{"id":222764,"date":"2025-09-13T05:30:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T05:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/222764\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T05:30:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T05:30:11","slug":"proposed-25-minimum-wage-for-san-diego-tourism-workers-includes-concessions-for-theme-parks-padres-and-hotels-san-diego-union-tribune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/222764\/","title":{"rendered":"Proposed $25 minimum wage for San Diego tourism workers includes concessions for theme parks, Padres and hotels \u2013 San Diego Union-Tribune"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seven months after calling for a mandated $25 minimum wage<\/a> next year for San Diego\u2019s tourism workers, Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera\u2019s office released a revised proposal Friday that would exempt the San Diego Zoo and others, while providing a four-year phase-in for amusement parks, hotels and major event centers like Petco Park.<\/p>\n

Elo-Rivera \u2014 facing the threat of a well-financed referendum campaign to thwart the controversial wage increase \u2014 had been entertaining proposals from multiple stakeholders in the tourism industry aimed at softening the immediate blow of what would amount to a 45% hike in San Diego\u2019s current citywide minimum wage of $17.25 an hour.<\/p>\n

As the City Council prepares to consider the wage proposal on Tuesday, the hospitality industry has raised $1.6 million for a potential ballot measure, thanks to contributions from such hotel industry heavyweights as the Manchester Grand Hyatt, Marriott Marquis San Diego and Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, a Maryland-based investment firm that owns several San Diego hotels.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe whole point of this is to improve wages for workers, and a referendum has the potential of delaying that,\u201d Elo-Rivera said in an interview this week. \u201cSo, yes, absolutely, in the ideal circumstance we pass a policy that takes effect on the day we intend for it to take effect, and workers aren\u2019t left waiting while their bosses spend money on a political campaign instead of raising pay by a couple dollars more per hour.\u201d<\/p>\n

If enacted, the wage mandate would affect tens of thousands of lower-paid service workers in San Diego, from hotel housekeepers and ballpark ticket takers to hourly SeaWorld employees and Convention Center, Civic Theatre and Pechanga Arena workers. The proposal, which is backed by local unions, would not affect already negotiated labor contracts, Elo-Rivera said. Those agreements would take precedence over the ordinance, he said.<\/p>\n

The draft proposal, while still opposed by San Diego\u2019s business community, is a marked change from Elo-Rivera\u2019s original desire to enact the wage hike almost immediately. While he has consistently argued strongly for the wage mandate, he said this week that he was open to making some key changes, in consultation with the City Attorney\u2019s Office, as long as there were valid arguments.<\/p>\n

The San Diego Zoo, for example, was exempted from the ordinance after its unionized workers this summer negotiated an agreement that provided for better wages, Elo-Rivera explained. Meanwhile, two San Diego State University entertainment and sports venues also were left out of the proposed wage increase.<\/p>\n

Viejas Arena, Elo-Rivera said, was given a special carve-out for specific financial reasons. The arena, he was told by SDSU officials, doesn\u2019t consistently attract the kind of high-profile events that would allow it to easily cover the higher wages mandated by a new minimum wage. While that is not necessarily the case with Snapdragon Stadium, Elo-Rivera said he was reassured there are plans in the works to significantly increase wages and benefits for concessions workers and audio-visual technicians.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Padres, which had pushed back against the new minimum wage during hearings before the council\u2019s Select Committee on Addressing Cost of Living, were able to work out an agreement where the wages for Petco Park workers would gradually rise over a four-year period. The hourly wage would start at $21.06 on July 1 of next year and scale up to $25 an hour by 2030. (Other city event centers like Pechanga Arena, which are also subject to the city\u2019s living wage ordinance, would also see a four-year phased implementation of the $25 wage.)<\/p>\n

The Padres had previously argued that it already complies with the living wage ordinance and would soon be paying its workers a minimum base wage of $21.06 an hour. To have it immediately jump to $25, they said, would affect San Diegans in the form of higher ticket and food and beverage prices.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did want to be mindful of impacts on residents, and so my point from the jump has been, if there\u2019s a real impact that this will have on San Diego and San Diegans, I\u2019m all ears,\u201d Elo-Rivera explained. \u201cDo not tell me that the sky will fall, that business can\u2019t absorb it and think that you\u2019ve made your case simply by saying that.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the Padres did not comment directly on the proposed change, it offered a statement Friday acknowledging the input it provided on the draft measure.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Padres have paid the city\u2019s living wage since its inception and currently pay the highest mandated wage in all of Major League Baseball,\u201d the team said. \u201cOver the last several weeks, we have worked with city leaders to provide input on the proposed hospitality minimum wage ordinance and its impact on Petco Park. As always, we remain committed to providing competitive wages and benefits that allow our employees to afford to live in San Diego while keeping Petco Park accessible for San Diegans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reaching an agreement with San Diego\u2019s hotel industry was a bit trickier, Elo-Rivera acknowledged. Local hoteliers had pressed for language that would have effectively excluded tipped workers, who typically make substantially more money than other types of service-level hotel employees.<\/p>\n

The City Attorney\u2019s Office, however, rejected the proposal, for a variety of reasons, said Elo-Rivera, who had his own concerns about the possibility of creating a large loophole that would potentially allow the lowest-paid workers to be erroneously classified as tipped employees.<\/p>\n

\u201cLegal risk aside, that issue of trying to enforce the ordinance and not have folks just be classified as tipped workers \u2014 we couldn\u2019t run the risk,\u201d Elo-Rivera said.<\/p>\n

Hotels with 150 or more employees, as well as amusement parks, which would only affect SeaWorld, would be subject to a $19 hourly wage starting July 1, rising by $1.50 a year thereafter, reaching $25 by 2030.<\/p>\n

The phasing in of the wage increase seems to have blunted the referendum effort, acknowledged San Diego County Lodging Association Board Chairman Robert Gleason.<\/p>\n

\u201cSan Diego hotels negotiated with the sponsor of the proposal, seeking a phased-in approach and relief from what would have been a 45% increase,\u201d said Gleason, who is CEO of San Diego-based Evans Hotels, which operates the Catamaran and Bahia resorts, as well as The Lodge at Torrey Pines. \u201cAnd that is an improvement. It is not the outcome we would have preferred but it allows additional time to plan for and absorb the increase.<\/p>\n

\u201cDespite the phasing, San Diego\u2019s competitiveness and economic outlook will be impacted due to higher costs, lost jobs, and a reduction in overall investment.\u201d<\/p>\n

The staff report notes that there are 89 hotels in San Diego with at least 150 guest rooms, and those properties account for more than 27,000 rooms. On the flip side, there are 180 hotels that contain fewer than 150 rooms, and together these hotels have more than 12,000 rooms.<\/p>\n

While acknowledging the economic headwinds currently facing the tourism industry amid tariffs and a clampdown on immigration, Elo-Rivera\u2019s office also pointed out the financial challenges of lower paid workers, citing a calculation from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that single-person households would need to earn $30.71 per hour in San Diego County to support themselves while working full-time.<\/p>\n

The San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce remains opposed to the revised wage proposal and will speak against it at Tuesday\u2019s hearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cDespite all the deals that are being cut, we\u2019re still opposed to the ordinance,\u201d said chamber President Chris Cate. \u201cWe think it will still impact the cost of living in San Diego, and we don\u2019t like that it is targeting one industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have the highest inflation in the country and we\u2019d rather have policy proposals that find solutions to the cause of why it\u2019s so expensive to live in San Diego, whether it\u2019s housing or utilities. And by increasing business owners\u2019 costs you\u2019re putting them in a very difficult position. And that\u2019s just going to contribute to increasing costs for San Diegans because they\u2019ll have to raise prices.\u201d<\/p>\n

The notion of creating a higher minimum wage for a select group of workers is not without precedent. Statewide legislation led to a $20-an-hour minimum wage for all fast food workers that went into effect last year.<\/p>\n

And voters in Long Beach approved a measure that increased hotel workers\u2019 wages to $29.50 an hour by 2028, while the Los Angeles City Council has backed a proposal to raise the minimum wage of tourism workers to $30 an hour within the next three years.<\/p>\n

The council voted in May to approve the yearly wage increases for hotel employees and workers at Los Angeles International Airport, and since then the business community has worked hard on a referendum effort to overturn the wage mandate. The coalition opposing the minimum wage boost, though, learned this week that it had failed to collect enough signatures to qualify its measure for the ballot.<\/p>\n

Originally Published: September 12, 2025 at 7:00 PM PDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Seven months after calling for a mandated $25 minimum wage next year for San Diego\u2019s tourism workers, Councilmember…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":222765,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,64,1582,276,1370,3549,7264,7289,5331,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-222764","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-san-diego","14":"tag-sandiego","15":"tag-top-stories-sdut","16":"tag-tourism","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115195348751566591","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}