Kansas City voters on Tuesday overwhelmingly supported a measure to raise the city’s minimum wage above Missouri’s, but the immediate effect is symbolic because the state legislature has passed a law barring cities from setting their own wage floors.

Meanwhile, attention turned to a separate initiative petition campaign that aims to raise the minimum wage statewide.

At the polls Tuesday, 69 percent of Kansas City voters approved a question that calls for a city wage floor of $10 an hour, effective Aug. 24, 2017, plus annual increases of $1.25 an hour, beginning Sept. 1, 2019, until the minimum reaches $15 an hour in 2022.

It passed citywide on a vote of 23,463 to 10,763, in unofficial final returns, with overwhelming support from south of the Missouri River tempered by less enthusiasm from voters in the Northland.

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