I am honored to be the Executive Director of She Leads Justice, an intersectional feminist nonprofit organization that advocates for women in Connecticut, especially women who are marginalized and under-resourced. We work to close the civil legal justice gap, to organize communities for change and to create state policy for economic security. You might know us by our former name Connecticut Women’s Education and Legal Fund or our nickname CWEALF, which we proudly held for 50 years since our founding in 1973. Last year, we changed our name to She Leads Justice to show our commitment to using a justice and equity lens as we strive toward gender and racial equity.
Connecticut is a wealthy state but, at the same time, we are also a state of deep disparity related to income and generational wealth. Women, especially women of color, continue to experience the greatest wage gaps and the most barriers to creating financial security for themselves and their families. This is why each year our policy agenda is centered intentionally on advocacy for legislation that protects, supports and increases women’s economic security.
Expanding access to paid sick days was our top policy priority this year because too many people have been faced with the difficult choice between losing a paycheck or being able to take time off from work to care for themselves or a loved one. Connecticut was the first state to pass a paid sick days law back in 2011, but the law excluded about 88% of workers, so that means approximately 1.6 million workers have not had access to paid sick days. This lack of access has many everyday impacts, such as not being able to go to a doctor’s appointment or care for a sick child, but we also saw firsthand the harsh consequences during the pandemic when many workers could not afford to quarantine.
Since passage of the 2011 law, several other states have passed more expansive and inclusive paid sick days laws, so it was clear and imperative that Connecticut needed to do the same if we want to protect our public health and create an equitable state that values the workers who are the backbone of our economy. She Leads Justice was proud to lead the Paid Sick Coalition, comprised of dozens of community and advocacy groups from across the state, which organized and lobbied for years over the course of several legislative sessions. This year, our efforts were successful, and the paid sick days bill was passed!
This was a major victory for workers, especially women and working families! We’re very grateful to Representative Manny Sanchez and Senator Julie Kushner, Co-Chairs of the Labor and Public Employees Committee, for their leadership in getting a strong and inclusive bill passed that will benefit all of us collectively, but especially our ALICE families who are working hard and struggling to make ends meet.
Full-time and part-time workers in Connecticut will be able to earn up to 40 hours of paid sick time each year, regardless of employer size or industry. Workers can use this time to care for themselves or family members during a short-term illness, including a loved one who is like a family member to them but is not related by blood or marriage. For so many working families, like ALICE, not losing income because of needing to stay home when you have the flu, for example, can be the difference between being able to afford necessities like groceries and going without until your next paycheck.
For so many working families, like ALICE, not losing income because of needing to stay home when you have the flu, for example, can be the difference between being able to afford necessities like groceries and going without until your next paycheck.
Now, we need to work on getting the information about paid sick days out to the public. Many more people will now have access to paid sick days that didn’t before, so we must spread the word to make sure people know their rights.
And while this is a big win for ALICE, we certainly have work to do to ensure that everyone in our state is able to live with dignity and have their basic needs met. I hope that we never stop being shocked and moved to action by the fact that poverty exists anywhere, but particularly in a state of abundance and prosperity like Connecticut. The existence of poverty is a policy choice. Choosing to actively eradicate poverty, especially child poverty, is also a policy choice. We must make more policy choices that disrupt systems of inequity instead of perpetuating them, like our unjust tax system that unfairly burdens those who earn the least and gives advantages to those who earn the most. Like many other advocates, She Leads Justice was disappointed that legislation was not passed for a permanent Child Tax Credit because that would have been a significant step toward lifting a critical mass of our children out of poverty.
We each have a responsibility to be part of this change, no matter our social background, line of work or political affiliation. We encourage everyone to follow the leadership of United Way of Connecticut and other advocates who are leading the charge to push the legislature to establish a permanent Child Tax Credit. Just because the legislative session ended in May doesn’t mean that we should stop reaching out to our elected officials or organizing people and organizations in our community to join the Child Tax Credit Coalition.
We need to be relentless in our demand for the Child Tax Credit, inside and outside of the legislative session, and keep the issue at the forefront of all policy conversations.
On a personal note, what led me to be passionate about this work was that many years ago I worked for a small nonprofit with a mission toward building multiracial democracy in local communities. I traveled to numerous states across the country for five years, working with community groups that wanted to organize people to address big issues like food security, police-community relations, diversity and changing communities, access to education, et cetera. My favorite part of that work was meeting people in the places where they lived, talking about their everyday lives and learning from them how they viewed the potential solutions to their concerns because they were, indeed, the experts on their own lived experiences.
I do the work that I do for everyday people, especially those of us who have been told that our lives matter less because of our gender, race or class. Every single one of us deserves a life with dignity, opportunity and safety.
