Home Blog Page 5056

States Struggle to Close Their Own Gender Pay Gaps

0

States Struggle to Close Their Own Gender Pay Gaps

Stateline News by Teresa Wiltz

California has the most stringent equal pay laws in the nation. But among its own workers, the state is still struggling to close the pay gap between men and women.

Women who work for the state earn 79 cents for every dollar that men earn, according to a 2014 report by the California Department of Human Resources. That’s a wider gap than that faced by women who work in the private sector or for the federal government in the state.

California isn’t alone. While nationwide data is not available, male state workers earn more than their female counterparts in many states, including Idaho, Maryland and Texas.

An assessment last year by the online salary data firm PayScale listed the gender pay gap in public administration the fourth-highest among 21 professions and industries across the economy, with women making less than 75 percent of what men make — an average of $16,900 less. The gap in public administration trailed only finance and insurance, professional services and mining.

Many cities, including Alexandria, Virginia, New Orleans and Sacramento, have spotted the gap and tried to address it, just as some states have.

Late last year, the California Senate gave 10 percent raises to 71 state employees in an effort to address disparities in pay between male and female workers employed in the state Legislature.

In January, lawmakers in South Carolina — where women who work for the state earn 87 percent of what men earn — introduced a bill that would guarantee equal pay for equal work and prohibit gender discrimination for private sector and state employees. In Missouri and New York, lawmakers have introduced legislation that would commission studies of wage disparities among state workers.

In Minnesota, which has tried for decades to address the issue, Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton announced plans in November to grant state employees up to six weeks’ paid parental leave. The plan applies to all workers, but Edwin Hudson, deputy commissioner of the state’s management and budget office, said because women often lose wages when they take time off to care for children, it could help close the wage gap. Women in Minnesota state government earn 89 percent of men’s wages on average, up from 69 percent in 1976.

In general, state jobs around the country are subject to stringent transparency rules, anti-discrimination laws and standardized pay rates. Despite these safeguards, disparities at the state level persist, though they are generally smaller than the pay gap in the private sector.

Advocates for women such as Kate Nielsen, state policy analyst for the American Association of University Women (AAUW), said “occupational segregation” is partially to blame.

“We need to look for ways to support women in nontraditional jobs and overcome implicit bias to make sure that women are being hired at all levels,” Nielsen said.

For women to break into male-dominated fields in the state workforce, states need to step up recruitment efforts and work to ensure that entrance exams are not biased, said Ariane Hegewisch, the program director for employment and earnings at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, which focuses on policies that affect women.

And once they’re on the job, women need to be protected from sexual harassment and discrimination, Hegewisch said. “Even if women get into these jobs, they may not decide to stay.”

Women typically need more accommodating work arrangements, such as flex-time or telecommuting, to handle family obligations. As a result, Minnesota’s Hudson said, they often gravitate to lower-paying occupations that make it easier to meet the obligations. To close the gender gap among state workers, lawmakers need to pass flex-time legislation, Hudson said. Some jobs dictate strict schedules, but state government has to be creative, he said.

“We’re going to have to be more competitive, particularly as the labor market shrinks,” Hudson said.

Flurry of Legislation
Nationwide, women experience a persistent pay gap in the public and private sector, earning 80 percent of what men do. For women of color, the gap is even larger. At the current rate of wage growth, the AAUW projects that women will not reach pay equity with men until 2152.

In the absence of legislation by the U.S. Congress, bills to address the gender pay gap have been introduced this year in at least 18 states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Typically, equal pay legislation covers both private and public sector employees, the AAUW’s Nielsen said. One exception is Louisiana, whose equal pay law protects just public sector employees, who account for 6 percent of the workforce in the state.

And it seems to be effective. Women who work in Louisiana’s private sector earn 57 cents for every dollar men earn, while women working for the state earn 78 cents for every dollar their male counterparts make.

Louisiana lawmakers introduced legislation this year that would amend the state’s 1950 pay protection law to include private sector employees. It also would require government contractors to verify equal pay practices.

In Texas, women and minorities working for the state consistently earn less than white men — a gap that has grown over the past decade, according to data analysis by The Dallas Morning News.

And in Maryland, an investigation last year by The Washington Post found that the pay gap among state employees was largest in Republican Gov. Larry Hogan’s office, where men hold more senior positions and women earn 68 percent of what men earn.

The wage gap among Maryland state workers “tells me that there is still some discrimination out there,” said Maryland state Sen. Susan Lee, a Democrat who sponsored a 2016 law aimed at combating the gender pay gap in the state and proposed a related bill this year. “Any kind of pay gap is not only unequal, it’s unacceptable.”

State Efforts
In the 1970s and ’80s, many states made a concerted effort to tackle pay inequities between male and female government workers. They required employers in the public and private sector to pay men and women equal pay for the same work.

By 1989, 20 states had implemented programs to boost the pay of lower-paid female government workers. These programs are no longer in place, but a 1994 study by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research and the Urban Institute found that the pay adjustments helped close the gap among state workers. Another 23 states had studied their wage gaps by the early ’90s.

Today, a Minnesota commission monitors wages for state and local employees and reports on pay inequities to the Legislature every two years. According to a 2016 report by the state, an 11 percent wage gap persists among state workers largely because women are clustered at the lower end of the wage spectrum. The study found that if office, clerical and skilled craft jobs were held equally by men and women, the wage gap would decrease from 11 to 2 percent.

California has several steps in place to try to prevent the wage gap between men and women. For example, the state outlines specific job classifications with corresponding pay rates for state workers, according to Joe DeAnda of the California Department of Human Resources. The state’s merit-pay system is also codified, with a specified range of pay raises. Sometimes this can work against managers seeking to remedy pay disparities. But it also means that managers can’t give male employees bigger raises, he said.

Nationwide, the pay gap persists for a complex variety of reasons, from the stubbornness of the “pink collar ghetto” to “mommy tracking” to the fact that men typically occupy more senior positions in state government, equal pay advocates say.

In short: Men and women continue to do different work — a phenomenon that plays out in state workforces around the country. In California, for example, the 20 percent pay gap persists partly because women work in lower-paying, clerical jobs, while men overwhelmingly work in male-dominated fields such as engineering, state police and fire departments, DeAnda says.

“We’ve got more men in the higher-paying job classifications,” DeAnda said. “For the state, our job is to encourage more women to seek those higher-paying jobs.”

The size of California’s pay gap has been decreasing, and DeAnda said he expects the state to continue to see improvements. But, he said, “this is a process that will take time, and perhaps require structural changes [i.e. legislation], to ultimately close the gap.”

In its 2014 report, California’s Department of Human Resources recommended that state agencies step up efforts to recruit women, increase internships and job-shadowing opportunities for women, increase career development and professional training opportunities, and improve leadership development and succession planning efforts so the next generation of female workers is ready to step into upper-level positions.

Closing the pay gap helps women and families to get ahead, said the AAUW’s Nielsen. And when states give female workers “a fair paycheck and a seat at the table, it means more women’s voices are represented, which means that there are more policies that will represent the population,” Nielsen said.

To close the gap, states need to first do an audit, looking at pay and gender department by department, job by job, and ferret out what’s causing the inequities, said Emily Martin of the National Women’s Law Center, which advocates for legal and public policies that benefit women and families.

“Only then can you close the gap,” Martin said.

High Court Reverses Termination Of Father’s Parental Rights

0

High Court Reverses Termination Of Father’s Parental Rights

Olivia Covington for www.theindianalawyer.com

A Montgomery County father’s parental rights have been restored after the Indiana Supreme Court held Friday that lower courts erred in granting and affirming the Department of Child Services’ petition to terminate them.

In the Matter of the Termination of the Parent-Child Relationship of Bi.B. And Br.B, D.B. and V.G. v. Indiana Department of Child Services,54S01-1612-JT-630, D.B. and V.G. had custody of five children – their two daughters together, Bi.B. and Br.B., and V.G.’s three sons from a prior relationship whose father had died. After the Indiana Department of Child Services learned that the parents were using methamphetamine and leaving their children unsupervised in a dirty home, the children were adjudicated as children in need of services and were eventually removed from the home in July 2014.

As a result of the children’s removal, V.G. and D.B. were ordered to participate in drug screenings, supervised visits and various other services, but their participation was only sporadic. DCS thus moved to terminate their parental rights in October 2015.

In its petition for termination, DCS alleged that two out of three statutorily required waiting periods applied – that is, a court has found that reasonable reunification efforts were not required, and the children had been removed from the parents and placed under other supervision for at least 15 out of the last 22 months. However, DCS did not argue that the last waiting period, which required that the children were removed from the parents for at least six months under a dispositional decree, applied to the case.

D.B., the father, argued that DCS had failed to prove the first two waiting periods and failed to allege the third, which could have actually been proven. Specifically, he said DCS filed the petition five days short of the 15-month anniversary of his daughters’ removal.

Despite that argument, the Montgomery Circuit Court granted the petition to termination his and V.G.’s parental rights. The Indiana Court of Appeals affirmed that decision in September 2016, finding that although neither of the waiting-period allegations were true, such error was harmless. The appellate court also found sufficient evidence to support the trial court’s decision.

Only D.B. sought transfer, and in a unanimous opinion handed down on Friday, the Indiana Supreme Court reversed the lower courts’ decisions to terminate his parental rights.

In an opinion authored by Chief Justice Loretta Rush, the state’s high court first noted that “the right of parents to raise their children is ‘perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests.’”

Under the plain language of Indiana Code 31-35-2-4(b)(2)(A) – which requires that the petition must allege that the 15-month basis “is,” not “will be,” true – the state legislature intended the 15-month waiting period to apply to the day when the petition is filed, as D.B. argued, not to the day of the evidentiary hearing, as DCS argued, Rush wrote.

Further, the statutory language holds that the petition “must” allege that at least one of the three waiting periods is true, Rush said. Thus, because DCS did not allege the six-month waiting period, the only one that could have been proven true, its petition for termination of D.B.’s rights fails, the chief justice said.

Finally, Rush wrote that state statute holds that “if the court does not finds that the allegations in the petition are true, the court shall dismiss the petition.”

“Like ‘must,’ ‘shall’ is mandatory, and we cannot engraft qualifying language onto that directive,” she said.

However, because V.G. did not seek transfer, Rush wrote in a footnote that the court summarily affirmed the Court of Appeals’ disposition as to her, though not its reasoning.

Consumer Alert from the Office of the Indiana Attorney General

0

The Consumer Protection Division (CPD) of the Office of the Indiana Attorney General on Feb. 10 was notified of an attempted W-2 phishing scam that targeted a central Indiana school corporation.

A complainant notified the CPD that a staff member at a central Indiana school corporation received an email that appeared to be from the corporation’s superintendent requesting copies of employee W-2 records – a telltale sign of a recent scam that is targeting businesses, schools, hospitals and nonprofits across the country. The complainant told the CPD that the staff member checked with the superintendent and confirmed that the email was fraudulent.

Cybercriminals, or scammers, will make their personal emails appear as if they are sent from a high-ranking employee at the targeted business or other entity. The email, which requests names of each employee and their Form W-2, is sent to someone in a business, organization or corporation’s human resources or accounting department. If successful, the scammer is able to collect sensitive personal information of each employee.

If you work for a company that has been compromised by such a scam, the Office of the Indiana Attorney General encourages you to sign up for a credit freeze to protect yourself from becoming a victim of identity theft. Hoosiers can visit the Attorney General’s Consumer Protection Division for more information. You can also fill out an Identity Theft Complaint Form. Contact us at 1-800-382-5516 to speak to a consumer staff member who can help you in obtaining an Identity Theft Affidavit Form 14039, which can be submitted to the IRS if you are a victim of tax fraud. You can also call the Do Not Call Hotline at 1-888-834-9969 for number registration and to file complaints.

Air Quality Forecast For Vanderburgh County

0

Air quality forecasts for Evansville and Vanderburgh County are provided as a public service.  They are best estimates of predicted pollution levels that can be used as a guide so people can modify their activities and reduce their exposure to air quality conditions that may affect their health.  The forecasts are routinely made available at least a day in advance, and are posted by 10:30 AM Evansville time on Monday (for Tuesday through Thursday) and Thursday (for Friday through Monday).  When atmospheric conditions are uncertain or favor pollution levels above the National Ambient Air Quality Standards, forecasts are made on a daily basis.

Ozone forecasts are available from mid-April through September 30th.  Fine particulate (PM2.5) forecasts are available year round.

Friday

February 17

Saturday
February 18
Sunday
February 19
Monday
February 20
Tuesday
February 21
Fine Particulate
(0-23 CST avg)
Air Quality Index
moderate moderate moderate moderate NA*
Ozone
Air Quality Index
NA* NA* NA* NA* NA*
Ozone
(peak 8-hr avg)
(expected)
NA* NA* NA* NA* NA*

* Not Available and/or Conditions Uncertain.

Air Quality Action Days

Ozone Alerts are issued by the Evansville EPA when maximum ozone readings averaged over a period of eight hours are forecasted to reach 71 parts per billion (ppb), or unhealthy for sensitive groups on the USEPA Air Quality Index scale.

Particulate Alerts are issued by the Evansville EPA when PM2.5 readings averaged over the period of midnight to midnight are forecasted to reach 35 micrograms per meter cubed (µg/m3).

Current conditions of OZONE and FINE PARTICULATE MATTER are available in near real-time on the Indiana Department of Environment Management’s website.

National and regional maps of current conditions are available through USEPA AIRNow.

Adopt A Pet

0

Betty is a female American Fuzzy Lop rabbit. She’s about 1 ½ years old. She has the typical bunny story: purchased online, and then someone realized that bunnies live 10+ years and can be a lot of work. Betty is a sweet & soft bunny seeking an indoor-only permanent home. Her $30 adoption fee includes her spay and cardboard carrier. Contact the Vanderburgh Humane Society at (812) 426-2563 or adoptions@vhslifesaver.org for adoption details!

Women’s tennis set for three weekend matches

0

Aces on the road for two and home Sunday

 Three matches over the next two days are on tap for the University of Evansville women’s tennis team will be on the road Saturday before heading home on Sunday.

The weekend begins on Saturday at 10 a.m. as the Purple Aces take on Valparaiso at 10 a.m. in Niles, Mich. at the Lakeland Tennis Academy.  The Crusaders begin the weekend with an 0-4 mark following losses to Dayton and the University of Indianapolis last weekend.

From there, the Aces head south later in the day to Muncie, Ind. where they face Ball State at 5:15 p.m. ET.  The Cardinals stand at 5-2 with their lone losses coming to Cincinnati and North Carolina.

On Sunday, UE will be at Tri-State Athletic Club for a match against in-city rival USI.  That match will begin at 5 p.m.  The Screaming Eagles are 3-1.

Last time out, UE came just short of a big win at Indiana, losing by a final of 4-3.  Despite a tough start in doubles, the women were able to get it together in singles play, earning victories in flights 2, 4 and 6.  Leading the way in the second flight was freshman Diana Tkachenko.  She defeated the Hoosiers’ Caitlin Bernard, 6-1, 7-6 (7-4).

In the fourth flight, Andrea Pascual-Larrinaga defeated Alicia Robinson, 6-2, 6-3.  Andjela Brguljan helped the Aces earn the split in singles play with an exciting matchup in #6 singles. She earned the win over Emma Love, 4-7, 7-4 (10-8), 1-0 (10-8).

 

TAPS By Jim Redwine

0

Gavel Gamut

By Jim Redwine

www.jamesmredwine.com

(Week of 20 February 2017)

TAPS

I do not play the bugle so any veteran’s farewell from me must come in words. I wrote this tribute to Gene McCoy, Harold Cox and all Korean War Veterans in September 2005. When my friend Gene McCoy passed away February 12 (Lincoln’s birthday), I was reminded of his many years of service to the rest of us about which I had written twelve years ago. Gene told me then he appreciated the bon mots. Because he was such a considerate friend, I am confident he would say the same thing now.

AN UNKNOWN VICTORY

You name the WAR:

Two countries are created from one by the greatest military power in

the world and are monitored by the United Nations;

One country led by a ruthless dictator invades the other in spite of

the United Nations warnings not to;

The Secretary General of the United Nations declares, “This is a war

against the United Nations.”;

A United States President leads a coalition of world leaders to unite to

drive the invaders out and re-establish the status quo;

An American general was placed in charge of the United Nations

forces;

While many countries offered some help, the American military

provided more than half of a million personnel in the war;

The aggressors were driven out of and liberty was restored to the

invaded country; and

The mission for which Americans fought and died was accomplished.

If you said The Gulf War of 1990-1991, that is understandable.  Almost all Americans supported that war and recognized that victory.  However, I am talking about the Korean War of 1950-1953.  It too was a great victory for American and United Nations interests and helped prevent World War III.  We owe a huge debt to our Korean War veterans.

Two of those heroes (they just hate to be called that but, hey, it’s my column and facts are facts) are Posey County natives and brothers-in-law Harold Cox and Gene McCoy.

Harold fought with the U.S. Army’s 25th Division which suffered many casualties and bore much of the fighting in Korea.  Harold was an infantry rifleman and was the jeep driver for his company commander.

Gene was a combat engineer with the Army’s 84th Engineers Battalion and, also, served as a courier/mail deliverer.

Harold was on the frontlines and Gene was building wooden bridges about 1000 yards behind those lines.  Gene says Harold had it a lot rougher than Gene.

Both suffered the 20 below zero cold, the stifling heat and humidity, the loneliness, home sickness and fear in what those not there called a “police action.”

Harold said one of his worst memories, outside of dodging enemy mortar rounds for a solid year of combat, was the stench of the human waste the impoverished Koreans would save all winter and fertilize their rice paddies with in the spring.  Gene, also, mentioned that nauseating smell and the mud and flooding caused by the lack of vegetation due to constant shelling.

When Gene first arrived in Korea they put his outfit on a train which stopped frequently.  Each time it stopped the young soldiers were given a few rounds of ammunition and ordered out to guard the train from sabotage.  Gene said this initiation to Korea was more than a little unsettling.

Harold told me that the traffic signs in the war were a bit more to the point than those back home.  On one particularly dangerous stretch of road a sign advised:

“Get your ____ in gear and drive like ____!

The NK can see you.”

Harold paid attention.

Harold and Gene came home and re-started their lives.  Harold served as Mt. Vernon’s Water Superintendent for several years in the 1980’s and1990’s.  Gene served as a Mt. Vernon City Councilman and the Posey County Recorder.  Gene is (in 2005) currently Posey County’s Veterans Affairs Officer.  They both raised families and went on publicly as if there had been no Korean War.  However, privately what General Douglas MacArthur called “the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield” never left their consciousness.

Of course, there was a Korean War and it helped save you and me from another world war.  It was a largely unappreciated “mission accomplished.”  Thank you Harold and Gene and all your fellow Korean War veterans.

As General MacArthur might have said, both the old song and those it honors quietly fade away:

Sun has set, shadows come,

Soldier rest, your race is run.

For more Gavel Gamut articles go to:

www.jamesmredwine.com

Trip to Bradley up next for UE Men’s Basketball

0

 Aces and Braves to meet on Saturday at 1 p.m.

 Part one of the final road trip of the regular season is up next for the University of Evansville men’s basketball team as they travel to Bradley for a 1 p.m. game on Saturday at Carver Arena in Peoria.

Evansville led from wire-to-wire in an 87-70 win over Drake on Tuesday night at the Ford Center.  Three UE players finished with 20 or more points, led by Jaylon Brown and Ryan Taylor, who notched 22 apiece.  David Howard added a career-high 21 points as he hit all nine free throws.  UE shot 57.9% on the night while outrebounding the Bulldogs by a final tally of 36-20.  For the night, UE hit 17 out of 18 free throws (94.4%), its best effort of the season.

Brown, Taylor and Howard each finished with 20+ points on Tuesday; it marked the first time three Aces registered 20 or more points in the same game since Matt Webster, Kyle Anslinger and Bradley Strickland had 20 apiece on Dec. 30, 2006 against Bradley.

Tuesday’s win over Drake marked the fourth conference win in a row for the Aces.  UE accomplished the feat twice last year and once in the 2010-11 and 2012-13 campaigns.  Head coach Marty Simmons is looking for his first 5-game MVC win streak in his tenure as UE’s head coach.  The last 5-game streak for UE in MVC play came from January 27 through February 10 1999.

A stellar streak of play continued for David Howard as he set his career mark with 21 points in the win over Drake.  A 64.2% free throw shooter on the season, Howard went a perfect 9-for-9 against the Bulldogs; Howard has hit 17 of his last 19 free throws over the last four games (89.5%) after starting the season shooting just 32% (8/25) in the first 24 games this season.

Bradley comes into Saturday’s meeting with a 9-19 overall mark and 4-11 in the Valley.  The Braves have dropped nine of their last 10 games, including a 64-61 loss at UNI on Wednesday.  Darrell Brown paces his team with 12 points per game; he also leads the team with a total of 76 assists.  Donte Thomas sits atop the Bradley list with 6.3 rebounds per game.

In the first meeting of the season, the Braves earned a 74-63 win over UE to move the series to a 26-22 tally in their favor.  In games in Peoria, Bradley has been dominant, going 18-5; Evansville has had the upper hand on the road as of late, winning three of the last five match-ups.