Boulder County to raise minimum wage to $15.69 in 2024, $25 by 2030

BOULDER — The Boulder County Board of County Commissioners voted unanimously Thursday in favor of an aggressive approach to its minimum wage, increasing it to $15.69 in 2024 with plans to boost it incrementally each year until it reaches $25 in 2030. 

After 2030, the rate will be increased to keep pace with the Consumer Price Index.

The move — which makes Boulder County the first government in the region to take advantage of House Bill 19-1210, the legislation that allows local cities and counties to increase their minimum wages beyond the state mandate — applies only to workers in unincorporated parts of the county, including those in Gunbarrel and Niwot. 

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“We heard all of this stuff during the pandemic about essential workers and how critical these people are to our society and our community. We saw signs and banners, and people risked their lives to work at the grocery store or to be janitors or to do child-care services,” Boulder County Commissioner Ashley Stolzmann said in an interview with BizWest this summer when county officials declared their intent to raise the minimum wage in 2024. “Their reward is that we still haven’t increased their wages.”

Boulder County’s decision came despite pleas from business organizations to pump the brakes and more thoroughly examine the potential impacts on employers. 

“Coming out of a global pandemic, we saw folks in so much hurt. I believe that residents are still hurting,” Boulder County Commissioner Marta Loachamin told BizWest in August, and a minimum-wage increase is one way to help ease some of the economic pain.

Workers groups, some of which worked with Boulder County officials and staff to create the local approach to minimum wage increases, applauded the decision on Thursday afternoon.

“We’re proud of the work (the Boulder County Self-Sufficiency Wage Coalition, which is made up of workers, community organizations, policy experts and faith-based organizations) has done to organize municipalities across Boulder County to pass gradual minimum-wage increases and reach a self-sufficiency wage of $25 per hour,”  said Kate Kelly, Boulder regional lead organizer for New Era Colorado, in a prepared statement. “Now, Boulder County is closer to becoming a place where young people have the resources they need to support themselves and put down roots in their communities.”

In August, a group of executives, managers and staff with the Boulder Chamber, Boulder County Latino Chamber of Commerce, and chambers of commerce in Lafayette, Longmont, Louisville and Superior signed onto a statement that said county government leaders are “seeking to rush a decision on raising the current minimum wage before the end of the year,” a path that the group, known as the Northwest Chamber Alliance, called “insensitive and reckless.”

Boulder Chamber president John Tayer told BizWest on Thursday after the commissioners’ vote that the business community remains concerned. 

“We continue to have our objections to moving forward in haste,” he said. County officials “are now asking businesses to absorb a significant additional cost just as the new year is beginning and at a time when economic conditions are still shaky for many of our small businesses.”

But, Tayer added, that “now that we’ve seen (county leaders) move forward, we’re going to want to work with them to take steps to minimize the impacts (on employers) as they said they were interested in doing.”

A divided Fort Collins City Council rejected a local minimum wage hike in May. City staff had presented options that would have boosted the lowest hourly wage for all workers in Fort Collins from the statewide minimum of $13.65 to either $16.65 or $17.29 by Jan. 1, 2026. However, after forceful but civil debate among workers, business owners and council members, the issue failed on a 4-3 vote.

Boulder County officials had urged their municipal compatriots to join them in boosting the minimum wage starting in January, but leaders in Boulder, Longmont and the eastern Boulder County municipalities have indicated that they’d prefer increases to begin in 2025 in order to give businesses more time to adapt.

“It’s too late, folks,” Boulder City Councilman Bob Yates said in late August after the board voted 5-4 not to join on to the county’s timeline. He said that a Jan. 1, 2024, target could have been “achievable” if the city had started the process much earlier in the year.

Leaders in Boulder, Lafayette, Longmont, Louisville and Erie are aiming for Jan. 1, 2025, for a minimum-wage increase.

“We’ve been having very thoughtful discussions and analysis through the city of Boulder’s process,” Tayer said. “We think those discussions are going to result in a decision on any potential minimum-wage increase that both addresses a shared interest in economic equity and acknowledges that there are unique business circumstances that make a significant wage increase a challenge.”