BILL REQ. #:  H-4145.2 

Read first time 01/27/10.   Referred to Committee on Commerce & Labor.

     AN ACT Relating to preventing the curtailment of employment opportunities by allowing employers to pay a training wage for a specified period of time; and amending RCW 49.46.060.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

Sec. 1   RCW 49.46.060 and 1959 c 294 s 6 are each amended to read as follows:
     (1) The director, to the extent necessary in order to prevent curtailment of opportunities for employment, shall by ((regulations)) rule provide for (((1))) (a) the employment of learners, of apprentices, and of messengers employed primarily in delivering letters and messages, under special certificates issued pursuant to ((regulations)) rules of the director, at such wages lower than the minimum wage applicable under RCW 49.46.020 and subject to such limitations as to time, number, proportion, and length of service as the director shall prescribe, and (((2))) (b) the employment of individuals whose earning capacity is impaired by age or physical or mental deficiency or injury, under special certificates issued by the director, at such wages lower than the minimum wage applicable under RCW 49.46.020 and for such period as shall be fixed in such certificates.
     (2)(a) The director shall by rule establish procedures for the issuance of special training certificates to employers to pay wages to new employees during a training period at seventy-five percent of the minimum wage required under RCW 49.46.020 or the minimum wage rate required under federal law, whichever is greater. The training period may last only for a maximum of six hundred eighty hours. Employers may only use this special training certificate once per employee. Only employers with fifty employees or fewer may use the special training certificate. Employees working under this special training certificate may not constitute more than ten percent of the employer's workforce, except that employers with fewer than ten employees may employ one employee at a time using the special training certificate.
     (b) If an employer discharges an employee working under the special training certificate prior to the completion of six hundred eighty hours, the employer must notify the director and provide an explanation for the discharge. The employer may not replace the discharged employee with another employee working under a special training certificate for one year from the date of the discharge.