Ten Cleveland restaurants hoping to make life better for workers just got a little money to help the cause.
On Thursday, on the second floor of the Asia Town Center off East 38th and Superior, Mayor Justin Bibb awarded $5,000 to the winning restaurants in City Hall's partnership with One Fair Wage, a national coalition seeking to raise the sub-minimum wage for servers to a meaty $15 an hour.
The restaurants given the award were:
- Cleveland Mofongo Latin Grill
- Ha Ahn Restaurant
- Miega Korean BBQ
- Superior Pho
- Verbena Free Spirited
- Daiquiri Factory
- Green Kitchen
- UnBar
- KafeLA
- JB Grill Soul Food
To the mayor, who bussed at Toby's Kitchen as a teenager, the first series of grants are a precursor—a "pilot program," he said—that could act as a legislative rallying cry to bring a $15 minimum wage to the whole state of Ohio.
"I'm really excited about the conversation, the hard but important conversation we're having right now about a fair wage," Bibb told the crowd standing in front of Miega's front door. "And that is not just about putting more money in people's pockets, because that's important, especially in this economy. But this is about dignity."
![Barbara Bradford-Williams, owner of JB Grill Soul Food. "We're looking to promote the neighborhood. We're looking to hire new employees, and we're looking to pay them $15 [an hour]," she said. - Mark Oprea](https://media2.clevescene.com/clevescene/imager/u/original/42966516/_m1a3465.jpg)
Mark Oprea
Barbara Bradford-Williams, owner of JB Grill Soul Food. "We're looking to promote the neighborhood. We're looking to hire new employees, and we're looking to pay them $15 [an hour]," she said.
Founded in 2012 by activist Saru Jayaraman, One Fair Wage currently has hordes of volunteers in at least a half dozen U.S. states campaigning for, ultimately, states' approval of a better wage for restaurant workers.
OFW and its campaigners are quick to compare Ohio's sub-minimum tipped wage—about $2.13 an hour—to the country's history of underpaying waitstaff and cooks. It's a mentality OFW supporters approach in an anti-capitalist way, suggesting that servers are paid low because, well, the pay has always been that way.
"The sub-minimum wage here in Ohio and here in our entire country is a remnant of slavery, and we are all fighting in those remnants of slavery," Mariah Ross, an OFW campaign manager, told the crowd. "The sub minimum wage was first introduced due to emancipation when Black women and Black men were freed."
As for the meager $2.13 an hour? "That is what we're fighting to change," she added.
Restaurant owners and managers present at Asia Town Center said they'd use the $5,000 to either start or continue higher pay for staff.
"We're looking to build up," Barbara Bradford-Williams, owner of JB Grill Soul Food, said. "We're looking to promote the neighborhood. We're looking to hire new employees, and we're looking to pay them $15 [an hour]."
But both Bibb's and OFW's financial boost for the ten progressive-minded restaurants present brings up questions for those on the other side of receipt.
In a culture run mad with ubiquitous tip suggestions, with flipped iPads and Square terminals everywhere, it seems that tipped workers paid a fair wage might not elicit the same 15 to 20 percent restaurant goers are used to paying them.
Mark Oprea
Chris Nguyen (center) and his wife Claudine (left), owners of Superior Pho. The restaurant was one of 10 to receive a grant Thursday
But OFW humbly disagreed, citing pilot programs in St. Paul, Minn., Flagstaff, Ariz., and Washington, D.C. It's, in a way, led to a new purpose for the tip: to base it solely on the quality of the meal.
"Tip percentages and menu prices don't change in the long run," Mikey Knabb, the national director of High Road Restaurants, a partner with OFW, told reporters.
Chris and Claudine Nguyen, owners of Superior Pho down the street, seemed to agree with this new model. They have been paying staff at least $14 an hour since 2021, and said the grant money given to them Thursday will only help bolster their employee pay philosophy. And keep ingredient prices, especially with inflation, manageable.
"Should it change the culture of tipping? I don't know," Nguyen said. "I think people tip if they want, and I think that they should have the choice to patronize businesses and tip if they would like to."
The second round of restaurants to win the $5,000 grant will be announced, the city said, later this year.
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