Increasing the minimum wage is a goal worth pursuing, South Portland city councilors agreed Monday. The question is how that goal should be accomplished and what the city could do to make it happen.

During Monday’s workshop several councilors expressed interest in exploring the possibility of instituting a local minimum wage, but Mayor Linda Cohen argued that raising pay should be done on a regional or statewide level and not by individual municipalities.

South Portland is just the latest community both in Maine and around the country to consider passing a local minimum wage ordinance designed to allow those at the bottom of the pay scale to earn enough to live on.

Portland was the first city in Maine to look at a local minimum wage, and now the Bangor City Council is also reviewing the possibility, according to South Portland City Manager Jim Gailey.

Both Portland and Bangor are considering a phased approach that would raise the minimum wage incrementally during the next three years to end up at an hourly pay somewhere in the $9 or $10 range.

In addition, a bill is wending its way through the Maine Legislature that would increase the statewide minimum wage from $7.50 an hour to $8 this fall and top out at $9.50 by 2018.

And, Gailey said, the Maine People’s Alliance and the Maine AFL-CIO labor union have launched a referendum drive to get a minimum wage increase before voters across Maine in November of 2016. If passed, the referendum would increase the rate of pay to $9 an hour in 2017 and then by a dollar a year until 2020, when it would reach $12 an hour and then be indexed to the annual cost of living increase.

Even as Maine’s largest cities contemplate a local minimum wage increase, however, Gov. Paul LePage has submitted a bill to the Legislature that would prevent communities from instituting such local pay rates.

He is also against raising the minimum wage on the statewide level, which hasn’t been done since 2009 even though the consumer price index in urban areas has gone up by more than 8 percent since then, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

South Portland City Councilor Brad Fox initiated the local minimum wage discussion in late December when he issued a press release announcing his intention to bring the issue before the entire council for discussion.

It’s taken a while for the local minimum wage to get on a workshop agenda and on Monday Fox said he didn’t have any particular rate of pay in mind, just that his concern is the minimum wage at the state and federal level has not kept up with inflation and “people just can’t survive.”

Fox argued that with a livable minimum wage, people would not need assistance to help pay for necessary amenities such as housing, heat or food, which would reduce the burden on taxpayers and also allow people to get ahead.

Both Fox and Councilor Tom Blake also argued that with the failure of the state and federal government to act on increasing the rate of pay, it falls to individual communities to take care of their residents.

In fact, Blake said, the failure of state and federal leaders to address the minimum wage is “a classic example” of the state and federal governments “shirking their responsibilities and shifting issues to the local level.”

Of the five residents who spoke at Monday’s workshop, all were in favor of increasing the minimum wage, but they mostly agreed with Cohen that the issue is not something the city should tackle on its own.

Councilor Patti Smith said in doing research on the minimum wage issue, she came across a study done at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that showed a livable wage in Cumberland County would be $10.03 an hour for a single adult.

Smith said she’s “fully in favor of adjusting wages upward” but said it should be done in phases and not all at once. She also argued that providing people with a livable wage raises “people’s ability to live and prosper.”

Councilor Claude Morgan agreed, and said, “elevating the wage is the right type of legislation” but argued that whatever the minimum wage is increased to, it must be “worthwhile for people to get up and go to work each day.”

While Councilor Maxine Beecher said “the (minimum) wage needs to go up,” she agreed with Cohen that it’s an issue that should be taken on at the regional or state level.

She also cautioned other councilors that adjusting the minimum wage is not a simple thing to do, arguing that raising the wage floor would likely equate to raising everyone’s rate of pay.

But, Morgan said, “we need to guide ourselves by our conscience. We need to try in spite of the obstacles.”

In the end the councilors agreed to ask for input from local businesses, gather more information about general assistance numbers in the city and wait to see what the Legislature does, all while committing themselves to continuing the conversation.