Marin’s County “living wage” rate and its pay for residential care aides will increase on Jan. 1.
The living wage will rise from $18 per hour to $18.70. The rate for workers with the In-Home Supportive Services Public Authority of Marin, or IHSS, will rise from $19 per hour to $19.50.
Adopted in 2002, the living wage ordinance requires county contractors and subcontractors doing $25,000 worth of business or more to provide a minimum wage to their employees that is higher than the state minimum wage.
“It also requires the county executive to provide an annual report on the effect of the living wage, if any, and also to make a recommendation regarding any adjustments to the living wage,” Dan Eilerman, assistant county executive, told supervisors on Tuesday.
The supervisors approved the 70-cent hike in the living wage recommended by the county executive’s office. The recommendation reflected a 3.8% increase in the Bay Area consumer price index from April 2023 to April 2024.
In addition to contractors and subcontractors working for the county, the living wage hike also affects a small number of county employee classifications. The positions include library aide, county services worker 1, event attendant and parks and open space seasonal assistant.
Eilerman said the increase to $18.70 an hour will result in less than a $50,000 annual rise in county expense.
“The larger impact of the living wage ordinance for many years has been for IHSS providers,” Eilerman said.
That is because in past years the county’s living wage rate was higher than the rate paid to IHSS workers. As a result, when the living wage rate rose, so did the pay rate of IHSS workers. For example, a year ago, the county raised its living wage rate from $16.80 to $18 an hour. That raised the rate for IHSS workers from $16.95 to $18.
This year, however, the increase in Marin’s living wage won’t affect wages for IHSS workers because their union negotiated a new contract in June that increased the pay to $19 per hour.
Nevertheless, the Board of Supervisors approved the increase to $19.50 per hour. The cost will be borne entirely by the state.
A combination of federal, state and county funding provides the money to pay IHSS workers. The federal government covers 50% of the cost, the state covers 32.5% and counties cover 17.5%.
The state foots the cost to ensure that IHSS wages remain $3 per hour higher than the state minimum wage. The state minimum wage is slated to rise from $16 to $16.50 in January, so the state will cover the pay hike in Marin.
Under the terms of the new contract, Marin IHSS workers’ hourly wage will rise another 25 cents, to $19.75 per hour, in February. The county will bear the cost of that increase because the state only contributes up to a 10% increase in wages and benefits over any three-year period.
The wage hikes failed to satisfy advocates for higher pay.
Rollie Katz, executive director of the Marin Association of Public Employees, said that a full-time employee earning $18.70 an hour would make less than $40,000 per year.
“I think it’s important for us to remember,” Katz said, “that $40,000 a year is not a living wage.”
Victoria Holdridge faulted county staff for not including San Francisco in a comparison they provided of the IHSS hourly rates in seven other Northern California counties. IHSS workers in San Mateo County will receive the highest wages: $21.30 per hour by Feb. 1. IHSS workers in Santa Barbara will get $18.67 per hour by then. IHHS workers in San Francisco make $21.50 per hour.
Holdridge said it is important to take what workers in San Francisco are being paid into consideration because Marin has to compete with San Francisco for caregivers.
Mary Ellen Jenkins, a member of the Marin Organizing Committee, asked, “Are we meeting the needs of people who qualify for IHSS caregivers, or is there still a waiting list of people needing care?”
Dario Santiago, executive director of the IHSS Public Authority of Marin, said, “We get around 100 requests for a caregiver per month, and we have around 50 caregivers available to serve clients per month.”
Santiago, however, said recruitment and retention of caregivers has improved. He said that in 2023 the agency’s goal was to recruit 10 caregivers per month, and it recruited about nine. This year, the authority has recruited about 19 caregivers per month through October.
In addition, Santiago said, the agency has retained 77% of its caregivers this year compared to 57% last year.
The new IHSS contract allocated $75,000 to provide incentive payments to caregivers who work through its registry and $6,500 in other incentives. The contract also provides a $200 bonus to IHSS workers serving people in West Marin to help compensate for long commutes.
Nevertheless, Santiago said, attracting caregivers to work in West Marin remains a challenge.