Sorry! This newsletter is about two weeks late.
You’ve probably had these seasons in your life too, where everything seems to be happening at once and some tasks just have to wait their turn.
Waiting our turn is something women are familiar with.
Whether it’s for a teacher to call on us, for a bathroom stall in a busy ladies room, for the kids to go to bed, for the doctor’s appointment, for the car repair to finish, for a call back from a job interview or for a promotion to open up.
Sometimes waiting is just annoying. Other times it comes with a real cost: time, money, opportunities to grow as individuals, families and communities, and even our own health and safety.
Here are two things that I personally think a woman shouldn’t have to wait for:
- Support for continuing her education and training in pursuit of career goals.
- Access to a safe and comfortable place when her life is at risk.
In the first case, I’m extremely proud that our Upper Keys BPW has been bringing down the wait time for women to invest in their education and careers for years with scholarships for working women.
With your help, we took it to a new level in 2022 when we established a permanent endowment that will generate real money for this program, pretty much forever. A new round of funding opened for applications this month.
In the second case, I’m frankly furious that the critical emergency shelter facility serving the Middle and Upper Florida Keys was destroyed by Hurricane Irma in 2017 and has yet to be rebuilt.
Since that time, residents – and that means mostly women but any of us, our friends, family, neighbors – who are experiencing domestic abuse have lost an estimated 7,000 nights of safety each year, according to analysis from the Domestic Abuse Shelter (DAS), which serves Monroe County and the Florida Keys.
So once again, we’re working to bring down the wait time. At our March 20 luncheon, we launched a campaign to raise $10,000 to create a business center within the soon-to-be-built domestic abuse shelter.
In a way it’s a drop in the bucket of the $5 million project, but I hope it sends a strong signal for how important this is to those of us who support working women in our community.
When we say our Upper Keys BPW strives to support women at every stage of their lives, we mean every stage.
From the most dangerous times when we’re experiencing threats of violence in our own homes, to the most promising times, when we decide to invest in our professional education and training, empowered women empower women.
So let’s move this line along! Please spread the word about our scholarships and contribute whatever you can to our Give Hope a Home campaign in rebuilding the Domestic Abuse Shelter.
I'm tired of waiting.
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