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The Mississippi Women’s Security Initiative’s Leadership Team will announce its plans to create an economic security policy agenda for the state’s most vulnerable women on Wednesday, May 27, 2015 at 11 a.m. at the state capitol.

The MWESI is a ground-breaking collective of advocacy groups, elected officials and other leaders, including the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, MS Center for Justice, Chancery Court Judge Denise Owens and Rep. Sonya Williams-Barnes, committed to positively impacting the lives of women. About 67% of the households in Mississippi are headed by women. Nearly 45% of those live below the poverty level. The MWESI Leadership Team wants to change that.

The initiative is led by Mississippi Low Income Child Care Initiative, an advocacy organization that works to ensure quality, affordable child care for struggling families across the state. MLICCI is expanding into areas beyond child care because its staff realizes that the women who most need affordable child care also have many other critical needs – affordable housing, livable wage-paying jobs and reliable transportation.

“They need a boat load of things to improve the quality of their lives that are higher on the list than child care,” said Carol Burnett, MLICCI’s executive director. “So we are excited to partner with organizations and groups that want to create this policy agenda to address those issues.”

Mississippi is among a growing number of states creating women’s economic security policy agendas to highlight issues like gender gap in pay, the intersectionality of race and gender for women of color, as well as health and child care, housing and domestic violence.

“This is something Mississippi has needed for a long time,” said Cassandra Welchlin, coordinator of the Making Mississippi Women Secure Campaign. “Because we are the poorest state, because our workers don’t have unions and because our women are stuck in the lowest paying jobs, we have to try to impact the policies that keep them from achieving economic security.”

Among the speakers at the MWESI launch will be State Rep. Alyce Clarke and State Sen. Deborah Dawkins. “Everybody is so excited about this,” said Welchlin. “Rep. (Bennie) Thompson wants to be part of it. Sen (Thad) Cochran said he will support it. Everyone we talk to wants to help. And we need everybody to get on board.”

To discover what Mississippi women’s most crucial needs are, the MWESI Leadership Team will hold Town Talks across the state. The team is reaching out to include the diverse women who make up the state, including Hispanics, Vietnamese and Native Americans. More Town Talks are being planned, but following is a list of those scheduled:

The findings of the Town Talks will be announced on October 10, 2015, at the Mississippi Women’s Economic Security Summit to be held at the Jackson Convention Center. Anita Hill, an internationally known law professor and fierce advocate for women, will give the keynote address. “We are so excited about having Professor Hill involved with this initiative,” Welchlin said. “She has done a lot of work around women’s issues.”

• May 30 – Jackson, MS—Metro Center Mall Events Center – 10 a.m. to noon; child care and lunch will be provided for those who RSVP to cwelchlin@mschildcare.org or 601 750 8388.
• June 13—- Indianola, MS—INFB, 702 Roosevelt Street, Indianola MS; noon to 2 p.m.; lunch and child care will be provided for those who RSVP to cwelchlin@mschildcare.org or 601 750 8388.
• August 8, 2015—Biloxi, MS—Moore Community House, 684 Walker Street, Biloxi, MS; lunch and child care will be provided for those who RSVP to Katie Pryor at kpryor@umcmission.org or 214-864-8324.

Also at the summit, discussions will begin about how information from the Town Talks can be turned into legislation for consideration during the 2016 Mississippi legislative session. “That is when we will be asking people to call their legislators,” Burnett says. “We want them to support the legislation that comes out of the Town Talks.”

To emphasize the critical civic engagement part of the MWES Initiative, voter registration drives will be held at each Town Talk.

The MWESI is funded by the Ms. Foundation for Women, the Groundswell Fund, the Foundation for a Just Society, the Marguerite Casey Foundation and the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. Other national partners include Center for American Progress and Wider Opportunities for Women.

For more information, please contact Carole Cannon at CaroleCannon@Bellsouth.net or 601 421 7517.