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"We understand what it will take to secure a strong, growing economy, offering the hope of opportunity and prosperity to every American," said Linda Tarr-Whelan, President and CEO of the Center for Policy Alternatives that has been the catalyst and coordinator of this nationwide challenge. "To sustain our economy, support our families, and strengthen our communities, we must recognize and invest in the economic power and priorities of women," continued Tarr-Whelan, who also serves as U.S. Representative to the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women. "We want to provide a proactive policy agenda for the new legislative sessions and offer strategies for change in the public and private sectors."

In news conferences in state capitol buildings across the country, women lawmakers, community leaders and business people are announcing specific plans to enact the agenda through a variety of legislative initiatives in 1999 state legislatures. Events are being conducted in 20 states: Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Washington, and West Virginia. (Click here to see a complete list of state activities.) State activites include:

• MASSACHUSETTS – in Boston, the Massachusetts Statewide Legislative Network will issue the Challenge, cosponsor a forum with key women legislators at the capitol and focus on two bills proposing options for paid family and medical leave.
  
• GEORGIA -- in Atlanta, Senator Connie Stokes, Senator Donzella James, and Representative Nan Grogan Orrock and other legislators will announce a comprehensive program including a living wage, funding for a women's business center, education, and health care.
  
• TEXAS – in Austin, State Representatives Vilma Luna and Dora Olivo, along with Diane Stewart of the Center for Public Policy Priorities, will outline a legislative agenda that encompasses education and job training, access to capital for women entrepreneurs and access to quality childcare and after school care.
• WASHINGTON – in Olympia, a bipartisan group of legislators and a coalition of community activists will announce an agenda cutting across the areas of economic self-sufficiency; entrepreneurship; health and security; and family and work.

"Our Challenge to Secure America’s Future is a challenge to every one of us to take action as we can to ensure that women are full players in our economic future. This is the beginning of a new, sustained effort to change our policies, our way of thinking and our future," said Tarr-Whelan, noting that women currently make 80 percent of all consumer purchasing decisions and women-owned businesses are among the fastest growing sectors of our economy.

The Challenge to Secure America’s Future, to lawmakers, policy makers, community leaders, and others, is straightforward:

• Endorse an economic agenda to secure America’s economic future by securing for women economic self-sufficiency, the opportunity for entrepreneurship, health and security, and a balance between family and work;
• Enact that agenda to close the gap between women’s real economic power and unrealized economic potential;
• Ensure this agenda becomes real to change and improve the lives of American women, their families, and their future.

"We issue this challenge believing we must, through our actions and our public policy, put our values to work demonstrating that we understand what it will take to secure a strong, growing economy, offering the hope of opportunity and prosperity to every American," said Tarr-Whelan. "We want to provide a proactive policy agenda for the new legislative sessions and offer strategies.

The Challenge to Secure America’s Economic Future finds its roots in the work of the Center For Policy Alternatives, one of America’s leading nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy and leadership development centers and its groundbreaking economic plan: America’s Economic Agenda: Women’s Voices for Solutions.

The Center for Policy Alternatives has worked for more than two decades to identify and address the concerns of American women. America’s Economic Agenda: Women’s Voices for Solutions, completed in April 1998, reflects the ideas and work of more than 100 women leaders participating in the April 1997 Women’s Economic Leadership Summit cosponsored by CPA and the White House.

The report’s four major pillars reflect the major challenges policy makers and others must face:

• Economic Self Sufficiency – Helping women achieve economic self-sufficiency through, among other things, equal pay, pensions and benefits;
• Entrepreneurship – Opening doors to entrepreneurship for women by increasing the pool of available credit and financing and increasing opportunities in procurement and contracting;
• Health Care and Security – Ensuring affordable, quality health care and security for women;
• Work and Family – Easing the struggle women face between family and work with flexible, affordable resources to support families with child care and elder care and family-friendly workplaces with flexible work options.