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ABQ Companies Meet Pay Equity Standards

Megan Kamerick
City Councilor Diane Gibson, Mayor Richard Berry and Martha Burk, chair of the Albuquerque Pay Equity Taskforce, announced that 19 companies met standards outlined in the pay equity ordinance.

  Albuquerque city officials announced Monday that 19 companies have met new standards on equal pay for women.

The new city ordinance established a 5 percent preference for businesses bidding for city contracts if they can prove they pay women within 10 percent of what they pay men. The idea appears to be catching on - officials in San Francisco, New York City, and Phoenix, have contacted Albuquerque about creating a similar law.

Mayor Richard Berry says businesses want to do the right thing, but sometimes they just need an incentive.

“ I can almost guarantee if you talk to some of these businesses once they started looking at this they were either already being equitable, or they found out 'Hey listen, we found something here we need to fix' and they went ahead and proactively fixed it,” Berry said.

Berry and City Councilor Diane Gibson plan to make amendments to the ordinance next year to increase requirements with the goal of eliminating the wage gap entirely. 

Megan has been a journalist for 25 years and worked at business weeklies in San Antonio, New Orleans and Albuquerque. She first came to KUNM as a phone volunteer on the pledge drive in 2005. That led to volunteering on Women’s Focus, Weekend Edition and the Global Music Show. She was then hired as Morning Edition host in 2015, then the All Things Considered host in 2018. Megan was hired as News Director in 2021.