Mayor Eric Garcetti lashes out at Kroger, which is planning to close three stores in Los Angeles after the City Council approved hazard pay for grocery workers.
"I'm very disappointed to hear that Kroger, with record profits, is going to close those stores down," says Garcetti. He calls it "reprehensible."
The City Council last month voted to require large grocery and pharmacy stores to give their workers a $5 an hour raise for four months.
Kroger earlier this month announced two Ralphs and a Food 4 Less in LA that it described as "underperforming" stores would be shut down.
"That a temporary bump of $5, for folks that have put their lives on the line, can't be weathered by a company that more than doubled its profits, doesn't seem to compute. It doesn't meet the test of basic math," Garcetti says.
He's asking the company to be an example by providing "hero pay" to its workers.
Kroger says in a statement: "Grocers in Los Angeles operate on razor-thin profit margins" and the city's ordinance will increase its operating costs by more than $20 million, making it "impossible to run a financially sustainable business at these three already struggling locations."