A constitutional amendment to raise Ohio’s minimum wage to $15 an hour will not be on the November ballot, the organizers of the campaign said Wednesday.
In an email to Signal Cleveland, the nonprofit One Fair Wage, one of the major organizers of the $15 minimum wage campaign, said that supporters had not collected enough signatures to be on the ballot.
“After receiving our final turn-ins from across the state today, we have determined that we won’t make the 44-county requirement and will thus continue to collect signatures to be on the 2025 ballot,” the OFW email stated.
Unfortunately, as we reviewed the hundreds of thousands of signatures we collected, we found that the signature counts in rural counties confirmed our expectations of dampened signature gathering due to violence and intimidation toward our low-wage worker of color canvassers, who were verbally abused and harassed by those opposing raises for workers,
One Fair Wage on not making the ballot
Organizers said they had difficulty collecting signatures in rural counties. The ballot measure would have raised the minimum wage to $15, including for tipped employees. Ohio’s minimum wage is currently $10.45 per hour. The tipped wage is $5.25 per hour plus tips, meaning that tips are supposed to bring the minimum tipped wage to $10.45. Both are tied to the rate of inflation. The constitutional amendment also would have tied the minimum wage to the rate of inflation.
“Unfortunately, as we reviewed the hundreds of thousands of signatures we collected, we found that the signature counts in rural counties confirmed our expectations of dampened signature gathering due to violence and intimidation toward our low-wage worker of color canvassers, who were verbally abused and harassed by those opposing raises for workers,” the email stated.
OFW said it is confident the amendment will be on the 2025 ballot.
“While we are very close to our goal, we want to continue collecting signatures to honor and respect the tremendous effort so many workers have contributed,” the email states. “We are disappointed but determined to continue collecting until we have enough to put $15 plus tips on the November 2025 ballot.”
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders visited Parma last month to rally support the amendment. A champion of a national minimum wage for years in Congress, he urged the large crowd at the United Auto Workers Local 1005 to help collect signatures because time was running out.
For more about the OFW proposal as well as a competing proposal by Republican State Sen. Louis Blessing III of Colerain Township, near Cincinnati, read $15 minimum wage: The differences between Ohio’s competing proposals.