BLOOMINGTON - A local group that wants to see employees at the U.S. Cellular Coliseum paid a minimum of $9.33 an hour marched on management offices Tuesday.

The Central Illinois Organizing Project continued its two-year long effort to see that employees of the building are paid a rate that for 40 hours a week would provide enough income to afford the rent for a single-bedroom apartment. That rate is $9.33 an hour in the Bloomington-Normal area.

The Coliseum's opening is Saturday.

The organizing project has been putting pressure on Central Illinois Arena Management to implement the living wage after a 5-4 vote last year by the Bloomington City Council defeating the adoption of a living wage as a city ordinance.

Jack Porter, one of the leaders in the local advocacy group, said Tuesday's demonstration would be hard for Mike Nelson and John Butler from the arena management group to ignore the group's demands.

"Demonstrations (at events) are among the options we are considering," Porter said. "We want to engage them when we can and negotiate with them implementing a living wage."

More than 80 of the advocacy group marched to the Coliseum offices on Washington Street but did not meet with Butler and Nelson as they had hoped. Nelson and Butler were out of the office at the time.

Porter said the advocacy group has tried to meet with Coliseum management many times but Butler and Nelson refused. Tuesday's efforts were an attempt to catch them at the office.

In a phone call to The Pantagraph, Nelson said the decision to pay for a living wage rests with City Council. The council, he added, approves the management group's budget to run the Coliseum. The council is expected to vote on the budget at one of its meetings in April.

"We are not going to go against the council," Nelson said. "It is out of our hands."

Nelson also said he and Butler have met with members of CIOP to discuss the living wage, but not recently.

"We have a lot on our plate right now to get this building open," Nelson said.

When the advocacy group could not meet with Nelson and Butler, the demonstration moved to the front of the Coliseum where members of the group taped signs and wanted poster of Nelson and Butler to the building.