Living Wage: 2 Days And Counting...

The City Council now has 2 short days to decide whether or not to call a special election over the LAX-area hotel workers' living wage measure. Evidently negotiations continue between the hotels and the workers, while the City Council is left holding its breath.

Exactly what is there to negotiate? The buzz I had heard was that the Chamber of Commerce wants a promise from the labor community of no further living wage measures within the city. But Rick Orlov of the Daily News hears something different:

Both sides said negotiations now center on whether hotel workers who earn tips would remain at the minimum wage or get the higher living wage.

"I think we have most everything else resolved," said council President Eric Garcetti, who has been representing the City Council in the talks. "That seems to be the last issue to be decided and I think we are 80 (percent) to 90 percent there."

Again, the clock is ticking, with a Wednesday deadline to schedule this special election. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, L.A.'s progressive and labor community is proceeding under the assumption that the negotiations will fail and that the special election *will* happen. This past Thursday was the oh-come-all-ye-progressives strategy session at LAANE, in which the game plan was laid out for victory in May. And we LA Greens were present, natch. So check back here on Wednesday (when we find out for certain if this election's going down) for a rundown on the meeting and a sneak peek at how the workers and the community are gonna straight-up kick some mega-hotel ass.