Domestic workers could get guaranteed breaks, minimum wage under proposed Washington state bill

Domestic workers in Washington state don’t have guaranteed breaks or minimum pay — unless they’re in the city of Seattle.

A bill currently before the Washington state Legislature would change that. Senate Bill 5023 and its companion, House Bill 1561, would require that people employing domestic workers pay them minimum wage and overtime, give them meal and rest breaks, provide a written contract, and give notice before terminating employment.

In a recent hearing on the bill, 34-year-old Ana Rosa Bello testified that she’s a single mom who works as a house cleaner.

“I worked for eight months for someone who never paid me a cent,” she said in Spanish.

She said she thinks the bill currently before the Legislature would have prevented that situation. The bill would allow workers to file complaints with the state labor and industries department.

State Sen. Curtis King (R-Yakima) spoke against the bill.

“I think the vast majority of them [domestic workers] are very well treated,” he said. “You’re going to do it at the expense of everybody that treats these people the way they should be treated.”

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Similar legislation has guaranteed rest breaks and minimum pay to domestic workers in the city of Seattle for almost six years. Several employers of nannies in Seattle spoke in favor of expanding those protections statewide, saying the clear guidelines were helpful to them.

Laura González testified that she’s worked as a nanny in Seattle for more than 20 years.

“If I got sick and couldn’t work, I didn’t get paid, and if I missed work because my son was sick, I also didn’t get paid,” she said. “All that changed when Seattle passed a domestic worker bill of rights.”

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The state legislation would cover nannies, house cleaners, home care workers, cooks, gardeners, and household managers, but not babysitters, dog walkers, or pet or house sitters.

Rachel Block, who introduced herself as a mom and lawyer in South Seattle, asked legislators not to include au pairs, since their employment is already regulated by the State Department.

“There’s already a 45-hour maximum, unlimited paid sick days,” she said. “A lot of this is already baked in.”

Twelve states, including Oregon and California, and three cities — Seattle, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C. — already have a domestic worker bill of rights.

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