Said Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer, who founded the “Cause the Effect” political action committee to get more women to run: “Women like to feel encouraged and supported to run. They don’t want to feel like they are out there on their own.”
Young feminists tackle obstacles to change at Chicago conference
Nearly 300 women gathered at “Cause the Effect,” the second annual young feminist conference, to talk about what stops change and how to beat those obstacles.
“We had a conversation around two years ago that it’s only the boys who get their voices heard or put in the paper,” Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer, D-Chicago, said. “I told them that if they think this is the last time that will happen it’s not, but they can do something about it.”
‘Off The Sidelines’ urges women to be change they seek on gun violence
“Silence is no longer an option when it comes to the violence in Chicago,” said Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer, who founded Off The Sidelines Chicago in 2015, inspired by U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s national movement encouraging women to bring their ideas to action.
“What better voices to help magnify than those of the women out in the streets working every day to make their communities safer?” Gainer said at the monthly issues-focused discussion that had drawn concerned women from as far away as Hinsdale and Alsip.
Kapos: Duncan, Gainer Talk Jobs
Gainer is behind the Aon Apprenticeship Program that’s connecting City Colleges students to office jobs. She hopes other companies will follow suit.
It’s not about having a fancy degree, she said. “But really, the skills required may just need someone who can be trained and who’s smart and ready to work.”
Kapos: Bridget Gainer and the power of sisters
The women’s marches around the country were all about sisterhood, so it was a natural that Cook County Commissioner Bridget Gainer would march with all four of hers.
“Each one of my sisters chose a life and work that makes a difference in the world. And now that we’re all working mothers, raising our own kids, we make time to come out and fight for what we believe in, but also to be with each other,” Bridget Gainer told me. “This was not our first protest and it won’t be our last, but to be out there with these women, now truly my best friends, made me proud.”