New York Mayor Bill de Blasio is seeking to drop his predecessor’s challenge to a law requiring landlords and companies getting economic aid from the city to pay workers the same wages as employees of its contractors.
The city asked state Supreme Court Justice Geoffrey D. Wright in court papers today to void his ruling from August of last year invalidating the prevailing wage measure, saying the court failed to recognize the city’s authority to incorporate wage standards into its commercial transactions.
The city council passed the bill 44-4 in May 2012 over former Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s veto. Bloomberg sued the council two months later, saying the requirement would increase costs and was pre-empted by the state’s minimum-wage law.
The law requires any company receiving at least $1 million in economic development aid from the city to pay its workers the prevailing wage — the rate set by law for each trade or occupation for employees of contractors who do public works projects and building service work for government agencies.