SPEAKER_03 0:00

BVHC, the frequency.

SPEAKER_02 0:03

I was running through Boulder City Council and it almost just felt like suddenly the folks that were sitting next to me at these forums were like standing up loud and proud about lessening my wages and that hurt. And I was also in rooms where probably not one worker was in the room. I felt surrounded by people with lots of money, people who have political power, who are deeply involved. And I felt isolated in this issue.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

I do think it's unfortunate when these restaurants have to close, but I also think the council's not focusing on things that make up a bigger chunk of costs of operating these businesses, such as rent and how much rent costs and how much it increased. They're trying to look for money in the pockets of people who are already pretty poor instead of looking towards the large landowners who really don't care that businesses close as long as they're getting rent.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

Every dollar does count, and I think that we should be fighting for those extra dollars for the workers. But even if we get those extra dollars, I don't know that that means that they actually have the ability to live or dream in the town with which they're trying to work in. Every solution would help someone, you know, and that's what makes this tough. I'm overall, like I would say, in general, for the worker person, but like I sure would like to make sure people have places to work at as well.

SPEAKER_03 1:39

Those were the voices and perspectives of Rachel Rose Isaacson, Aidan Wall, and Justin Calvin, respectively. A barista, a server, and a bartender at three different Boulder establishments. All three oppose changes to the tipped wage that Boulder City Council will be voting on next week. They worry wage cuts will devastate workers and do little to actually help small local businesses like the ones that employ them. I'm Shay Castle, and this is The Frequency, a weekly local podcast covering the news, events, and voices shaping the Boulder Valley. We'll get back to our main story in just a moment. But first, a word from our sponsor. In honor of this milestone, the institute will host a science-y celebration for all ages at its mountain research station just north of Netherlands off the Peak to Peak Highway. For more than a century, the station has fostered mountain field science and education. On Wednesday, August 19th, get a peek into its inner workings through guided hikes and tours, hands-on activities, dinner with a scientist, and an evening seminar from ecologist Catherine Suding. Sign up now at tinyurl.com slash MRS Open or find more info on the events section of InStar's website. We'll put both links in our show notes. Let's return to the tipped wage conversation. We started this coverage on Wednesday, focusing on the government side of things. Go check out that episode if you haven't heard it yet. As a reminder, here's what's happening. Boulders' minimum wage is just under $17 per hour, but food and beverage workers who earn tips get paid just under $14 per hour. Council is currently considering freezing the tipped wage, which means workers could be getting thousands of dollars less than they otherwise would if council left their pay alone. How much council might adjust that wage is still to be determined. They'll be voting at a July 30th meeting and public hearing. But any amount of change is too much for workers already living on the edge. Here's Aiden, followed by Rachel. Aiden did not wish to share the name of the Boulder breakfast restaurant he works at.

SPEAKER_01 4:10

I do serving like almost 27, 30 hours a week, and I have another job on the side as well to keep myself afloat. Inflation has been so out of whack that if you earned a raise over the past year of like two dollars, it's basically nothing. It's been completely erased by the rate of inflation. Most tipped workers at most restaurants are not getting any sort of benefits. Healthcare comes from the government, and thanks to changes from the new administration, my healthcare went up by $160 per month, kind of overnight. These workers don't get vacation, they don't get sick days. If you're sick, it comes out of your pocket. So it's just kind of cool and disgusting that they would be trying to take away more money from people who already don't have any benefits.

SPEAKER_02 5:02

I think sometimes like the picture that we think of tipped workers is like, oh, I'm just like a college student who is just trying to make some extra money for cute clothes and stuff. But the realistic picture is a lot of us are not in that bracket. We are adults who are we're living paycheck to paycheck. So supporting yourself right now is incredibly hard. But there's parents I work with who are just trying to afford something as basic as a haircut for their children. I want people to really think about the implications. It's really easy to dismiss the amount here, but the implications are pretty devastating.

SPEAKER_03 5:40

According to data compiled by the city of Boulder, the median hourly wage for bartenders and wait staff is $20 and $25 per hour, or roughly $40,000 to $50,000 per year. But even those numbers are deceptive. Median means half the workers earn below those numbers and half above. That means half of bartenders earn less than $40,000 per year, and half of wait staff earn less than $50,000, according to the city's own data. Changes to the wage would apply to every single worker. Cuts would also come at a time when people are relying on their base wage more as the volume of customers and amount of tips declines.

SPEAKER_00 6:21

There's a lot of tip fatigue, and pair that with a couple years of people while they were being introduced into the world of spending their own money, working jobs, things like that. There was like a gap in peer education or peer standards and practices, just going out as a customer. When COVID happened, there was one people that didn't get that experience, two, that experience wasn't available to us because of lockdowns and things like that. And three, they just weren't shown the way.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

I think just a lot of people are going out less. This year is definitely a lot less vibrant at the cafe. There's just so many folks who are getting laid off or scared. And so as we're talking about, as we as we are in this clear economic downturn, do we want to safeguard the folks who are going to be most impacted or not?

SPEAKER_03 7:19

That was Calvin and Rachel. Rachel is a barista at Walnut Cafe in South Boulder. Calvin manages the Sundown Saloon on Pearl Street, affectionately known to locals as the Sundowner or sometimes the scum downer. Calvin is also a member of the Downtown Management Commission, a citizen-appointed board that weighs in on management of the Pearl Street Mall and Downtown Parking District. Both say they are deeply worried for the survival of businesses in Boulder. Though wages are a factor, both said high rents and the cost of goods were bigger costs for their establishments, along with Boulder's economy as a whole.

SPEAKER_02 8:06

So at our restaurant, oftentimes I'll go into work and Excel has just shut our power off. When the utilities get shut off, we are losing tens of thousands of dollars of product in addition to losing days of income. And so it's just it's very concerning. And just in the past year, even with Trump's tariffs and the consolidation of these major food companies, the cost of food has just skyrocketed. And so we are just at this tipping point. One thing that I really tried to communicate out to our community is that we need to look holistically at the situation. If we want to support our small local businesses, I think that there's a lot of ways that we can do so that we we really haven't done.

SPEAKER_03 8:54

One of the top three things that would help Calvin's business the most is more people with disposable income, he said. Calvin would prefer council to wait and quote, let the dust settle on higher wages passed last year before making more adjustments, particularly since he doesn't see enough people involved in the conversation who will actually be impacted.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

Whatever your views are on it, I think it would be worthwhile to get the people that are actually living day to day with the consequences of it.

SPEAKER_03 9:37

One thing Calvin would like to see change is what he calls the culture of degradation of service workers, something cutting wages would only exacerbate. It's not the first time in recent weeks workers have spoken up about the impacts of entitlement and privilege on their mental health. A vacuum repair shop closed earlier this summer and placed at least part of the blame on the behavior of Boulder customers. Quote, your neighbors are the Goodbye Post read. People aren't built to be degraded by strangers day after day, and our boulder team burned out fast.

SPEAKER_00 10:09

It's felt, and it's hard to explain, and I can't quantify it, but like there's a shame associated with being a worker in this town. And some of that is perpetuated by the people that are easily able to live wherever they want, and easily able to live in this town and go out to eat, but still ask that the people that are serving them their coffee in the morning are making sacrifices. And that's a real tough pill to swallow, to be constantly told that, like, hey, we we don't want you to make enough to be able to live in this town. And it's not framed that way in legislation, obviously, but it feels that way on the ground. Even framing it as cutting wages, some people wouldn't even say that those two words, which it is what it is. There's a lot of double speak happening from the top down, and that contributes to that shame I was referencing earlier as well. Anytime a minimum wage conversation comes up, even if they're making well above the minimum wage with tips and things like that, it is on some level saying if we could pay you less, we probably would. And that's a tough thing to stomach.

SPEAKER_03 11:25

The viability of small businesses hinges on much more than employee pay, as does affordability and cost of living for workers. Aidan, Calvin, and Rachel all said, while wages might be the easiest thing for council to change, it's far past time to shift the conversation away from the lowest hanging fruit and toward some of the larger forces creating this economic environment where fewer and fewer people can make a living, either by owning a business or working at one.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

I fundamentally think that if you can't afford to pay your workers a living wage, then that isn't a viable business model. I went to school for business. My parents owned a pizza shop in Oregon. You readjust your model, but there's a cheat code for people who have enough money and time. You can lobby your city council and have them change the regulations. Then I think they're coming after us because we're the easiest to come after. They're not going to get as much pushback. Whereas if they came after landlords and people causing inflation, they would get a lot of pushback and it would be difficult.

SPEAKER_02 12:31

I want to make it a top priority to support businesses in all of these ways that I think can holistically not only one, I want to protect our wages, but also I want to make sure that we still have that job stability in the long term. And I think that there's a lot of things that council hasn't done yet. And our small business community has been pretty much begging for change for a very long time.

SPEAKER_00 12:53

The minimal amount of information that a lot of people have, both in the public and in the workforce, really makes conversations tough. And if anything, they make them pretty adversarial towards their employers. And it takes a lot of the affordability conversation off of maybe the things that would have a greater impact on people's day-to-day lives and puts a lot of people at odds with each other that might not otherwise be at odds. Even within the restaurant industry, I mean, in this town, there are national chains, and then there are mom and pop places that are just trying to get by. And in this town, seeing so many of those uniquely bolder places and experiences disappear and or move to neighboring towns, I think that should be the bigger conversation and honestly something that workers and business owners could be able to rally around together instead of fighting over dollars.

SPEAKER_03 13:57

Thanks to Rachel, Calvin, and Aiden for sharing their perspectives. There is so much that was left out of our conversations. You can listen to full interviews at patreon.com slash Boulder Frequency Pod. One quick note on both tipped wage episodes. Ryan Schuchard, featured Wednesday, and Rachel Rose Isaacson are running for city council this fall in Boulder. Their inclusion in this podcast is not an endorsement of either campaign. Join us next week when we will again be talking about businesses and landlords and the economic vitality of Boulder as we focus on the downtown core of the city. As always, thanks for listening.