How to Increase Gender Equity in Your City
Human Resources
Provide paid family leave for employees. Collect and analyze data on pay and promotion equity, and address race and gender disparities. Provide space for breast-feeding and pumping in public facilities. Always remove names from resume review and prohibit asking for salary history. Ensure companies the city does business with also use best practices.
Transit
Make sure there’s plenty of room on buses and trains for wheelchairs and strollers, and make sure strollers needn’t be folded down. Allow bus routes to stop in between formal stops at night to improve safety, and provide public education on eliminating street harassment on transit.
Housing
Increase the supply of and access to affordable, community-based, supportive housing. This is particularly important for the elderly, the queer community, those with mental and physical health concerns, women, transgender, and gender non-conforming people, and those who work in the service sector. Eliminate non-safety related occupancy limits to make housing more affordable and create community.
Child Care
Increase access to affordable, quality child care by waiving fees and limiting taxes on qualifying child cares, including in-home care. Prioritize geographic dispersion of child cares using thoughtful land-use policies. Provide resources to assist child cares in becoming certified, including easy, affordable access to building safety professionals.
Public Safety
Increase diversity in fire departments, and provide resources to support and retain that diversity, such as personal protective equipment that fits, anti-harassment policies and procedures, and improvements to testing and recruitment. Ensure that reforms to policing also improve responses to sexual assault and family violence, mental health crises, and sex work.
Social Services and Small Biz
Develop a women- and minority-owned business program to spread city resources more equitably. Review social services contracts and procedures to ensure small equity-focused nonprofit service providers can access funds to improve the reach and fairness of city resources.