SEATTLE — Editor's note: The above video on grocery workers agreeing to a new union contract originally aired April 30, 2022.
Seattle's City Council voted to end pandemic hazard pay for grocery workers that has been in place since February 2021.
A sunset would be established for the hazard pay stipulation 30 days after Mayor Bruce Harrell signs the ordinance, if he chooses to do so.
Hazard pay has been criticized by the Northwest Grocery Association and Washington Food Industry Association. The associations previously filed a lawsuit seeking to end it.
“It has been months since our communities returned to pre-pandemic activities,” said Tammie Hetrick, president and CEO of the Washington Food Industry Association. “Our industry has been unfairly singled out for this extra pay, and we are deeply appreciative for the Council’s recognition tonight that we have turned a corner and are no longer operating in a pandemic emergency.”
Since Feb. 3, 2021, Seattle grocery businesses with at least 500 employees have been required to pay workers an additional $4 an hour as emergency hazard pay.
Earlier this year, the union representing 25,000 grocery employees in the Puget Sound region voted to ratify their contract, bringing many workers higher wages and increased funding to health care and pension plans.
Union members with United Food and Commercial Workers 3000 will see wage increases of $4 to $9 an hour for the most veteran workers during the term of the agreement.
The mayor's office transmitted the legislation to the City Council, making it likely that Harrell would sign and approve the ordinance.
Following the Council's approval, Councilmember Kshama Sawant criticized the decision, citing a COVID-19 variant surge and inflation that is stretching workers' paychecks "to the breaking point."
"Grocery workers and all frontline workers have made incredible sacrifices during the pandemic, and they deserve a raise, not a pay cut," Sawant said in a prepared statement.