Provide a Voice for Women Who Were Directly A

For more than two decades, Mothers for Justice has been a strong collective voice for low-income women seeking to improve their lives and communities. Now the grassroots advocacy group is developing the next generation of leaders.

Mother’s for Justice is providing free advocacy training for change for young women ages 15 – 19 years old. The kick-off is this Thursday and the program provides dinner and a stipend for interested young women.

“We hear that too many young women don’t have strong role models,” says Merryl Eaton director of director of advocacy and education for Christian Community Action, which sponsors Mothers for Justice. “We envision that if this diverse group of girls can learn from each other and become friends, they will be a shining example for the rest of us.”

Mothers for Justice was founded in 1993 empower local women to influence policies that affect them. The group provides training to members and galvanizes public testimony and rallies at the state legislature on issues including welfare reform, prison re-entry, housing, healthcare and domestic violence.

provide a voice for women who were directly a

Mothers for Justice is a grassroots advocacy group that organizes, trains, and mobilizes women living in poverty to be civically engaged, to speak out on social justice issues in order to bring about positive change and transformation in their community. Our work is rooted in the first-hand experiences of the women and our personal knowledge of the community. We help women to find their individual and collective voices so that they can exert pressure on policy and decision makers to implement solutions that help move people out of poverty and into self-sufficiency.

Thursdays 5:00–7:30pm October 13th 20th 27th

Nov. 3.rd 10th

We will have dinner together. Class will start at 5:30pm

Mothers for Justice is a grass-roots women's advocacy group who are seeking to support each other and empower themselves and their families in order to improve their lives and their communities. Mothers for Justice was founded in 1993 and is dedicated to using their collective voice to change the systems that perpetuate poverty and injustice. Our issues and concerns are Welfare Reform, Prison Re-entry, Housing, Healthcare & Domestic Violence among many other things.

Monthly meetings are held on the fourth Wednesday evening of the month at 660 Winchester Avenue, New Haven, CT 06511 from 5:30pm-7:00pm. Childcare and transportation are available.

Christian Community Action –to provide advocacy training and mentoring for young women poised to take on leadership of the renownedMothers For Justiceprogram advocating for low income women and their families.

Mothers for Justice's ability to train new advocates is based on twenty two years of success as a grassroots advocacy group. They are the most long standing, consistent and visible grassroots voice of women whose incomes are low in Connecticut. Their opinions and recommendations are sought out by state level advocacy groups like End Hunger Connecticut and Connecticut Association for Human Services. T

Proving that perseverance pays off, Mothers for Justice (MFJ), an advocacy group supported by Christian Community Action, Inc., helped ensure the passing of SB 106, “An Act Concerning Improving Employment Opportunities Through Education and Ensuring Safe School Climates.” After more than two years of tireless advocacy work by the Mothers and their partners, the new law, allows women in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program to seek training and education in order to improve their employment potential. Prior to the change, working toward a GED or college degree was not counted as eligible work credits for those receiving temporary assistance, making it nearly impossible to move out of poverty. Women were forced to abandon furthering their education — an important means to maximizing earning potential and workplace success.

The Community Fund for Women & Girls, a component fund of The Community FoundationforGreater New Haven,began funding Christian Community Action’s work to teach advocacy skills back in 2008. In 2010, a $10,000 grant from the Fund allowed MFJ to create their powerful teaching tool,Living in a Broken System, a documentary short

Monthly meetings are held on the fourth Wednesday evening of the month at 660 Winchester Avenue, New Haven, CT 06511 from 5:30pm-7:00pm. Childcare and transportation are available.

Advocacy training for change.

Meryl Eaton

Working FB and email connections

To try to get girls

Facilitator training

In grassroots adovacy group. To improve

Seek out opportunities to speak out against

MFJ

Was very involved in passing bill, TANF could go to school as a work activity. Rac in CT

Worked to ban the box.

After a long hard puhsh helped get bill passed that if you have a restraitng order you have to hand in gun.

Organizes trains and mobilizing members to advocate for change.

First thing we do

Membership of group is 35 women and men. We might end up bgciomg mothers and others for justice.

We talk to people about issues important tot hem. One person interested in food insecurity issues.

If you have the passion and commitment let’s bring it up at planning

We are not issue specific. We engage pe

Then provide some knd of training. 1) how to tell your story.

Train the trainer for the women

Patrent leadership traingnn

Peo9ple empowereingpeop,le.

2 hur session to 20 week class.

What we are best known for I sthe personal epxperiecnes of group members.

Almowst every meme of the group is paying a high percetnatf of their income for rent. They talk about their

80% of income for rent. That means they can’t buy heahtly foods, they can’t fix the breaks on their car.

We want to give legistlators story of that and titighat

Data and story.

1400/

State level advocacy. We work very very hard with New haven delegates.

Testify. Speak at press confercne. Meeting with legislatweor. Invite leg to have breakfast with members fo the group

We want to have an impact so we have a specific ask. We come up with solutions. Strong partnerships wthoruhg the state wth the data collection. We just met with housing commistion Yvonne klein.

We had an idea. She said it’s a great idea, so

We specifically set legislative agendas. Becaseufo the very tight budget we are looking to say what else is a good use of our times and skills.

Not a redquir

We hope that once people become empowered they spread out in NH community they sit on school cou8ncisl.

We heerea that too many young women don’t have strong role models.Issues with violence.

They

Orgnaizignafournd more teachers of color at Amistad. We would love to be helpful in how to have voice heard.

The work that we do looks at con

First level: daughers of mfj mothers and girls living in CCA transition housing program.

The more diverse voices the

Reaching out to Foote School

Islamic

Rabiinc council

We want to broaden it. We envision that if this diverse group of girlsanc learn from each 0other and become friencs. That would be a shining example for the rest of us.

For most of history alamostentirerely black low income women. Now a male SCSU social work

Welfrar reform is his passion. He knows it from an acaemdin point of you and he’s become an important member.

MFj

All day poverty simulation with

Show our documentary. We participate in the

And rem

It’s not just data it’s pepel.

JF has seen the passions and chanlleng

Offer support to raise up a new generation of voices for change. We also understand they have th3eir own issues. We would be pleased to see them bigna effective advocates for their own isseus.

One o fhte big things is jobs,

College tuition

Go to Gateway and

One woman whose sun got a full scholarship to Q andhad to drop out because ehe didn’t hav e a computer and

$1,500

First gnat i

Rarely able to go right through. Drop out or help families.

At one point nH had a lot of jobs in the summer for teens. That money has become

Violence: we had someone come in to talk about. How many people in the room have seen gun violenc.eAll hands went up.

How many have been d

New Haven is a small community. We would check in with each other on a Monday mrngin.

MFJ is much more about coming up with solutions. There are enough people poingin out the problems. Sometimes you need to give a man fish. Then you need to teach a man to fish. We need to change the wate that these fish are livint in.

That’s whe

Looking into inclusionary zoning. When developer comes in and wants to build a 40 unit building. City can say, we’ll let you build 45 but 10 need to be affordable. That has had a lot

Mfj as we start to build this affordable housing coalition, we need strong parnters.

How are the nurses affording NH. How are the teachers

We complained about it long enough. We have the data. Worse heath outcomes with high rents.

We need other people and other orgs who uncerstanddevelpmetn to stand beside us.

Small group.

Looking for partner.

We have found the combination of story and data. Data specifically around the hidden cost of children growing up in poverty.

We have somebody, shared her story. She had a son with gang active. Husband abusing her pys and ssexua

We came up with a figure of what it would cost the state to take care ofthis family. Cliffor Beers,

Using existing community resources.

Dcf. Showed up .took kids. Coordinator said get an exteruminator. Got kids into therab

Got abusive partner in

Got her a ged.

We showed cost. $1000

Our stories

People make assumptiongs about people living in poverty hat are so unfair. But we like

And persistence and good relationshiops.T’ony walker trusts these women. She’s the one who can say I’m going

Stipend. We want the people who are truly interested.