1st Monday Mayhem: Taking a Closer Look at the Women's Equality Agenda!

This month we'll be discussing the Women's Equality Agenda!

The Women’s Equality Agenda will help ensure that New York’s 10 million mothers, daughters, sisters and wives get a fair shake. This groundbreaking legislative agenda will level the playing field and break down barriers so women can more fully and equally participate in society.

The Flying Squirrel Community Space collective has invited KaeLyn Rich to give a presentation about the agenda. She is the new Director of the Genesee Valley Chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union and was formally the community affairs coordinator at Planned Parenthood of the Rochester/Syracuse Region, where she was responsible for legislative advocacy, government relations, coalition building and the regional campus organizing program. KaeLyn has also worked at Services to Aid Families, a rape crisis/domestic violence program in Oswego and serves on several local non-profit boards.

After KaeLyn's presentation, the community is invited to engage in conversation about the agenda.

The 10-Point agenda is:

1. Protect Reproductive Health and Choice: Every woman should be able to decide what is best for her and her family when deciding whether to use contraception, have a child or end a pregnancy, especially when her health is in danger. This measure ensures that every woman in New York State can get the health care she needs. It’s not only about strengthening reproductive rights; it’s about supporting autonomy, privacy and dignity.

2. Achieve Pay Equity: Women in New York make just 84 percent of what their male peers are paid. This measure strengthens existing laws and enforcement measures to close the wage gap.

3. Stop Sexual Harassment in All Workplaces: Three-quarters of sexual harassment complaints filed in New York are filed by women. This measure closes loopholes in existing law to protect employees of any business, large and small, from sexual harassment.

4. Allow for Attorneys’ Fees in Employment, Lending and Credit Discrimination Cases: Victims of employment, credit and lending discrimination are overwhelmingly women. This measure amends state law to include a provision for reasonable attorneys’ fees for successful litigants, and ensures that discrimination victims have an opportunity to vindicate their rights.

5. Strengthen Human Trafficking Laws: Sex-trafficking victims are almost always women. This measure creates an affirmative defense in prostitution prosecutions for defendants who are sex-trafficking victims.

6. End Family Status Discrimination: Women with children are less likely to be recommended for hire or promoted, and in most cases are offered lower salaries than similarly situated men. This proposal prohibits employers from denying work or promotion to workers simply because they have children.

7. Stop Source-of-Income Discrimination: Many landlords will not rent to people who need low-income housing assistance, the overwhelming majority of whom are women. This measure prohibits discrimination against tenants based on lawful sources of income.

8. Stop Housing Discrimination for Victims of Domestic Violence:
State law does not protect domestic-violence victims from housing discrimination, meaning landlords can evict them under zero tolerance policies. This measure protects victims of domestic violence from discrimination when they attempt to purchase, rent or lease housing.

9. Stop Pregnancy Discrimination Once and For All: Too often, women are fired or forced to take unpaid leave because employers are not required to make minor job modifications for pregnant women. This measure requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations for pregnancy-related conditions.

10. Protect Victims of Domestic Violence by Strengthening Order-of-Protection Laws: For someone facing threats of violence from an intimate partner, getting an Order of Protection can be difficult. This measure lifts some of the requirements of the process to make it less burdensome.

1st Monday Mayhem: Taking a Closer Look: On the first Monday of January, the Flying Squirrel will return to hosting its monthly meeting that forgoes the technical and logistical concerns of running an open-use community space in order to take a close look at the impact of our actions on the community and our potential as a catalyst for change.