Save family and medical leave!

Hi --
The federal Family and Medical Leave Act is in danger. Please act before February 2!!!!!

(this is an urgent message adapted from MomsRising, an interesting web-based organization promoting children and family issues, www.momsrising.com):

The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) has been a real life-saver for tens of thousands of families. It allows people who work for companies with fifty or more workers up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a new baby, or to care for a family member or themselves when facing a serious health issue.
Now the FMLA, even though it's unpaid leave and only applies to those who work for bigger companies, is at real risk of being scaled back when it actually should be expanded. As you may know, the current law is actually quite weak in comparison to the rest of the world. A Harvard study of 168 countries found that only 4 don't offer some form of paid leave for new mothers--Papua New Guinea, Swaziland, Lesotho, and the United States of America.
THE LOWDOWN: After years of corporate opposition, the U.S. Department of Labor is now seeking comments on the FMLA as it reviews the law. The FMLA could be scaled back if they don't hear from lots of people demanding that they protect (and expand) the law.
TELL THE DEPARTMENT OF LABOR TO RETAIN & EXPAND THE FMLA: Submit your comments via e-mail to whdcomments@dol.gov
The comment period ends Feb. 2. Sorry I didn't get this to you earlier. Please forward to everyone you know!!!

Questions to start 2007 with

1. Will the Democratic Congress stop the war and redirect at least some of the money to programs that children and families desperately need? One of the most urgent questions on my mind is: Will they stop cutting Section 8 and put in more money before housing costs push even more families into hunger and homelessness? The federal government has also been cutting job-training funds—while increasing the pressure on parents to get off welfare. Will they provide enough funds to enable parents to get the kinds of jobs that can support their families?

2. Will California really make health care available to all kids who live here? Advocates say yes, and according to the polling, Californians really support this, but the stumbling block is anti-immigrant ideology. If you want to help, see http://www.100percentcampaign.org/

3. Will the governor be able to provide high-quality, comprehensive health care to all Californians without raising taxes? (Hint: the answer to this one is: No. Even if he increases the number of Californians with “health insurance,” I’m sure you know that many health insurance policies leave people stranded a lot of the time—oh, we don’t cover that.)
Many people favor a requirement that employers pay for health insurance. But what happens when you change jobs or are unemployed for a while? And who’s going to guarantee that the health insurance they provide will cover the care you need?
The follow-up question is: Will advocates for children and families finally add their voices to the movement for a nonprofit, single-payer health care system that includes everyone, set up by the state? A nonpartisan think tank commissioned by the legislature found that such a system could provide high-quality, comprehensive care for everyone in the state for less money than we now spend on our inadequate non-system of health care.

4, What’s going to happen to the families on CalWORKs?!?!
* The state is under increased pressure from the feds to make them get jobs.
* The governor wants to deny them cost of living increases and take away the whole grant, not just the parent’s share, if the parent violates a CalWORKs rule.
* On the plus side, California has done a good job so far in protecting support services like job training and counseling.
More questions:
* As many CalWORKs parents struggle with homelessness, limited English skills, lack of job skills, domestic violence, depression, substance abuse, etc.— the reasons they went on welfare in the first place -- is increased pressure really what will enable them to support their families?
* If more parents are pushed to go to work, will the state increase the amount of child care available for their kids?

Stay tuned! And watch the Children's Advocate for updates on these and other issues. www.4children.org