Women’s Equity Plan
My Women’s Equity Plan
As Mayor, I commit to supporting the women of New York City through every stage of their lives. My administration will:
Start uplifting girls from a young age to ensure a lifetime of independence.
By investing in workforce development training and mentorship for girls starting in high school, we can set up women to pursue careers in high-paying professions and male-dominated workforces. As Mayor, I’ll start by:
Supporting the expansion of STEM programming in public school curriculum
Through programs such as Ignite and the New York Women’s Foundation, working to implement programs in middle and high schools to get girls politically involved and socially engaged in their communities
Making NYC community colleges (CUNY) free for those who need it
Expanding our Summer Youth Employment Program and ensuring girls get placed in work opportunities across a wide range of industries
Expand programs for early-career women in the arts through the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment
Listening to our students: I will create a girls’ council who can provide ideas, feedback, and programs to the Mayor’s office directly, ensuring that they know their voices are heard
Through these measures and more, City Hall will ensure that young women in NYC have a strong educational foundation, and then are able to continue their education without the risk of not being able to afford it. We must prioritize our students to become our city’s future leaders.
2. Support women through abusive situations, reform how they are treated while interacting with the police, and how they are treated in correctional facilities.
Address Causes of Violence Through Community Health
We can’t just think about how to help women after violence has been committed against them; we have to try to stop violence against women in the first place. My policy positions on everything from housing, to small businesses, to affordability and food insecurity, education, and more will help create healthier communities. These healthier communities will be able to better address causes of abuse and violence by reducing societal stress.
Additionally, my City Hall will partner with communities, CBOs, and non-profits (including increasing funding and other support to them) to address violence against women with the individual needs of each community in mind.
Reporting Gender-Based Crimes
Police have a long history of mishandling hate crimes against women, including incidents of racial, sexual, and domestic violence. With the NYPD responding to over 200,000 domestic violence incidents each year, we must introduce understanding, respect, and humanity into our justice system so that women feel safe and supported when reporting violence of any kind. See my policing platform for how I will reform the NYPD, so that for non-violent incidents, we’re sending social workers, de-escalation experts, and domestic violence experts instead of armed police officers who can escalate violence.
As Mayor, I will have the power to appoint a police commissioner who pledges to fix the broken reporting system that we currently have, and will use the power of the Mayor’s office to work with District Attorneys to extend these measures to their offices as well. These measures include:
Mandatory sensitivity training for police officers, ADAs, and any officials who handle victims of gender-based and sexual violence, including how this violence intersects with race, sexual identity, language barrier, immigration status, and disability
Instituting a “Know Your Rights” intake process, in which victims are educated on the criminal & civil justice systems and are informed of their rights and legal options before they are asked to make any formal reports - in their preferred language
Expansion and better marketing and management of the Office of Victims’ Services to support victims of gender-based violence, ensuring that victims know about this service on the same day they report their case to the police
Building a system to manage complaints against police officers, ADAs, and any officials who mishandle domestic violence or sexual violence cases
I will work with the DA’s office to implement a system where victims of gender-based violence can request a new ADA or detective be assigned to their case, if they don’t feel the one assigned to them is handling their case appropriately
Resources for Women Facing Abuse
The existing Mayor’s Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence, which is currently closed due to the pandemic, must be reopened. Then, the assistance that it currently provides must be increased drastically by hiring more counselors, legal aid, and resources for safety. The City must also take responsibility to expand and better equip our women’s shelters in order to meet the needs of the city, and must have stronger oversight measures to prevent abuse while women and children stay in these shelters.
Reforming Our Broken Criminal Justice System
See here for my detailed policing & public safety policy. I am a proponent of closing Rikers Island and not building any additional prisons. As Mayor, I will also support and advocate for the decriminalization of sex work.
Prison must be a safe place for women. I will work with organizations like the Women’s Prison Association and the Women’s Community Justice Association in order to move women out of large prisons like Rikers and into community-based housing and smaller, restorative centers. This includes:
Closing Rikers.
Building better conditions for women who remain incarcerated:
Immediately instituting a zero-tolerance policy for abuse of any kind in our carceral system, from both inmates and corrections employees
Providing comprehensive legal counsel & mental health care for incarcerated women who are victims of rape and abuse
Providing adequate educational resources for women in prison to help them obtain their GEDs or learn marketable job skills
Putting in place a system for women in prison to report sexual abuse and rape at the hands of fellow inmates or corrections officers, and mental health resources given to those women when faced with those circumstances
3. Make City Hall a workplace environment that supports and includes women from all walks of life, ensuring family supportive workplaces, protecting against discrimination in hiring, firing, and pay, and curating a safe space for women in all working environments.
Whether through government or private sector jobs, the discriminatory working conditions and pay that women receive is no longer acceptable. In 2019, women were earning only 83% of weekly wages that their male counterparts were making.
On top of this, we are now over a year into a deadly pandemic where women and minorities have been hit the hardest by unemployment and the need for caregiving. 3 million women have left the workforce since the COVID shutdown, while more have been forced out due to cutbacks. My City Hall will commit to complete gender equity, and commit to transparency to ensure we’re held accountable, including:
Taking a cue from Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, I will work to implement a system, similar to MyVoiceLA, for government workers in any office to be able to submit tips, anonymously or not, and to provide these victims with resources such as information regarding their rights and possible next steps.
An annual audit of pay of all City employees to ensure equal pay, and to right the wrongs where we discover women were not receiving equal pay
I will commit to at least 50% of Mayoral appointments to leadership positions being women.
I will commit to appointing a woman as Police Commissioner.
4. Lead by example and hold City vendors accountable to the same standards as I hold City Hall.
I’ll do everything in the City’s power to hold the private sector accountable for gender inequity as well. The Mayor’s Office of Minority and Women-owned Business Enterprises needs to be revamped and refocused to support women and minorities who want to pursue the American dream and start their own businesses. While the creation of this office was a step in the right direction, it has failed to meet its objectives. I will reboot the system to:
Run on a user-friendly website where women & minority business owners can register and share resources and information. See my Reboot City Hall policy to read more on how I’ll revamp the City’s technological infrastructure
Build an Entrepreneur Corps of business leaders to create mentorship programs for women business owners in topics such as marketing, managing, etc. for women to gain more literacy into the business world and gain the tools necessary to create their businesses in this community.
Streamline the process of permits, inspections, & licenses to make New York City the best place to start a business.
Create new business incubators for startup entrepreneurs to streamline the process of starting, obtaining permits and qualifying for MWBE status and to provide technical assistance to promote business survival and sustainability.
Hire new Procurement Officers in order to streamline the process for women-owned businesses in New York City to be brought into the City’s vendor system. With work contracted by the City, it will be easier for women to advance their businesses.
In addition to holding businesses accountable, the City should also provide support to businesses -- especially small businesses and women & minority-owned businesses -- to help them get back on their feet post-COVID equitably.
While many have been left hurting over the last year, there were 10% fewer BIPOC women employed in the workforce. As BIPOC women are more likely employed in the service, hospitality, and leisure industries, they were hit hard by the pandemic as they were no longer able to perform this labor. We now need to pick up these pieces and create more of a safety net for these vulnerable communities, such as an endorsement for raising the minimum wage, expanding NY’s paid leave for family and sick days, and universal childcare. In addition, we need to implement financial literacy programs and work programs aimed at raising women out of poverty and welfare.
I have endorsed the Marshall Plan for Moms at the federal level. To read how I’d bring further support women in the workplace, see my policies on:
Small business support: making NYC the best place to start and run your own business
5. Continue to support women’s healthcare initiatives, including contraception and abortions, and ensure equal access to medical care for women of all races, religions, and across the gender spectrum.
During the 2018 midterms, I was one of the local political supporters on the ground fighting to vote the IDC out of the New York State Senate, an essential step to ensure we could pass the Reproductive Health Act and provide contraceptive care in our state. I’m proud to say I supported successful women candidates like Alessandra Biaggi and Jessica Ramos, so that they could go on to truly make our Senate progressive. New York State’s Reproductive Health Act passed as a direct result.
Women deserve the right to choose if and when they bring another human being into this world with their own bodies. It is essential for us to use our platform to support pro-choice and pro-contraceptive care legislation, doing whatever we can to ensure that our legislative bodies pass and protect reproductive rights.
For City employees specifically, I will re-bid the current health insurance plans for City employees. We will ensure that public health institutions are properly funded, allocating resources towards abortions, contraceptive care, prenatal and maternity care, and women’s overall health.
There are further measures we can take to ensure protection, support, and effective medical attention for women:
Increase the number of community-based health centers, with an emphasis on providing services to women with disabilities and undocumented women
Defund anti-choice facilities that spread misinformation and cause harm to pregnant people
Provide protection for pregnant people and medical providers from anti-choice supporters and protesters at abortion clinics
Advocate for more accurate, informative, and inclusive sex education programs in our schools
Make contraceptive, maternity/pre-natal, and abortion care options available for immigrants, refugees, and undocumented people, in their communities and languages
Invest in growing women’s health & maternity programs at all public health centers and hospitals
Support access to proper healthcare for ALL women, ensuring that BIPOC women and LGBTQIA+ women, including trans women and nonbinary people, are properly and fairly provided for without discrimination
6. For far too long, Black women have been dying at disproportionate rates during childbirth and have faced unconscionable discrimination from our healthcare system.
Our city must count the data on racial disparities in our health system, especially for black women. The maternal mortality rate and race disparities in maternity care are a disgrace -- my administration will not stand for it, and will work with the City’s health institutions to identify the problems causing this disparity and fix them, with a data-driven approach to pinpoint problems and measure success at solving the problems. As my administration implements Universal Childcare, I will seek to extend this from early childhood care to prenatal care for mothers. Additionally, my City Hall will:
Use data to locate the areas where we have the highest rates of maternal mortality, children born prematurely, pregnancy complications, and complaints about maternity ward service
Create a team under the DOH that will investigate and plan for solutions
Provide funding to support the recommended solutions, including:
Expanding access to holistic maternal care, such as doulas & midwives
Build Birthing Centers separate from hospitals to quickly increase the amount of care available
Support midwife & doula training programs at CUNY and other public institutions