At last night’s City Council meeting, Mike Barber stated his views on a possible minimum wage hike in Greensboro:
I can certainly see some merit to accepting the petition, but I immediately want to squash this idea with all the force and might I possibly could. It couldn’t be a worse economic decision for our community than raising the minimum wage to $9.36……There are 97,000 economic reasons why this is a horrific idea and would create such a problem for business in this community, would give an uneven playing field which we already suffer from lower wages in other countries. It’s not economically sound. It sounds great, but it’s not economically sound on any level. It’s misguided, and it would be horrible for the City of Greensboro.
I also noticed that much was made over Robbie Perkins’ return to the City Council. I didn’t support Perkins in the general election due to his involvement with Heart of the Triad, but I’ll say this much about him: Perkins, along with Barber, has the ability to define an issue when working with city staff and put it perspective that the average citizen (or reporter) can understand. He was key in helping hash out the legalities behind the minimum wage petition, while others were either confused or trying to confuse the issue.
