owns Bronson Ace Hardware, said he won’t argue the politics of the amendment but he finds “it is a very interesting issue and could have dire effects not only on local government whenever the minimum wage is pushed to $15 but on small businesses especially.”
Meeks also mentioned that Amendment 3, an unrelated issue on the Nov. 3 ballot, proposes to eliminate the process of approving future constitutional amendments by a vote of the electorate.
Supervisor of Elections Tammy Jones said the state hasn’t sent her the final wording of the six amendments on the Nov. 3 ballot. She doesn’t think the final wording on the amendments will arrive until late this week. She was responding to a Spotlight request for a copy of the six constitutional amendments on the ballot.
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Board of County Commission Meeting August 18, 2020; Posted August 18, 2020
