The U.S. Supreme Court today denied the Golden Gate Restaurant Association’s emergency application to halt the enforcement of San Francisco’s current health care mandate, which they have sued to repeal.
The decision means that the city will continue to require businesses with more than 20 employees to provide a certain level of health care to their workers, or else pay into a city program that does so. The mayor’s office issued a statement (pdf) indicating satisfaction with the decision.
While today’s decision means that restaurants must comply with the health care mandate for the time being, the GGRA has not yet exhausted every appeal in their lawsuit challenging the merits of the ordinance. It can still get its case picked up by the United States Supreme Court.
GGRA executive director Kevin Westlye has claimed that, while most restaurants remain sustainable under the health care law, they won’t be able to do so after caps on the costs to businesses are lifted next year. On Saturday, the Chronicle reported that the GGRA was calling for a tip credit in the city, which would allow restaurant owners to pay employees less than minimum wage, with the difference made up by their tips.
The City has maintained that restaurants should cover employees just like every other business. City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s spokesman Matt Dorsey called the latest application a “non-starter” when it was filed.
[Photo: Via foundphotoslj/flickr]
