South Fulton to study raising minimum wage to $20 an hour

SOUTH FULTON, Ga. - The South Fulton City Council voted 5-1 this week to study increasing the minimum wage for city employees to $20. Those in the city government supporting the measure said it wants to make sure all employees can make ends meet.

"In order to afford a one-bedroom apartment in Atlanta, you must make $19.12 an hour," said Mayor khalid kamau. "The fight for $15 has moved to the fight for $20."

The mayor, who sponsored the measure, said he recently was looking to move and found rent for a one-bedroom apartment had increased to between $1,200 and $1,400 a month.

"If $20 an hour is not enough when the study is completed and we need to go to $25, I have no problem with that," said District 4 Councilman Jaceey Sebastian. "Anyone who works and gives their services to the city should be able to afford to live here."  

"I do believe in a fair wage and compensation, but we already have agreed to do a wage and compensation study – a comprehensive wage and compensation study," said District 3 Councilwoman Helen Z. Willis, who was the lone dissenting vote. "The comprehensive wage study will take inflation into consideration, it will take cost of living into consideration, it will take industry standards into consideration and get us where we need to be to fairly compensate people."

The last compensation study was in July 2019, but fallout inflation from the pandemic has raised the cost of living across the board.

About 30 city employees fall below the $20 an hour mark.