Our Fiscal Crossroads: It’s Your Economy

This essay was originally published on Huff Post Politics

The phrase "fiscal cliff" has been buzzing by our ears like a gnat threatening to bite ever since Election Day and has interrupted what should be a celebratory moment in American politics. As part of the work of Strong Families, we decided to roll up our sleeves and see what all the "fiscal fuss" was about to help make the nebulous term accessible to the communities we live and love in.

"Fiscal cliff" is a name intended to scare us by evoking the stomach-lurching experience of suddenly falling into an abyss. The good news is that it is not as intimidating as its name. Simply put, the fiscal cliff is a deadline that Congress gave itself for dealing with the looming problem of balancing the budget -- a problem that must be addressed by the end of the year or else a series of self-inflicted punishments go into effect -- a combination of tax increases and spending cuts that would bring income and expense into closer alignment.

Instead of the cliff analogy, we would like to refer to this moment as a "fiscal crossroads," because unlike a cliff, a crossroads represents a choice. In order for our elected officials to make good decisions at this crossroads, there are a important myths that we need to confront head on.


Myth #1: Poor people just want "stuff and things."
Low-income folks contribute a lot to society not only through labor and through taxes, but like any good American -- through spending. Generally, those who are not wealthy have slimmer chances of filling savings accounts because of low wages and spend money immediately, pumping money back into the economy. Even so, people want to work for better wages and a higher quality of life -- just look at the recent Walmart strike.

Myth #2: Rich people hate paying taxes and they want to reduce government spending. Not true! Just check out this video by millionaires for higher taxes. These folks get that they benefit from roads, bridges, and WiFi that works and although they don't mention it in the video, we would venture to guess that many of them also really want to live in a country (and a world) where kids have enough to eat, and parents don't need to choose between infant formula and rent.

Myth #3: Immigrants are "taking advantage" of the social safety net. Immigrant labor is one of the main drivers of the U.S economy and immigrants often pay more in taxes than they have ever received in safety net benefits. So, the question is how can immigrants take advantage of a safety net that their work helps to sustain?

Myth #4: Social Security is broken. People that are low income to middle class are the ones footing the bill in a tax system that unfairly burdens us because any income beyond $110,000 in income is exempt from paying into Social Security. According to former New York Times financial reporter David Clay Johnston, Social Security ended 2011 with a $2.7 trillion surplus. In a blog published on Reuters last spring he wrote, "That surplus is almost twice the $1.4 trillion collected in personal and corporate income taxes last year. And it is projected to go on growing until 2021, the year the youngest Baby Boomers turn 67 and qualify for full old-age benefits."

So why all the talk about Social Security "going broke?" That theme filled the news after release of the latest annual report of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Federal Disability Insurance Trust Funds, as Social Security is formally called. The reason is that the people who want to kill Social Security have for years worked hard to persuade the young that the Social Security taxes they pay to support today's elderly will do nothing for them when they age.  

Myth #5: This is way too complicated! No, it's really not. There is a lot of jargon around this conversation that almost seems designed to keep regular people from getting involved. But here's the truth: The people we elected and who we pay with our tax dollars need to find a way to bring the budget into balance so we can continue investing in the things we know to bring about long term benefits to our society, like education, job training, and everyone having access to quality food, shelter, and medical care. In order to do that, we need to bring in more revenue. Economists agree: letting the Bush era tax cuts on the wealthiest 2 percent expire would be a good start.

It's your crossroads; which path do you want to take?   

Co-authored by Lisa Russ and Kortney Ryan Ziegler, Ph.D.

What Catholics Really Believe About Choice

Religious and faith communities are speaking out about their broad range of increasingly progressive beliefs about reproductive health, rights, and justice, including our newest Strong Families member, Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. Rather than let the dominant narrative of “Christian values” or “The Religious Right” determine how a diverse group is seen, these communities are defining themselves. For many, however, many still view those of the Catholic faith as one of the “last strongholds” that remains unwavering.

However, Catholics for Choice recently released a film that challenges the conventional wisdom about what the Catholic Church teaches on a range of social issues related to sex and sexuality. As they describe below:

“The Secret History of Sex, Choice and Catholics”, a new documentary-style film, produced by Catholics for Choice, sets the record straight about Catholic social teaching on issues related to sex and sexuality. In the wake of a bruising campaign season, during which Catholic bishops politicized the pulpit and tried to drown out the voices of Catholics who disagree with them, this film offers a straightforward explanation of what Catholic social teaching really is on the controversial issues that drive the news cycle and it’s not simply the dictates of the US bishops.

Contrary to popular opinion, there is more to Catholics’ beliefs than what the hierarchy espouses, said Jon O’Brien, president of Catholics for Choice. We put together this film with some of the top theologians in the world to get at the heart of Catholic teaching: that people become Catholics through their baptism and are given both a free will and a conscience to make important decisions. We hope that anyone seeking to discuss what Catholics think, how they vote or, most importantly, what Catholics believe, will consider this film.

We must all continue to challenge the conventional wisdom that we were raised and socialized to believe about ourselves and others. The complexity of the issues we approach and the groups involved are often much more nuanced than we are led to believe. Pausing to consider the many perspectives on what appear to be clear-cut issues will only strengthen our ability to continue identifying cross-sector commonalities and building alliances across our differences.

Catholics for Choice (CFC) was founded in 1973 to serve as a voice for Catholics who believe that the Catholic tradition supports a woman’s moral and legal right to follow her conscience in matters of sexuality and reproductive health.

When You're Denied Abortion

The recent Turnaway Study provides new evidence about the negative economic, physical health, and (short-term) mental health consequences of being denied abortions. All the women in this study had sought abortions, but not all received them. The groups were similar to start, but the event of getting an abortion or not appeared to change that trajectory negatively for those denied abortions. Due to varying gestational limits of when abortion is permitted in clinics, ANSIRH estimates that 4000 women a year are being turned away simply because they are just past their local clinic’s limits.

Recently proposed bills like Ohio's halted 'heartbeat' bill and Wisconsin's planned anti-choice legislation would increase the number of women denied abortions, and who may experience a similar negative trajectory as those in this study. Women -- especially women of color and low-income women -- do not need any more threats to their choice, their economic/health status, and their ability to build and raise their family.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The Turnaway Study was conducted by ANSIRH (Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health) at UCSF.

New Mexico speaks out for domestic workers

By Andrea Plaza, Encuentro
 

Today marks an important day for the future of domestic workers in New Mexico and across the country.  With the release of a national study, Home Economics: The Invisible and Unregulated World of Domestic Work the National Domestic Worker Alliance is shedding light on the labor conditions for one of the fastest growing industries in the country: domestic care. 

Who are domestic care workers?  They are the tens of thousands of mostly women, many of whom are immigrant workers, who care for our country’s most vulnerable: our children, our aging and our individuals with special needs. 

Domestic workers are trusted to feed, bathe, administer medications, clean homes and provide companionship to our family members so that Americans workers can get to their jobs and continue supporting their families and our nation’s economy.  
 

Despite their critical contribution, these workers are not protected by the basic fair labor laws that others of us take for granted every day.  The Home Economics report surveyed over 2000 house cleaners, nannies and caregivers across the country and found that many are paid below minimum wage, do not receive over time pay, health benefits or workers compensation.  Many endure extended working hours without a break, and many cited physical and verbal abuse that went unreported due to the fear of losing their jobs.  If we trust domestic workers with our family members, how can we allow these conditions to persist?
 

In New Mexico, domestic care represents the second fastest growing industry in our state, with over 6,000 new domestic care worker jobs projected by 2016.  To respond to this growing need we must ensure that families, educational institutions, employers and lawmakers work together to prepare and protect this growing workforce.

As New Mexicans we must demand better working conditions and basic labor protections for our domestic workers.  This is the best way to guarantee that our aging parents and our growing children are receiving the highest quality of care, which we all agree they deserve.

The photos below are from today's press conference in Albuquerque, NM.  Encuentro and Strong Families New Mexico collaborated with OLE NM, NM Direct Caregivers Alliance and El Centro de Igualdad y Derechos. To see highlights of this morning's press event:

Making Domestic Workers Visible

Domestic workers are one of the most critical workforces in the US economy but are routine victims of substandard work conditions, low wages and even physical and mental abuse at the hands of their employers. The recent study, "Home Economics: The Invisible and Unregulated World of Domestic Work," by the National Domestic Workers Alliance, exposes the sometimes harsh reality of the domestic workforce through the interviews of  2,086 worker in 14 major metropolitan areas.


The Key Findings of the study are: 

• Domestic workers earn substandard pay, and enjoy little economic mobility or financial security.
• Formal employment contracts are rare in the domestic work industry, and where work agreements do exist, employers frequently violate them.
• Employers think of their homes as safe, yet domestic work can be hazardous.
• Domestic workers who encounter problems frequently feel too vulnerable to stand up for themselves, especially live-in workers and undocumented immigrants.

You can read the rest of the study at:  http://www.domesticworkers.org/homeeconomics/ as well as TAKE ACTION to be part of winning dignity, respect and labor protections for domestic workers.

Celebrate Fewer Restrictions On Building Families

Photo Credit: Equality California

Strong Families is excited to co-sponsor an event with Laurel Fertility Care to celebrate their recent policy win (AB 2356)! This new law ensures that same-sex couples and singles who are using known donor sperm and seeking fertility treatment do not have to undergo delays (e.g. unnecessary screening, freezing) before accessing this treatment. Currently, hetero-couples do not have to experience this kind of barriers and delay. Consequently, this new law expands equity for same-sex and singles to get the same treatment as hetero-couples.

Please join us on Thursday, Nov. 29 at the Rockwood Leadership Institute (426 17th Street, 4th Floor) in Oakland from 6-8pm.


Laurel Fertility Care is a clinic that has emerged to do policy work this year and are building a network with physicians, OBs, and nurse practitioners throughout the state on how to provide respect, recognition and equal access to fertility treatment for same-sex couples, singles, and HIV-positive folks who need support in getting pregnant.

Finding Strength in Fragility

by Kortney Ryan Ziegler

I remember begrudgingly accompanying my aging grandmother to our routine food stamp interviews. Feeling embarrassed, I would sometimes disguise myself because in my neighborhood, no kid on food stamps wanted to be seen going to get food stamps, even though many of us ate because of them. She never seemed to mind and wasn’t ashamed because of it.

The office was usually crowded, filled with long lines and uncomfortable plastic chairs that my grandmother’s arthritic body never quite settled comfortably into. This made it my job to do the waiting but it didn’t bother me because I wanted to make the experience the least physically stressful for her as possible. At points when the waiting seemed endless, I would rush out to the car to meet with her, rub her swollen hands and munch on the snacks that I never saw her make but deeply appreciated when they appeared.

I often think back to our trips to the office and how we supported each other through the defeating experience, and I am reminded of how our relationship–as grandparent and grandchild–positively shaped the ways in which we practiced the act of love. Though we never discussed it, I knew that she, too, feared being seen. I might have had to shield myself from the shameful eyes of my classmates but it was her who carried the bigger burden of having to defend her right to access welfare as an unmarried black woman to the sneering eyes of the larger judgmental society. The intimacy that surfaced during our trips, however, helped to alleviate some of this pressure.

According to pro-marriage proponents, being raised by a single parent–let alone a single grandparent–cultivates an endless cycle of pathological dysfunction for the entire community involved. But for those of us who are products of non-traditional family structures, we know firsthand that such thinking is flawed because it doesn’t explore how our families engage in emotional, mental and physical acts of love and support. Despite this, there continues to be a wealth of resources given to studies that brand single parents and their children as inevitable failures.

One such study conducted by scholars at Princeton and Columbia Universities, called “The Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study,” follows in this vein. Taking a cue from the infamous 1965 Moynihan Report, which blamed black poverty on households led by women, the Fragile Families study concludes that the increase of social impairment, specifically in communities of color, can be attributed to the growth of unwed parents and their children. The data implies that “fragile families” can be fixed with a focus on keeping birth parents together but there are multiple problems with this perspective since it doesn’t recognize that everyone hasn’t had the same access to the rights of a family.

Within the U.S. fabric of history, exists a legacy of policy and legislation designed to intentionally break up poor families and families of color. For example, black people haven’t always had the right to identify as a family due to our historical status as property from enslavement. Even my grandmother’s parents struggled to stay together during a time where Jim Crow laws robbed black families of basic rights, while other groups continue to fight for the right to be a family in the midst of a history of flawed immigration and deportation laws that repeatedly devalues their presence. The recent veto of the TRUST Act by California governor Jerry Brown, exemplifies the powerful influence of this legacy.

Another problem with the study’s pro-marriage stance is the idea that marriage is always beneficial for families, no matter the circumstances. From personal experience, I know this isn’t always true, as my grandmother chose to be single as a process of self-care. She willingly separated from an abusive husband with the hopes of creating some form of familial normalcy for her and her children. Like many women who leave their partnerships to escape potential harm, she understood that single parenting was a better and safer option and in my eyes, this is not a sign of weakness but a bold act of courage and marker of strength.

The new family that my grandmother created was not without it’s problems, but no family is. To make up for the lack of partner income, she worked long hard hours for little pay at the local post office and from what my aunts and uncles tell me, always did her best to maintain a positive sense of kinship–perhaps money was tight but love and care were abundant.

Balancing child rearing with full time work was not easy for my grandmother, and neither is it for other single parents. The Fragile Families study reports that mothers in this type of situation are at an economic disadvantage compared to those that are married but it doesn’t discuss the racism that excludes certain types of mothers from access to high paying jobs. For many single parents, this is a stressful reality that hinders the development of healthy relationships much more than the type of job itself. My grandmother might have been able to survive a blue-collar job to provide for her family but the little room of advancement such a position offered, only worked to heighten the stresses of poverty.

It has been almost 10 years since my grandmother transitioned into the spirit world and not a day passes that I am not grateful for her love. Her tireless attention to my healthy development pushes me to think about my own potential as a parent–whether I decide to have children with a partner or not. Being that I exist in the world as a transgender man, whatever family I decide to create will not come without unsolicited criticisms of what constitutes a “strong” family since the idea of marriage equality continues to be mysteriously excluded from pro-marriage rhetoric. Love knows no gender and the existence of alternative family structures that challenge the idea that only cisgender fathers can lead healthy families, is surely revolutionary.

If scholars are serious about producing research that attempts to influence policy change for all families, we cannot continue to “blame the victim.” Instead, research must account for the multiple social disparities that both produce and inadvertently sustain all types of families. Indeed, there is strength in “fragile” families and it is up to us to recognize it.

My grandmother and other loving single parents deserve it.

Dr. Ziegler is an Oakland based award winning artist, writer, public speaker and the first person to hold the Ph.D. of African American Studies from Northwestern University. More of his writing can be found at blac(k)ademic.

Myth vs. Fact: Paid Sick Days

Photo Credit: AP/Richard Drew

Reposted from Center For American Progress 

Critics of paid sick days argue that additional benefits for employees mean greater overhead for businesses and, consequently, fewer jobs. But these claims are both oversimplified and off-base. Below are the most common misconceptions about paid sick leave—a vital policy that more than 40 million American workers still lack.

Myth: Paid sick days hurt businesses.
Fact: Businesses would be the greatest beneficiaries of paid sick days.

Critics are fond of saying that paid sick days will be bad for businesses, but it’s just the opposite. Paid sick leave policies strengthen worker loyalty, increase productivity, and reduce turnover. In San Francisco, which was the first city to pass paid sick leave legislation in 2007, two-thirds of employers are supportive of the city’s ordinance.

Workers who do not have access to paid sick days, moreover, are one-and-a-half times more likely to go to work sick with a contagious illness, putting their co-workers or customers at risk.
“Presenteeism,” the decreased productivity of an employee who works sick, is also a serious concern for more than half of U.S. employers. And with good reason: The cost of presenteeism in the United States is $160 billion each year, surpassing the cost of absenteeism.

Myth: Paid sick days will slow economic growth and eliminate jobs.
Fact: Research based on San Francisco’s experience clearly demonstrates this policy does not harm economic growth or stunt job creation.

Since San Francisco enacted its Paid Sick Leave Ordinance, job growth has been higher there than in surrounding municipalities, including in industries most likely to be adversely affected by the legislation, such as food services and retail. The real threat to jobs is that 23 percent of adults nationwide report either being threatened with termination or being fired for taking time off when they or a family member are sick.

Myth: The overhead for paid sick days is too high.
Fact: It’s affordable, and businesses save on turnover costs by having a policy.

In San Francisco, 85 percent of employers did not experience any loss of profits after the city adopted a Paid Sick Leave Ordinance. Another study conducted by the Economic Policy Institute examined the potential costs of paid sick leave to Connecticut business owners. It concluded that if employees in Connecticut used 2.41 days of leave (the national average), the direct cost to businesses would be only 0.19 percent of total sales.

Businesses can retain employees and save money by implementing workplace policies like paid sick leave and paid family and medical leave. Companies typically pay about one-fifth of an employee’s salary to replace that employee. Adopting worker-friendly policies that reduce turnover makes sense for every business.

Myth: We can’t afford paid sick days now.
Fact: We can’t not afford paid sick days now.

As wage growth has stagnated, benefits such as paid sick days have become all the more important to ensuring workers can stay out of poverty and in the middle class. For the average family, missing work for just three-and-a-half days results in lost wages equivalent to an entire month’s grocery bill. In the past year, 42 percent of parents of children age 6 or younger have missed work to care for a sick child. One-third of parents of children in child care worry about losing their pay or their job to care for their child, and the same proportion worry they do not have enough paid sick leave at all.

More broadly, lack of access to earned sick time perpetuates job insecurity and inequality, both of which harm economic growth, especially as our economy struggles to regain momentum. Only 15 percent of workers in the bottom fifth of weekly earnings currently have paid sick days.[1]

Myth: Workers will take advantage of paid sick days and abuse the policy.
Fact: No evidence supports this assertion.

To begin with, only half of workers who have access to paid sick days use any of them.
Compared to those without paid leave, covered workers take only one more sick day per year on average for illness.

Myth: We don’t need any paid sick leave.
Fact: Many of the workers least likely to have paid sick days are those who care for our families and loved ones in child or elder care facilities and schools.

Providing paid sick days helps protect those benefitting from these services while cutting down the spread of infectious disease and reducing emergency health care costs for all Americans.

This is also important for other low-wage workers, many of whom work at retail stores, hotels, and restaurants, where they come into direct contact with the public. A shocking 86 percent of employees in the food service industry do not have paid sick days.[2]

Remember that stable, secure jobs with benefits and good pay are all critical to creating the consumers and demand that drive our economy. As long as millions of Americans are forced to choose between staying home to care for themselves or their family, foregoing pay, or risking losing a job, businesses and individuals alike will suffer.

Endnotes
[1] Calculations from the 2011 American Time Use Survey. For more info, see: “American Time Use Survey,” available at http://www.bls.gov/tus (last accessed November 2012).
[2] Ibid.

Jane Farrell is a Research Assistant for the Economic Policy team at the Center for American Progress.

I'm Voting For My Family

After years of wanting, months of planning and even more months of waiting, the dream of creating a family has become a reality for my partner and me. As I look back on our journey, the path to parenthood looks very different now than it did when we took our first steps.

 

Starting out, we immediately found ourselves at a crossroads and had to make some very important decisions on what direction to take. We recognized and appreciated that there are so many children in the foster care system that need a forever home. So, we agreed that adopting through foster care was the best fit for us.

 

The first milestone to cross was finding an agency to work with us. I’ll admit I was leery about how a gay couple (even in Massachusetts) would be received by the system. Would they hold us in the same regard as our straight counterparts? Or would we wait longer than a heterosexual couple because of bias?

 

From the very beginning, the agencies we contacted embraced us and assured us that we would be matched with children based on our ability to care for the child and provide a loving home and not by our identity. Each step along the way, we saw small reflections of ourselves that made a big difference. The mandatory training course that we took was taught by a lesbian mom who had also adopted through foster care years before. In ourclass was another gay couple. The panelist of adoptive parents who came into class to share their adoption stories also included a gay couple. The resource materials we were given included information for LGBT families. It was so impressive how inclusive the Massachusetts system is of the LGBT community. When we finished the pre-work and began ramping up the matching process, our positive experiences continued and we soon accepted that our identity as a gay couple would not influence access or decisions on the part of those charged with finding permanent and loving homes for awaiting children.

 

One of the first things we learned about the boys who would ultimately join our family was that they were brothers who had been living in separate foster homes for years. At the time when we were ready to adopt, serious consideration was being given to adopting them out separately, since it is so difficult to find adoptive parents who want more than one child at a time. It was unlikely that these boys would ever find a home together. We all found each other just in time.

 

I wonder about those states where the LGBT community is restricted from adopting through foster care. How many siblinggroups are permanently ripped apart simply because there is no one to adopt them? What if my boys had lived in one of those states? Chances are, they would either spend their entire childhood in the foster care system or be adopted out to separate families. Luckily, we’ll never know.

 

As we move forward to finalizing our adoption, my boys now finally have their forever home and will grow up together as it should be. They will never know the pain of separation again. My partner and I will finally realize our dream of becoming parents. I can’t help feeling incredibly lucky – lucky to live in a state that recognizes that my ability to parent a child is not determined by my gender or sexual identity. But many LGBT people are not solucky. They are still barred from adopting through foster care. But, who’s more unlucky? Is it the LGBT couple who want to adopt but can’t or those thousands of single and sibling groups of children in the system who are needlessly waiting to find their forever home? For our boys, what matters isn’t that they now have two dads, but that they have a loving and permanent place to call home…together.

Bill Lorenz is the Director of Finance and Administration for Family Equality Council. In 2011, Bill and his partner adopted two children from foster care and live in Nahant, Massachusetts along with their two dogs.

 

We won. Now let's get busy.

Art by Favianna Rodriguez, www.favianna.com

By Eveline Shen

I am elated at the news that President Obama will serve four more years.  We have narrowly missed what would have been an extremely dangerous four years for our communities under a Romney administration, and with President Obama’s victory we have been given an opportunity. It’s on us to use it well.

There were many important gains during Obama’s first term, but some critical needs for our communities were not met.

Obama’s first term began with a sense of hopefulness.  Some of us thought he would usher in a new dawn.  With a community organizer for a President, what could go wrong?

Now we know that’s not enough. We need to fight hard for the things our communities need.  Our elected officials are not going to take leadership on our issues just because it’s the right thing to do.  They will do it because our voices are loud, our demands are strong, our message is clear, and our numbers are many.  Our work at Strong Families is to engage all of you in making that happen.

These are the lessons we are bringing into President Obama’s second term:
    1.    No matter what the threat, whether it’s climate change or conservative decision-makers, those most impacted will always be our families.
    2.    As the recovery effort post-Sandy is showing us, during times of crisis, community organizations, churches, and compassionate volunteers are essential in reaching our families.  We are moved and amazed by what the good people of New York, notably our friends at CAAAV, have been able to accomplish.
    3.    We need a government that works.  We need strong infrastructure. We need public employees like fire fighters, FEMA workers and city officials whose job it is to ensure all of our public safety.  We need a government that’s there for us before, during and after a crisis.
    4.    We can’t do this alone. We will continue to partner with amazing organizations around the country, but it is truly people like you that will bring about the change we need.

Join us in this hard work. Sign up now as a Strong Families Champion, and let us know we can count on you to be part of this movement for change.  As a Champion, you will receive extra requests from us, as many as one per week, asking you to sign petitions, make phone calls to elected officials or to share your stories with us.  We engage all of our members in some of these asks, but by becoming a Strong Families Champion you are signing to fight harder alongside us, and work closely with us during this important time.

We would be honored to count you in.  We promise not to deluge you with fundraising requests or send any kind of spam. What you will get from us are specific, strategic asks to move our work forward.

If you can’t commit more time right now, but want to show your support, please consider a donation to Strong Families. It will take all of us, and all we’ve got, to move our families forward.

Oakland youth Trick or Vote!

by mai doan

Yesterday, over 30 high school students in Oakland went out to do door knocking for on Halloween. Adding a twist to trick or treating, our youth went out in full costume and talked to Oakland residents about voting for the propositions that directly impacting all young people. In bunny ears and face paint, we joined a national effort – Trick or Vote! – to educate voters around why it's important to vote on behalf of the young people in their community.

While many youth are not able to vote, it's important that the registered voters in their communities think about how ballot initiatives impact all of us. And who can turn down an opportunity to raise awareness in your community in dressed up as a fairy or football all-star or wearing a giant spider on your head?!

With the support of some fierce adult allies, our youth were able to knock on 247 doors and talk to over 130 people, and get candy in the process. We shared information with people about the necessity of proposition 30 for public education in California, as well as the harmful effects of corporate control supported by proposition 32.

Also, we could not have had such an amazing night without the support of our allies Californian’s for Justice who let us use their space, as well as Favianna Rodriguez for letting us use her beautiful wings for our photo booth!

Check out some pictures from our Trick or Vote photo booth and night out on the town!

Wish we knocked on your door? Check out our Strong Families’ Guide to Civic Engagement for some helpful tools to empower yourself to make decisions around whether various candidates and propositions support your family and communities. And for information on specific propositions, check out the California Calls 2012 Voter Guide! Whether you can vote or not, these are helpful tools to get your voice heard in this upcoming election.

mai doan is the SAFIRE organizer at Forward Together.