ROC Vows Return to Court if Legislature Tries to Maintain Tipping System

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If legislators move bills preserving Michigan’s tipped wage system in the aftermath of the Michigan Supreme Court’s adopt-and-amend decision, the Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United will return to the courts, says state director Chris White.

“We’re hoping that they don’t get to that point, and then what we see is that would just be another adopt-and-amend (situation) all over again,” White said on the MIRS Monday podcast. “The democratic process and public trust is on the table.”

In 2018, the Republican-led Legislature adopted a citizens’ initiative to gradually raise the minimum wage to $12 hourly by 2022 before locking it to the rate of inflation. The proposal phased out Michigan’s tipping system until wait staff and other tipped employees were paid the same minimum wage as all workers.

The Legislature adopted the initiative in September of that year, but later changed its provisions, like preserving the “sub-minimum wage” for tipped employees.

The Supreme Court ruled in July what the Legislature did was unconstitutional, particularly because the Legislature both adopted and amended a citizens’ initiative in the same legislative session, instead of waiting until the 2019-20 term to make its changes. Ultimately, the court ordered that what the Legislature adopted should now go into effect, but not the amendments it made.

The ruling sets a new schedule that brings the servers’ minimum wage to that of other workers by Feb. 21, 2029. The Legislature could stop this by passing a new bill, but White said it’s their job at ROC to make sure they don’t go back down that road again.

“We won in the Supreme Court, which preserved the petition process,” White said. “We gathered signatures, and we fought the fight for six years.”

White said he believes the argument that wait staff and bartenders will lose their tips is “fear-mongering and false information,” claiming they’ll get a higher base pay – currently, they must earn at least $3.93 per hour without tips – “with tips on top of that.”

“How many customers and consumers know how much a waitress makes a year? So if they knew they were making less than $4 an hour, how would they feel about that?” White said. “I tipped yesterday at a restaurant, and I have never asked the waitress, ‘before I give you a tip, how much do you make an hour?’ I have never asked a barber, ‘before I give you a tip, how many heads have you cut before me, (and) how much have you charged them?’”

He said his organization works with approximately 150 restaurants in Michigan.

When asked about how restaurant employers must make up the difference if their wait staff doesn’t earn at least minimum wage through tips, White said he hasn’t heard much about it, and “maybe that’s because it’s a matter of educating the workers in all the restaurants.”

Meanwhile, MIRS spoke to Tom “Dewey” Bramson earlier this month, the managing partner and owner of various bars and restaurants in East Lansing, Ann Arbor and Lansing, including the Nuthouse Sports Grill in downtown Lansing.

He said his own wait staff, including parents who depend on tips either as part of their full-time occupation or second job, generally earn around $28 hourly. On a football Saturday in East Lansing, he said that hourly amount can double.

But overall, he said his employees never make less than minimum wage.

“We can’t afford to quadruple somebody’s pay and not raise our prices or cut staff, or both,” Bramson said. “We try and do our best to find ways to adapt to every new situation that gets thrown our way, but this one – this one’s probably the scariest one, yet.”

Right now, both sides of the debate, between the ROC United and the Michigan Restaurant and Lodging Association, are putting pressure on legislators when it comes to the future of the state’s tipping system.

Article courtesy MIRS News for SBAM’s Lansing Watchdog newsletter

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