LD 513: An Act Regarding Overtime Protections for Certain Maine Workers has not been reported out since the Labor and Housing Committee voted the bill Ought to Pass as Amended along party lines. The RLDAM has signed onto a broad coalition of business groups opposed to the Democrat majority amendment. This amendment was proposed by Sen. Tipping and replaces the bill with new language that would scrap the existing “3000 times the State’s minimum hourly wage” with a flat rate of $55,068 starting January 1, 2025, and beginning January 1, 2026, indexed annually by the percentage increase “if any” in the Consumer Prices Index for wage and salary workers as published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Currently, the U.S. Department of Labor is considering new federal rules that could increase the salary threshold nationally to $55,068 and index the threshold every 3 years. Over 33,000 public comments were received by the November 7, 2023 deadline. Final rules are expected sometime this spring, but no date has been announced yet.
The majority report jumps ahead of the final federal rules in two ways: First, the majority report presumes that $55,068 will be the new federal threshold for 2025.
We don’t yet know what the new threshold will be until the final federal rule is issued. Second, the majority report presumes that indexing will be in the final rule, but the majority report proposes indexing every year instead of the federal proposal of every three years.
Overall, the majority report would force employers in Maine to pay overtime on a higher salary threshold for at least two out of every three years compared to employers in nearly every other state nationally.
In addition, the Labor and Housing committee voted “Ought to Pass” on LD 2176: An Act to Ensure the Workers’ Compensation Board’s Allocations are Properly Funded. The majority report supported by the Democrats would remove the existing cap on assessments to employers in order to fund the operations of the Board. The bill was enacted in the House on March 21st and placed on the special appropriations table pending enactment in the Senate on March 25th.
Lastly, LD 2184: Resolve, Regarding Legislative Review of Chapter 9: Rules Governing Administrative Civil Money Penalties for Labor Law Violations, a Major Substantive Rule of the Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Standards was finally passed in the House on March 19th and finally passed in the Senate on March 20th.
This bill has become highly partisan and controversial after the new director of the Bureau testified at the hearing seeking authority to conduct “proactive” investigations of employers, without complaints or evidence of violations.