Olympia bar owners say future of business is uncertain if Prop. 1 passes Nov. 4
Brandon Weedon, owner of Fatso’s Bar & Grill in Olympia, said he’s been getting hateful messages from the community since he voiced his opposition to the Workers’ Bill of Rights on the Nov. 4 ballot.
He said he’s not so bothered by an increase in the minimum wage that’s included in the measure, but he sees the business regulations as Olympia’s own “Big Beautiful Bill.”
Weedon said his family has been running Fatso’s for 35 years and has 16 employees, which means it would fall under the medium-sized business category in the Workers’ Bill of Rights ordinance.
He said he thinks the intent behind the initiative is great — he previously worked with labor unions to draft a minimum wage increase proposal years ago. But he sees unintended adverse consequences for small businesses if the proposal were to pass.
“It’s really about wanting the best overall for our community. And with us being smaller employers, we want the best for our workers,” he said. “And I think that gets misconstrued quite a bit in that they are saying, ‘Oh, you don’t support us,’ and that can’t be further from the truth. I wouldn’t be doing this for over 30 years if I didn’t care about my community and if I didn’t support my employees.”
Weedon quoted City Manager Jay Burney saying the city of Olympia is out of rabbits and hats in terms of solving its budget deficit. Weedon sees Prop. 1 dissuading small business owners from staying in Olympia or opening in the city in the first place — and that will slow the tax revenues that support the city budget even more.
“The large businesses are going to continue to thrive,” Weedon said. “You know, this isn’t going to affect them whatsoever. They will raise prices. They will lower their amount of employees. They’ll do whatever it is to continue their mega machines and continue to pump it out.”
Weedon said he thinks Olympia needs to be a beacon for small businesses.
“I truthfully believe that small businesses are the backbone of Olympia in general,” he said.
He said he doesn’t think Olympia has a wage problem, but an affordability problem. He said there needs to be better legislation that helps lower- and medium-income individuals become homeowners and afford rent.
Weedon said he likes several aspects of the Workers’ Bill of Rights, such as ensuring individuals have an opportunity with larger companies to get full-time hours. What he doesn’t want to see are added fees from those bringing their work to Olympia.
“At the end of the day, it’s the small businesses and the workers here that are going to pay higher amounts in order to go ahead and bring that (work) in,” he said. “If you’re dealing with a plumber or electrician that’s in Tumwater, and now they’re having to come to Olympia, they can very well go ahead and raise your prices.”
The uncertain future of business
Weedon said he thinks if the city approves Prop 1, all that will soon be left are large chain restaurants.
“We want a small community at heart,” he said. “I think that the people that are going to hurt the most are the smaller individuals and our workers that we employ, and we tried to keep our money here locally.”
He said he invests a lot of money in Olympia’s schools and donates a lot of time to coaching sports. If Prop. 1 passes, he said he won’t have the money or time to continue this work, or give his employees the support and bonuses he currently does.
Weedon said the first year under Prop 1 will determine if his business can survive long term. Either way, he sees it driving up costs in Olympia and potentially pushing folks to dine elsewhere.
“I think I’m worried about the overall heart of Olympia and that we will not have the revenue to continue to support our community, and therefore it’s going to just raise questions on how Olympia is going to be able to afford, not only to dig ourselves out of the hole, but also to continue on and try to operate in a very hard business already,” Weedon said.
A complicated proposal
Swing Wine Bar owner Nicole Butigan said the core problem she sees with the initiative is that people don’t know what is going to happen if it passes. The eight-page ordinance has many clauses and different points, and it’s very complicated.
At the same time, she said she doesn’t want to seem unsympathetic to those who are struggling in the community.
“I definitely understand. I don’t want to seem separated from that,” she said. “My problem is with this initiative itself. I wish it was more simple and more defined.”
Butigan said if the initiative had been for a minimum wage increase for large, non-local businesses, she would be more inclined to support it. But her business falls under the medium category, as do most full-service restaurants in Olympia. That means she has to raise the wages of all employees, including tipped employees, starting Jan. 1 if the initiative passes.
Wages would then go up incrementally every year, tied to inflation. Butigan said that’s something restaurant owners have been complaining about for years. She said tying wages to inflation gives servers who make tips an automatic raise.
“I would rather give that money to my back of house staff,” she said. “And so the choice has kind of been taken away from me as to how to make it more equitable in terms of tipping in a restaurant.”
Butigan said she understands businesses will have to adapt to the changes. She just wishes there had been more of a discussion with business owners beforehand.
She said there are some residents in Olympia who still don’t know about the initiative, including some local businesses.
“They don’t even know what this is, and it’s something that could hugely impact them,” Butigan said. “And I find that really shocking. So it was a very short window of time that all of this occurred.”
Butigan said she wants people to understand that restaurants are heavily tied to donating to nonprofits in Olympia.
She said she’s a sponsor of shows at the Washington Center for the Performing Arts and donates to a number of other organizations in town, including Olympia Family Theater and Harlequin Productions. She said she would have to pull back on that support if Prop. 1 were to pass.
Butigan said there were concerns among restaurant owners about profits well before the city began considering the Workers’ Bill of Rights. She said restaurant owners got together over mutual concern for the data coming from the Washington Hospitality Association: profit margins were already shrinking and the future of full-service restaurants was looking grim.
She doesn’t know what Prop. 1 would do to the already staggering problems facing local restaurants.
“I’ve had different ideas I’ve been working on,” she said. “I mean, whether that is going to a counter service model or completely changing the business model, I don’t know exactly what I want to do. And I don’t want to panic. I want to make an informed, smart decision.”
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