Council Pauses Tipped Wage Increase, Approves In-School Cell Phone Ban and Vacant Property Reform

With the painfully delayed budget release by the mayor finally behind us, the Council is now fully immersed in the essential, detailed, and time-consuming process of budget oversight. Yet despite disruptions in the timing of the normal legislative calendar occasioned by the delayed budget submission, the legislative process can and must persist.

At its most recent Legislative Meeting, the Council passed an emergency measure pausing a scheduled July 1 uptick in the tipped minimum wage. When Initiative 82 was approved by voters, it included a sequence of six increases in the tipped minimum wage from $5.05 to match the prevailing minimum wage by July 1, 2027. One such increase was set to take the wage from $10 to $12 on July 1, 2025.

When the mayor’s proposed budget was finally released, it included an unexpected full repeal of the voter-endorsed Initiative 82. With a large $2 bump to the wage scheduled to go into effect just days after the mayor’s budget proposal, and just weeks before the Council’s required passage of the budget, the timing of the increase, though long-scheduled, was suddenly inopportune. Compounding the challenge of the scheduled increase was the inclusion of a measure limiting the federal taxation of tips in a federal budget reconciliation bill currently under expedited consideration by Congress.

Since the paused tipped wage increase measure that passed the Council was an emergency bill, it required approval by two-thirds of the Council, goes into immediate effect after mayoral approval, and only remains in effect for 90 days. During the period of the pause, the Council will have the opportunity to monitor Congressional action on the relevant Congressional reconciliation measure, and further investigate prevailing restaurant industry conditions here in the District.

In other action at the most recent Legislative Meeting, the Council took the first of two necessary votes to approve a bell-to-bell full-day ban on student cellphone use at school. Despite some prior consideration of accelerating the ban’s implementation, the bill as passed by the Council would put the ban in effect for the start of the 2026-2027 school year. This will allow the Office of the State Superintendent of Education to fully flesh out a policy, and implementation guidelines, that will be applicable to all DC public and public charter schools.

Additionally, at the most recent meeting, the Council approved on the first of two necessary votes a wholesale, omnibus revision of the Disrict’s vacant property status quo. The goal of the measure is to attempt to avoid properties becoming vacant and abandoned in the first place, and to subsequently facilitate and accelerate properties resolving their categorization in this status. Vacant and abandoned properties afflict both the property owners, neighbors, and surrounding communities, so it is in the District’s best interest to avoid and remediate problem vacancy.

The bill includes measures such as tangled title clarification, an official will registry, payment plans for real estate taxes and facilitated tax sale processes for such properties, and incentives for their redevelopment. The bill resulted from a consensus working group effort intended to advance common sense fixes to the District’s challenged vacant property status quo.

Also approved on the first of two necessary votes was a bill that attempts to facilitate the creation and operation of farmers markets in food deserts via grants and discounted permitting fees. Another approved measure would authorize the foreign doctors traveling with international soccer teams in the context of the upcoming FIFA World Cup competition to provide medical care to team players and staff during their time in the District, despite not being licensed here.

Finally, a measure approved on the first of two needed votes would rename the District’s newest high school, currently known as Macarthur High School, as John Thompson, Jr. High School. Through a collaborative process, the school community decided to change the school’s current name (which reflects the street on which the school is located) to instead honor native Washingtonian and longtime Georgetown University basketball coach John Thompson, Jr. Thompson’s rigorous dedication to his players’ combined athletic and academic excellence made him an icon and a worthy namesake for a District school .

The Council’s next scheduled Legislative Meeting will be held on July 1. Unusually, the Council’s two subsequent Legislative Meetings will be held on Mondays—July 14 and 28. Critical budget votes will be taken at those meetings, and they were scheduled with an eye towards the Home Rule Charter-mandated 70-day timetable for approval of the District’s budget following the submission of the mayor’s proposal.