Columnist Dennis Bidwell: Addressing downtown Northampton’s challenges (MA)

By DENNIS BIDWELL

Monday, June 05, 2017
The Northampton City Council Committee on Community Resources, through public forums and a variety of presentations and submitted reports, has learned a great deal about both the strengths of the local economy, particularly as it affects downtown Northampton and the center of Florence, and about a variety of local challenges.
The efforts of the Pioneer Valley Workers Center and several labor unions produced considerable testimony, particularly from restaurant and construction workers, about their experiences with some local employers failing to comply with wage and labor laws. We also heard from restaurant owners describing their compliance with these laws, as well as their concern that the media’s attention on just one perspective about the issue left many restaurant owners feeling they were maligned as a group.

This attention to wage-theft issues yielded three actions taken by the city. First, issuance by the mayor of an executive order requiring that all contractors seeking procurement contracts with the city, or seeking tax increment financing agreements, certify their compliance with wage and hour laws. Second, passage by the City Council of a resolution declaring Northampton a fair employment city, and calling on the city’s License Commission and Community Preservation Committee to adopt similar requirements regarding contractor certifications. And third, urging additional wage-theft enforcement powers and resources for the state attorney general’s office, and approval of a council order requiring all applicants coming before the council for licenses to affirm their compliance with wage and labor laws.