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Okay. Okay. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah, You Mhm. Hi, I'm Senator Lawton Child's, and I'd like to welcome you to the Lawton Child's update. Today we're going to meet a group of displaced homemakers who are making a world of difference for senior citizens in Tampa. But first, let's talk about some of the issues facing women in our country.

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For many years, women have been working to change the social and legal obstacles that have sometimes prevented them from paying an equal role in our society. Many feel we've come a long way and changes have been made, but we know we've still got a ways to go.

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Senator Barbara Mikulski is from Maryland before being elected to the United States Senate in 1986 she represented Baltimore in the House of Representatives. For 10 years, Senator Murkowski was a social worker for Catholic Charities in the city of Baltimore before coming to Washington. She's been a leader on women's issues throughout her career in Congress.

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We recently talked about some of these issues. Well, Senator, we've had an opportunity to work together on on a few projects, but I think from your perspective, you've championed some causes here and just kind of tell us a minute about some of the problems of working mothers.

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What you see, some of those pressing problems are right now, Senator Charles. As you know, women are in the marketplace, and they're here to say, years ago, women used to work either for pin money or family luxuries. Now they work for economic necessity. And probably the most pressing problem that a woman faces as she enters the marketplace is daycare, particularly if she is a mom and what many working women know now as working dads.

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That daycare is hard to find, and it's hard to pay for. And, uh, it's questionable sometimes about its reliability. The second thing that women face is that for giving a full pays a full day's work. Well, before we get off that on the day care a minute, let me just talk to you about that.

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That looks like that's one of the subjects that's on the coming agenda. We know we're not going to really approach that this session election year. Everybody's starting to talk now about how do we get out of here? So that's probably one you're gonna have to solve after all lot leaves.

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But how do you see us kind of coming to grips with that? We know we're talking about something that could take massive bucks. And yet, uh, it's as you say, it's something that we've got to solve. What's the federal government's rule? We're gonna be in that as you see it.

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And then I want to speak to the private sector. Well, I think that one of the roles that the federal government has to play his number one stimulating supply, trying to encourage the availability of more daycare and number two ensuring safety. Well, now, when you say encouraging more availability, I trust you're not.

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We were hearing together in the administration's answer to this was that we have a catalog and we make available where some of the facilities are. I think you're not just saying that. No, Senator, what I'm talking about is, first of all, you do need information and referral.

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Very often. When a mom or dad is seeking daycare, they need. It's helpful in states if they have one stop shops that they can call to find out what's around and what's licensed. Um, that's why we've been working in the Congress to fund information and referral services.

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But if there's no daycare there that's licensed and reliable, all the information referral doesn't mean anything. And therefore it's up to the federal government to try to increase the supply. Taking a look at the tax benefits to create daycare number one, trying to smooth out some of the liability issues where parents are protected.

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But it doesn't become burdensome for small business to start. The other thing is what I call safety. And then that means you need to have the standards to make sure that people who care for your Children sometimes as much as eight and 10 hours a day are adequately trained and adequately educated.

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We don't wanna warehouse kids, and we don't want some type of, uh, government day care. We want to stimulate daycare in the private sector. I think that that's such a great answer that we're not talking about ultimately creating a great big federal program, the federal bureaucracy.

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It makes sense because women are such an important factor in the workforce now for the private sector to be recognizing that Look, this is something that you've got to do. Of course, if you're talking about a small business for five employees. They can't set up a daycare center, so there's got to be some way of pooling some of those resources, and I guess that's what you're talking about.

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Tax credits and absolutely, and the other thing to do is also for us to be able to work with governors and mayors to stimulate one site day care. I truly believe that, like in a hometown, if they're going to build a new office tower and provide health club facilities, maybe in that office tower there could be daycare facilities.

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There are six million employers in the United States of America, and only 150 provide one site day care. Some of the areas where one site day care is being pioneered is really hospitals. Why? Because the nurses of primarily female workforce have special hours and schedules, and so on.

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If hospitals can do it, Certainly, law firms and insurance agencies and so on can do it On site daycare would be one. The other is to work again with governors and mayors and the private sector, local communities for after school after school and summer school daycare.

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But We think that a wiser use of the resources helping them coordinate and so on can stimulate this supply, huh? Now I interrupted you. You were talking about the other problem that you see of working women Well, it's also being able to afford day care. For many working women, daycare constitutes almost 25% of their earnings for many women.

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Also, their salaries are quite meager. We often call it the pink collar ghetto, where women's jobs are particularly jobs traditionally assigned to women. Do not pay high wages. And, uh, we're concerned about that now. One of the things I'm concerned about is the federal government as an employer.

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That's why I'm a champion of pay equity legislation. I think women ought to be paid what they're worth, and that means equal pay for equal work were of equal value. Right now in our country, women with pretty much the same education doing comparable jobs are paying 64 cents compared to the dollar that males are.

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And as you know, many women now are heads of households, and, uh, we need to pass this pay equity legislation. I think before we asked the private sector, though to come in, The federal government has to take a look at itself and see how it brings, how it pays people.

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And then we become a model for the nation. So you see that as sort of a two step process. First, taking a look at their governments. House? Absolutely Senator challenging. Sometimes the government's quick this the private sector to do something that it's not willing to do itself.

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That's why working with you, for example, we were talking about daycare. You remember that real argument we have with the lady who had Social Security in Baltimore, and that's 16 workers, predominantly women, And she didn't want to provide daycare. Well, it's a little hard for Senator Mikulski in Maryland, uh, to go to General Motors or Mercy Hospital and talk to them about day care.

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If I can't get Social Security to provide daycare, Social Security Administration to provide it or Goddard Space Agency, I think we want to practice what we preach. Then, when we talk about pay equity or family leave for any of these issues, I think the federal government should be a model.

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We try it out where they make sure there aren't wrinkles and then turn to the private sector. We'll all during the budget act is in every step of the way. You kept handing me notes and talking to me about impoverishment of spouses. Uh, why don't you try?

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It took a while before I understood what you were talking about. What? You made that message clear to me. After a while, I explain, uh, you know, for our program here. Why? What what? What are you really talking about? Their? Well, Senator, I'll be happy to.

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But before I talk about spouse and Powers room and just say something right now, you know, I'm the first Democratic lady to come to the Senate, elected on her own, right? As I champion women's issues, we find that really there now. American issues, uh, their family issues.

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But I know that we cannot move any any program to help families by without the good men in the Senate. And I count you as one of the galaxy. You were one of the gala heads of the Senate, and this Quinta Veer has been happy to work with you.

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Um, in terms of in terms of the spouses impoverishment, this is where the government itself. Bankrupt families When one of the members of the family has to go into a nursing home, let me give you a concrete example. Husband and wife with all their lives together.

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Maybe in South Florida they might own a business selling rugs all of their lives. They call it our money. He might have a disease like Alzheimer's. Parkinson goes into the nursing home, and all of a sudden they find out that Medicare does not pay for any kind of nursing home care.

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Uh, practically whatsoever. The only government program to help them is Medicaid. Now, if you've got Alzheimer's, that might cost you $2 a month for your husband to be cared for properly. No family can withstand that, so they look for help. In order to qualify for Medicaid, you have to spend down your resources to you become bankrupt.

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They had $50,000 in the bank I was saving. They'd have to spend it down to 3000 if they had $1000 a month coming in and retirement income 500 his Social Security 300 ingenuity he took out for his wife, 200 her social security. That money that's his Social Security and annuity goes to the nursing home.

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That would leave her from going middle class to only having $200 a month income and $3000 a month in the savings account. She's bankrupt. So under the legislation that I introduced and you've helped me advocate, we help American families keep their own money up to 700.

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The wife at home could keep up to $750 a month of her own money and up the life savings of About. I think that's important because I think when you first started when I heard people talk about this issue to start with, I'll have to say I was concerned because I've always been worried about the situation in which, apart from the time when I was coming up and you're a lot younger, so it maybe it was different.

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But people used to feel they had some responsibility of taking care of the folks, their family, so to speak. And it has always bothered me, sort of when I since the time I was in the state Legislature that kids thought they got totally a free ride that they didn't have to do anything for their folks to start with, and yet they were entitled to inherit all of their money even though the government had taken care of them.

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But when I hear you say we're going to make sure that a wife and or husband is left $750 a month, we're not talking about something that allows you know them to accumulate or again have some massive mass program. There were just saying that they don't have to go into poverty or shouldn't have to.

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Uh, when they've had these earnings all their life, when they provided and paid their taxes and done in these things, that's exactly right, Senator. The principle of our legislation is family responsibility, but not family bankruptcy in the case that I gave $250 but still have to come out of the family's pocket, The second thing is, I believe like you, you've got to help pay your own way.

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That's why I also hope that we could work with the private sector and developing insurance for long term care needs. So that's what we're working on. One of the programs is I was going around my state, I found that it's just a super thing. It's a group of displaced homemakers, uh, in in Tampa and they've banded together and they're in the repair home repair business and they're out sort of helping other people and helping themselves at the same time and having a, you know, sort of almost a family that they've created together.

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Among that situation, I wondered if you've run into any other programs like this where displaced homemakers are out. Well, we find that through some of the job training that we've worked on together, that it has helped the displaced homemakers instead of them going on welfare. We've given them the advice and technical assistance to start some of their own businesses.

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I know of displaced homemakers, for example, that run an answering service, Um, in terms of taking telephone calls. Some are working in neighborhoods so they don't have to get involved in childcare working, say, for example, with senior citizens to do homemaker and sure services, not medical services.

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But all of those things that help people become self sufficient. I know one group of whom displaced homemakers that opened their own catering business and they went from essentially your Dirk's right up to a full scale stuff. And they're doing pretty good. And that goes to what our philosophy is to provide people with the technical assistance they need to help themselves.

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Well, I think that's important. You know, we don't have any problem getting our mind around the fact that where a business, let's say, goes overseas, that was a steel foundry or something, a tool and dye kit that we need to train and retrain those workers. And yet we have a displaced homemaker, and somehow for a long time we haven't felt that there's any problem with that.

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You know what's more important than having people that are going to make that home to start with and then recognizing that they also have to have some trained some ability, and if they don't they become wards of the state, and then the taxpayers do have to pick up their bill so it makes sense sort of from both will stand for your ladies.

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Sound exciting. I wish they were in my neighborhood. I've got a whole bunch of things that I'm either too short or too busy to do myself Well, they're doing a great job and helping people fix their houses up, and the people are very happy about that, and they're very proud about that.

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I want to thank you for giving us an opportunity to hear what the voice of ladies in the Senate and the voice of women in this country is having to say. And you're doing a great job and we're enjoying having you very much. And I thank you for being with us today.

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Thank you. Should you know more about Social Security? Many people don't know the half of it. I knew I paid for it out of every paycheck. Well, that's just the way it was. But now I see it's a part of my whole retirement plan. I didn't think Social Security would be around when I retire, but now I know there's enough money to pay benefits way into the next century.

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Get the whole story. Call 1 809 37 2000 for this free booklet and see what's in it for you. Social Security. It never stops working. There is a need in your own hometown. Please join your local chapter. Welcome back. Is Senator Makowski and I discussed. Many homemakers find themselves almost dumped on the workplace as a result of death or divorce.

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They're called displaced homemakers, and since they've spent the last 20 years or so raising a family, their job skills are not readily identifiable as they try to find employment. But they're doing something about that In Tampa, where a group of displaced homemakers have formed a company called Ship, It stands for a senior home improvement program, and it's involved in rehabilitating the homes of senior citizens.

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Since the program began in 1980 more than 1400 homes have been repaired. In Hillsborough County, many of the homes were deteriorating because of age, storm damage or Vandals. Without the help of ship, many of the elderly homeowners would have been forced to move out. We may just going to rebuild the middle post, so let's break this.

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Take this corner post out. Angela Martinis is the director of the ship. She started the program when she became a displaced homemaker eight years ago. She got the idea while doing volunteer work at the Center for Women in Tampa. Angela recalled the program's early day. We started small with just as a weatherization program.

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But right away we found out they didn't need weatherization. There was nothing. There were no doors. There were no windows. You know, weatherization wasn't doing it. So we got right into the carpentry repair part of the program. The area Agency on Aging funds us through older Americans.

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Act title three b. They were our first funders, and there are core funders. Without them, we would be out of business. Angela talked about a typical displaced homemaker displaced homemaker is a person who has been primarily a homemaker and then, due to the death, divorce, separation or disability of the spouse must now become the breadwinner.

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Uh, usually it's a woman. It could be a man, but you hardly ever find men displaced homemakers. So we were looking for employment. And it's kind of hard to find a job if you're not trained in anything. Now. Homemakers are actually trained in everything, but they don't own those skills.

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They don't realize they have those skills and they don't market themselves. They don't market their skills, right? They just say, Oh, I was just a housewife. You know, I don't know how to do anything And actually, there's probably nothing that they don't know how to do.

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We just have to find out about it. So when this, uh, Grant came up for bid, this is nine years ago. It was a very small grant. $35,000 grant for six months. We bid on it and we got it. And it pretty well scared the heck out of us because number one we didn't even know what it did was we don't know what a grant was.

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We didn't know what we were going to do with it when we got it. We found out very quickly. We brought many different skills to the program. And we found out that if we knew how to cut out a dress pattern, we would know how to cut out of wood pattern.

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If we knew that this little thing fit here, you know, in remodeling now, mostly it's taking something off and putting something back that looks the same. So even though there wasn't a tremendous amount of construction experience, we learned very quickly. We asked questions of everyone, and everyone was so helpful.

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Now there isn't anything anything that these women don't know how to repair, replace, fix anything in residential construction. We don't have a typical ship worker because we're all from different backgrounds. Whether one of us was raced yachts out of the, uh, yacht club here in Tampa.

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Um uh, an artist, a rancher. We come from all kinds of backgrounds that never really prepared us or maybe really did prepare us for what we're doing now. The need in Tampa for ships help is tremendous. And currently there's a two year waiting list. Half the people served by ship or over 75 years old, and many are in their nineties, a lot of their businesses generated by word of mouth.

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Every time the women wear their bright red work shirts into a new neighborhood, they can count on picking up more job request Angela explain how to qualify for help. In order to qualify for the ship services, you have to be over the age of 60 and the house has to be owner occupied if we don't do any.

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Repairs on rental houses were not into helping slumlords or whatever. So it has to be for the thrust of the program is to help the elderly remain in their homes if that's where they want to be, remain in their homes more comfortably and safer. We do a lot of security.

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We do a lot of dead. Both put on a lot of new doors. Our referrals come in from from the police. If somebody has been broken, the house has been broken into. They'll call us and we'll come and do security on that house. Social workers call us because the floors have collapsed, but most of our referrals come from the old people themselves.

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They must have a pretty good network because I'll get maybe 10 to 15 calls a day, some days more than that of people needing help. The need for exceeds our ability to meet it. Funding for ships programs come from a variety of sources. A large portion is from the federal Older Americans Act, channeled through the State Council on Aging.

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The roofing and plumbing program is funded by the city of Tampa with a federal housing and urban development grant, and the weatherization program is sponsored by Tampa Electric Company. It involves window Cauchy weather stripping and insulating water heaters. But even with all this community support, that never seems to be enough money left over to buy needed supplies like paneling, windows or doors.

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That's why ship came up with a new way to make ends meet. It's called Adopt a House. We have a program called Adopt a House, and in the program, an individual or business or club can sponsor the repairs on an elderly person's house for three of the adoption fee is $300 for that.

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Their name is Ana, and the sign is a pretty big sign, and they get their name across at the emergency. Repairs on this house have been paid for by whoever adopted it through a donation to ship. And then we take before and after pictures, and they get the before and after pictures.

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They get a certificate of adoption, and it tells what we did on their house. So a lot of clubs, especially adopt houses. Some businesses and quite a few individuals have started adopting houses. They adopt them in memory of the mother, perhaps who has always had a good life in a nice house, and one man in particular has adopted about seven houses because his mother had a good life, and now he's making it nicer for somebody else.

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Ship also accepts volunteers, youth groups and military personnel have helped to mow grass, clean yards and paint houses. The women make a big difference in the lives of the people they served. Mr. And Mrs Pendolino had a much needed wheelchair ramp built by ship with without that ramp, I would not even be able to get out of this house, just like I said through empty my trash bag.

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I have to go to set it out on the back step close the back door, come through the house and out the front door down that ramp all around the house, too much garbage can and put trash in and they come all the way back around the house and back up that ramp back to the front door to get back inside the house.

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See, I was a carpenter in my young days, and I know carpenter work, and those ladies were wonderful. They really did good. The repairs can be real. Morale boosters and home improvements helped spark new pride in the neighborhood. The women believe they also reduce the elderly sense of helplessness and give them a feeling of being in charge of their own lives.

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These people have given so much to the city of Tampa or the county of Hillsborough. Their life blood is what built this next great city, and now people forget them and they're they're no use to anybody anymore and let's get rid of them. And let's tear down these old houses, etcetera.

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But they want to stay in their houses because that's where their memories are there. Children were raised here. The spouses have died here and it's their identity. And if you take an elderly person out of the home that they want to stay in and put them in an institution, they don't ever live very long.

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So as long as we can maintain them in their homes with a little supportive services, they're much happier. And if we can do that, then we're much happier. The women do tremendous work, so we see their experiences. Homemakers has prepared them for almost any job. Last year, Ship won an award from the National Community Development Association for addressing the needs of families, homes and neighborhoods through the use of community development block grants.

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These women in Tampa continue to prove that displaced homemakers can make it in the marketplace and also help others live safer and more comfortable lives. Well, that's all we have time for today. I hope you'll join me again. Next time for the Lawton Child's update. Mhm.

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Okay, okay. Okay. Mhm. Yeah, but mm, yeah. Mhm. Yeah. You mhm. Yeah, yeah.