After serving on the board of directors for the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce for two years, Hamilton Gardiner was nominated and elected to serve as Chair of the Board for 2015. The Chamber supports a healthy economic climate in which the community and its businesses can grow and prosper. For more information about the Chamber please visit: www.wschamber.com.

On June 2, 2014, after great debate and protracted negotiations among various business and labor representatives throughout the City, the Seattle City Council made history by voting unanimously to pass Mayor Ed Murray’s $15 per hour minimum wage plan. The goal of the plan, according to the Mayor, is to “grow the middle class.”  This new minimum wage will eventually be a sixty one percent (61%) increase over the current state minimum wage of $9.32 per hour (already the highest state minimum wage in the United States), and is a dramatic wage escalation for those affected businesses.

Starting on September 1, 2012, employees of businesses operating in Seattle began accruing paid sick and paid safe time (PSST), defined as the “same hourly wage that the employee would have earned during the time PSST was taken.”  The new requirements apply to employers with more than four (4) full-time equivalent employees and cover all full and part-time employees, as well as temporary and occasional employees who work more than 240 hours in a calendar year. 

A February 2012 Washington State Supreme Court decision, Snohomish County Public Transportation Benefit Area Corp. v. First Group America, Inc., clarified how Washington courts are to interpret indemnification clauses. The facts of the case are interesting and the ruling provides a tie in to our daily work since indemnification clauses often arise in lease and purchase and sale negotiations.

Recently, the Washington State legislature passed SB 6315 which affects the Residential Landlord-Tenant Act (RCW 59.18 et seq.).The changes to the law went into effect on June 7, 2012, and imposes new notice requirements on Washington residential landlords.