David Meinert Joins Burien's Lawsuit to Kill Voter-Approved Minimum Wage
Meinert sold most of his Seattle businesses after nearly a dozen women accused him of sexual assault. Last year, he settled a wage theft lawsuit filed by more than 100 employees.
UPDATE: This post has been updated with comments from Meinert.
David Meinert, the onetime Seattle nightlife impresario who sold most of his businesses after KUOW reported that nearly a dozen women had accused him of sexual assault, has mostly retreated from local politics in Seattle. But he's still active in Burien, where he just joined the city's lawsuit seeking to strike down a new minimum wage passed by voters in February. The voter-approved minimum, which is pegged to the voter-approved minimum wage and Tukwila, is currently $21.10 an hour.
The city of Burien filed the lawsuit against the minimum wage initiative's sponsor, the Transit Riders Union, and its general secretary, Katie Wilson. The suit claims that businesses have no way of knowing what Burien's true minimum wage is, given the existence of a competing minimum wage passed by the Burien City Council last October, while the initiative campaign was going on. The lawsuit also claims that the council's version pays workers more money anyway.
It doesn't. In fact, the convoluted law exempts most local businesses (those with 20 or fewer employees) completely, and establishes a "total compensation" of $21.16 an hour, rather than an actual minimum wage—effectively imposing a penalty on employees who receive tips or any kind of benefits. If an employer provides any benefits or if a worker receives tips, those count toward their total hourly "wages," allowing employers to actually pay much less. With so many carveouts and exemptions, the Burien council's minimum wage allows most employers to pay the state minimum, currently $16.66 an hour.
Meinert said he joined the lawsuit because he wants clarity on how much he should pay his workers; currently, he said, he's paying $19.10 an hour, the amount required for medium-sized employers under the initiative.
"It’s a really poorly written initiative, and the biggest problem is that it doesn’t actually set a minimum wage," Meinert said. As we've reported, the Burien initiative sets a minimum wage that's the same as Tukwila's, and phases it in over time for smaller employers. Tukwila's minimum wage, in turn, is set at the same level as the "living wage" established for hospitality and transportation workers in SeaTac, and that number is currently $21.10 an hour with no tip credit or other penalty.
"I literally don't know which one to follow," Meinert said. "We just want clarity."
In his declaration supporting the lawsuit, Meinert wrote that the restaurant's margins are somewhere between 6 and 10 percent. Last year, Meinert settled a class-action wage theft lawsuit. If the voter-approved minimum ends up prevailing in court, Meinert said he'd have to raise prices to make up the difference, which he said would lead to fewer customers and ultimately layoffs.
"Because of this legal confusion, I cannot plan our payroll with any confidence. I don't know whether we'll be in compliance under one law while violating another," Meinert wrote in his declaration supporting the lawsuit. "We are trying to act in good faith, but the lack of clarity puts us at risk of enforcement or legal liability no matter what we do."
Meinert isn't the only Burien business owner complaining about the "confusion." Others who've filed declarations supporting the city of Burien in its lawsuit against the voter-approved minimum wage increase include the owners of a McDonald's franchise, Skinperfect Aesthetics, Andy's Handy Mart, and Vince's Italian.
Transit Riders Union and Wilson countersued the city of Burien earlier this month.
In a new response to Burien's lawsuit, TRU accuses the city of violating the law by obstructing and refusing to implement the initiative, and failing to pay the new minimum to its own workers; currently, the city is advertising several jobs that pay just above the state minimum.
TRU's counterclaim describes the actions Burien took before the February 2025 election to undermine the minimum wage initiative, including by passing a weaker minimum wage ordinance "to compete with the Initiative," creating a ballot title and explanatory statement designed to create "an unfavorable comparison to defeat the Initiative, and sending mailers to voters "that tout the competing ordinance, which were intended to garner opposition to the Initiative."