Dear Editor,

On an ebony evening in June, 1985, I climbed down off my horse-drawn carriage, handed in my tips and fares to the night manager at Coach Horse Livery in Chicago, and walked my Percheron down the aisle. My coworker, Jedd, came loping after me. “What’d you do? We don’t hand in ALL our tips!”

  I stared back in naïve confusion. We’d just come off a twelve-hour shift. Eager to brush down my horse and climb into my car, I responded briefly: “We were told to report ALL our tips.”

  “We’re making Five Dollars on each half-hour ride,” Jedd replied, “the tips are ours. If you report everything you make, that’s more money in the owner’s pocket. He’ll give you twenty-five percent on an evening’s worth – that’ll amount to fifty dollars on top of your fifty dollars for your ride commissions. In other words, you’ll get one hundred dollars for a twelve-hour shift, or $8.00 an hour…”

  I quietly responded to Jedd, still shivering from the evening on Chicago’s windy Gold Coast.

  “I didn’t realize,” I replied, pulling off my soaking wet breeches and sopping dressage boots. I pulled on my dirty jeans and walked my horse into his stall. He laid down in exhaustion as I scraped drips of water off his body...

  I share this story as I'm reminded viscerally of my time in the hospitality industry working for tips. As before, Colorado restaurant owners' attempts to winnow down already paltry wages under the newly introduced Colorado’s House Bill 1208 is little more than a thinly-veiled attempt introduced under the veil of our present national chaos to steal the hard-earned supplement for menial, grueling and thankless labor of our hospitality industry. People should be ashamed for taking advantage of our youngest labor force simply trying to forge a life in an impossible socioeconomic landscape.

  Call your Colorado state representative and demand they vote NO on HB1208. Your local waitstaff deserves to be compensated for their dedicated efforts to serve your eggs and smoky pork barbeque at the local café, and not turn everything over to the owner, so they may increase their bottom line.

 Denise Boehler, M.A., Writer, Ecopsychologist

Nederland