Equality Works Legislative Advocacy

ASSURING EQUAL OPPORTUNITY FOR WOMEN IN FIREFIGHTING

Legal Momentum brings attention to discrimination against women firefighters in Houston.

Legal Momentum has urged Houston mayor Bill White to address ongoing sex discrimination in the Houston Fire Department that makes it virtually impossible for women to advance from the Department’s rank-and-file to leadership roles.  The discrimination stems from new promotional rules adopted by the City and its firefighters’ union.  The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) determined that the rules have a discriminatory disparate impact on women firefighters.  

In a letter to the Mayor and the City Council released January 2, 2008, Legal Momentum expressed dismay at the City’s stance, particularly given women’s gross underrepresentation in the Department’s ranks and their near-invisibility among the Department’s senior leadership.  “In short,” stated the letter, authored by Legal Momentum’s Legal Director Jennifer K. Brown, “just as a few pioneering women were poised to integrate the Department’s leadership, they were bumped back down the line.”  

ASSURING EQUAL OPPORTUNITY FOR WOMEN IN CONSTRUCTION

Equal opportunity on construction sites begins when building owners publicize the importance of their plans for hiring and retaining women and minorities from the very first bid packages - and back them up with contract clauses that individually bind both the general contractor and all subcontractors. While no two contracts are the same, project owners who are committed to ensuring equal opportunity should consider amending their construction contracts to include the language recommended in these two publications.

Model Construction Contract Provisions Concerning Equal Employment Opportunity for Women: In this 2005 fact sheet, Legal Momentum details the key provisions that should be included in any contract or subcontract to assure that women are recruited aggressively and that their work environments are free of harassment and other discrimination. 

Model Collective Bargaining Agreement language with reference to a Model Equal Employment Opportunity Policy 

Checklists

Equal Opportunity Monitors: A Comparative Analysis of Selected Successful Programs: In this 2005 fact sheet, Legal Momentum explains how the use of equal opportunity monitors on large-scale, publicly-funded construction sites around the country helped assure relatively high numbers of women workers on those sites.

 

THE FUTURE OF GIRLS

Initial Comments to the Mayoral Task Force on Career and Technical Education Innovation’s Preliminary Recommendations.   On June 12, 2008, Francoise Jacobsohn testified at a public hearing of the Mayoral Task Force on Career and Technical Education Innovation in New York City.  Francoise offered Legal Momentum’s initial comments on the Task Force’s recommendations to overhaul the city’s career and technical, or vocational, education system.  The Equality Works pipeline project works intensively to increase girls’ enrollment in high schools that prepare them for the skilled trades with the goal of overcoming the intense sex segregation that has long been the norm in these schools.  Francoise’s testimony focused on the necessity for the Task Force to end ‘gender tracking’ as it seeks to transform career and technical education.  

Can a Girl Be a Carpenter?: One of the initiatives of the Mayor's Commission on Construction Opportunity was a new High School for Construction Trades, Engineering, and Architecture, due to open in the fall of 2006. We helped maximize girls' recruitment to the new school by drafting the above flyer educating parents and guidance counselors about the economic opportunities offered by the construction trades, and enlisted tradeswomen to attend new school fairs and guidance counselor conferences City-wide to recruit middle school girls. The result? Nearly 30% of the school's new students are girls.

 

LEGISLATIVE ADVOCACY 

Legal Momentum Testifies before the United States House of Representatives Committee on Small Business: SBA’s Progress in Implementing the Women’s Procurement Program on January 16, 2008.

Legal Momentum Testifies at City Hall, New York City: "Are There Enough Non-Traditional Employment Opportunities for Women in NYC?":  On September 20, 2007

OPL tradeswomen and member testifies at City Hall, New York City: "Are There Enough Non-Traditional Employment Opportunities for Women in NYC?":  On September 20, 2007

Legal Momentum Testifies About Discrimination Against Women Construction Workers and Firefighters
On April 8, 2005, Legal Momentum President Kathy Rodgers testified before the New York City Council in support of the Human Rights in Government Operations Audit Law (Human Rights GOAL), highlighting the measure's potential for improving women's underrepresentation in construction and firefighting. 

Legal Momentum Testifies About Barriers to Women's Equality in the Construction Trades: On March 29, 2004, Legal Momentum Vice President and Legal Director Jennifer K. Brown testified at the New York City Council's Government Operations Committee's hearing on the topic, "The Glass Ceiling: Is There Diversity and Opportunity At All Levels of New York City's Workforce?"

 

See our Resources page for a list of organizations with useful information for women in non-traditional jobs.