Philadelphia City Council passes bill to protect workers who speak up for rights

From Philly and the Pa. suburbs to South Jersey and Delaware, what would you like WHYY News to cover? Let us know!

Sandra Bryan thought she had landed a job that paid $15 an hour. But when her first paycheck came, the math didn’t add up.

The 59-year-old Philadelphia resident soon learned she was earning just $11 an hour — with the promise of $14 later, if she performed well.

“And it never goes to $15, they do that all the time,” she said about domestic work agencies. “They think they can escape it all the time and because we really need the work, we just look over it a lot of times and it’s not fair for us.”

Bryan immigrated to the city 18 years ago from Jamaica and has been a home care provider and house cleaner for nearly two decades. She said she enjoys her job because she loves taking care of people, but finds the industry difficult to navigate.

“Employers will take advantage of you,” she said.

A law with more teeth

Under a bill that’s headed to Mayor Cherelle Parker’s desk, workers such as Bryan will have more protections against retaliation if she speaks up to question her paycheck and reports the company for wage theft.

The legislation is cosponsored by Councilmembers Jim Harrity, Mark Squilla, Nicolas O’Rourke, Jamie Gauthier, Rue Landau, Curtis Jones Jr., Isaiah Thomas, Jeffery Young Jr., Anthony Phillips, Quetcy Lozada, Cindy Bass, Nina Ahmad and Council President Kenyatta Johnson — which is a veto-proof majority of City Council.

The bill passed 16-0 with Councilmember Brian O’Neill absent.

The POWER Act would enable the Philadelphia Department of Labor to investigate and penalize employers accused of abuse, suspend licenses and procurement contracts for violators and subpoena records in workers’ rights court cases. Third-party attorneys can also file civil cases against employers as class-action lawsuits.

While the bill was inspired by domestic workers, it would apply to more than 750,000 workers citywide in restaurants, hotels and many other industries.

It will also permit the city to pay damages directly to workers who were found to be victims of labor law violations. It will require written receipt of complaints, status updates and a clear appeals process for workers. The city would also create standards for a bad actors database to track repeat offenders, and create guidelines for the city to certify immigration protections.

The bill also recalculates sick pay for tipped workers, aiming to lower the financial burden of taking time off. It also makes changes to the portable benefits system, allowing for damages when employers violate meal breaks, rest breaks and written contracts.

Employers face a $2,000 fine for each violation. The city will create a Worker Justice Fund for fines collected from violations to give back to workers who have suffered economically, physically or emotionally because of retaliation.

A widespread issue

“We had so many phone calls in our office about wage theft. Believe it or not, a lot of folks don’t even know that’s something they can fight,” said Councilmember and bill sponsor Kendra Brooks of the Working Families Party.

In 2019, Philadelphia City Council passed an ordinance that prohibits employers from discrimination in hiring practices, requires written contracts with job duties and an hourly wage and requires meal and rest breaks, as well as sick time and paid leave. The law took effect in May 2020.

New Jersey, New York, California, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Oregon, Illinois, Nevada, New Mexico, Virginia and Rhode Island already have domestic worker protections.

The goal with the new regulations is to make sure workers are “free from retaliation and employers are being held accountable,” Brooks added.

Businesses oppose the changes

But there’s been pushback by some business associations over the new rules.

Ashley Miscevich, manager for local government advocacy at Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, testified against the legislation during the late April committee hearing.

“Presumption of retaliation assumes guilt and places an unreasonably high burden on employers requiring them to prove by clear and convincing evidence that a routine decision wasn’t retaliatory, even if they weren’t aware that the protected activity had occurred,” Miscevich said.

In response, Brooks added some amendments to the bill such as a clear path for employers to be removed from the bad actor list.

“Some of the changes were made just to make sure it was a balance between what’s helpful for workers and what’s actually possible for businesses,” Brooks said. “The compromise we made wasn’t huge, but we want to be fair.”

But even after the amendments, the business chamber was still opposed to the legislation.

The chamber “has serious concerns about the impact of the POWER Act on Philadelphia’s competitiveness and job growth, particularly for small and mid-sized businesses who face some of the highest taxes and most stringent regulations in the country,” said Shannon Williams, senior vice president of advocacy for the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia in a statement on Thursday after the vote.

Instead, the chamber wants a task force to review the labor laws instead.

Ed Grose, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia Hotel Association, also testified against the bill.

“Many small- and medium-sized businesses often lack the legal or human resources capacity to investigate and resolve these types of issues while still running the day-to-day business,” Grose said. “While we support the efforts to hold employers accountable for improper retaliatory behavior, this bill sweeps many perfunctory and standard business management practices into the realm of improper retaliation.”