The campaign to increase Michigan’s minimum wage has upped its goal to $10.10 an hour in four years.
As we hear from The Michigan Public Radio Network’s Rick Pluta, the campaign hopes to get the OK to start gathering signatures this week.
The campaign is asking an elections board to certify that its petition meets all the technical requirements in state law before it begins collecting names. The petition drive had initially set its sights on raising the state minimum wage from its current $7.40 an hour to $9.50 by 2016. But organizers say there’s been a lot of feedback to suggest the public would support an even higher minimum wage. $10.10 an hour would also be more consistent with what’s happening in other states, as well as the increase that President Obama has called for in the federal minimum wage.
Once the petition is OK’d, the campaign will have to collect more than 258 thousand signatures to put the question before the Legislature. If the Legislature does not approve a petition for a citizen-initiated law, it goes on the November ballot.