Sabrina Prochaska, a barista at Anodyne, tells reporters at a news conference Tuesday morning that the wages she and coworkers are paid aren't enough to live on. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

Wisconsin grass-roots advocates called on state lawmakers Tuesday to adopt a platform for workers that would nearly triple the state’s minimum wage, then increase it to keep pace with rising prices.

“The key here is to not leave workers behind with a poverty wage, but instead bring that living wage number up to at least $20 an hour,” said Peter Rickman, president of the Milwaukee Area Service and Hospitality Workers union — MASH — at a press conference Tuesday in the state Capitol.

Wisconsin’s minimum wage is currently $7.25 an hour, the same as the federal minimum, which was last set in 2009.

The timing of Tuesday’s press conference, organized by a coalition that includes MASH, was part of the group’s message to lawmakers and to the public.

Monday was Labor Day, “when politicians issue statements celebrating the American worker, maybe even declaring their support for labor and the working class,” Rickman observed.

“But we’re here the day after Labor Day, calling on political leadership in Wisconsin to make all of those statements real,” he said. “To make work pay, to deliver for the working class majority in our state with a guarantee that no matter where we punch a clock, no matter where we bring our paychecks home, that paycheck has a living wage.”

A hotel worker named Adrienne, who did not give her last name, said the current minimum wage “keeps the pay ceiling embarrassingly low for workers at a time when housing has become less and less secure, health care is being threatened, grocery prices are at an all-time high, and educational expenses are crippling entire generations.”

Rickman told the Wisconsin Examiner Adrienne didn’t further identify herself because she works at a nonunion Milwaukee hotel that is currently being organized by MASH.

“I have to express my disappointment with the way many of our representatives have failed to show up for workers like myself,” Adrienne told reporters. “Twenty-five dollars an hour would be a wage that would allow workers to thrive and build further futures, but today we’re simply asking for a wage that will allow workers to survive.”

Sabrina Prochaska, a barista at Anodyne Coffee in Milwaukee, said her current wage of $15.81 an hour isn’t enough to cover her living expenses, including groceries, rent and health care.

“Every month my partner and I scrape together money to pay rent on our one-bedroom apartment,” Prochaska said. “And I’m stressed out every 30 days because I know half my paycheck is going to go to put a roof over our heads.”

A recent visit to urgent care was billed at more than $3,000, Prochaska said, “and the truth is I don’t know how to pay that off and I don’t know how I’m going to cover it.”

Anodyne employees voted unanimously in June for MASH to represent them. “We’re ready to do whatever it takes to win living wages at the bargaining table,” Prochaska said. “It’s time for these politicians to do what people like me do every day: Show up, do their job and take care of their people. It’s time to make work pay. It’s time for a living wage for all Wisconsin workers like me.”

In addition to MASH the coalition that sponsored Tuesday’s press includes Citizens Action Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Working Families Party/Power, along with Our Wisconsin Revolution and the Fighting Oligarchy Coalition.

Our Wisconsin Revolution grew out of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign. The Fighting Oligarchy Coalition is a new grass-roots organization that formed as Sanders embarked on a “Fighting Oligarchy” tour to oppose the influence of billionaires in the current U.S. political environment.

The proposal outlined Tuesday hasn’t yet found its way into proposed legislation, but organizers of the campaign said they are clear on what it should include.

“We are calling on [state lawmakers] to, in collaboration with the Living Wage Coalition, draft comprehensive living wage legislation, with a $20 minimum, indexed to inflation, reduce the tip penalty, and restore local control,” Rickman said.

The “tip penalty” refers to the lower minimum wage for Wisconsin employees whose jobs make them eligible for tips — $2.33 an hour. The group also wants to repeal state laws that prevent local governments from setting labor standards.

Rickman said recent state and federal measures to abolish the tax on tips for tipped employees should not undermine the effort to stop paying tipped employees much less than the minimum wage.

“Tax policy… in lieu of wages has never done enough to increase working class household income,” he said. “It’s a scam.” All businesses, he added, “no matter what they do, [should] guarantee a living wage, not leave it up to government tax expenditures.”

Simon Rosenblum-Larson, an organizer for the Fighting Oligarchy Coalition, said the campaign to guarantee livable wages would “create real economic growth as workers here in Wisconsin spend their money here in Wisconsin instead of CEOs that take the money out of state [where] they buy houses, they put money in offshore bank accounts and trust funds for their kids.”

The campaign also lays down a marker for the 2026 elections.

In Wisconsin, 800,000 workers would see a raise if the minimum wage were increased to $20 an hour, Rosenblum-Larson said. “And we will be demanding that every legislator, Democrat or Republican, pledge their support in the 2026 election cycle for a $20 an hour minimum wage for every Wisconsinite.”