The Caring Force is excited to announce its “Essential Workers” campaign!
We are launching a two-stage campaign to thank human service workers and bring public awareness to this workforce, as well as to advance legislation that will improve compensation and benefits to these selfless and dedicated individuals. Improved compensation will result in reduced turnover, more experienced staff on the frontlines of our industry, and eliminate the need for so many of our workers to have two full time jobs just to make ends meet. One job should be enough, especially when it is so important; there are lives in the balance.
Here are some details:
Yard Signs: As a first step, we have created an eye-catching yard sign and distributed an order link to agencies. Costs are reasonable and the signs are high quality. We want to pepper the landscape to provide this visual “shout out” to our staff. This is a great way to fully engage your workforce, board and other stakeholders in thanking and recognizing human services workers across the Commonwealth while raising awareness of our sector. Please reach out to Ravi Simon if you would like to purchase lawn signs for your workers.
PSAs and “Caring Force Ambassadors”: Next, we will plan to create public service announcements that will provide information about the essential work done in our sector – see the attached campaign outline. We are asking for your help in identifying “Caring Force Ambassadors” – staff, clients, family members, board members and even celebrities who may have a connection to our sector – that you might approach and ask permission to share their contact information with us. We want to have all subsectors of the human services community represented, and we will ask ambassadors to share their personal stories about the human services sector and why it is critical to their life and our Commonwealth. We also hope our “Caring Force Ambassadors” will testify with us at the State House in support of our fair pay for comparable work and student loan repayment legislation that we will file in January 2021. Please think about who you might approach to be a Caring Force Ambassador and if they agree, you can share their contact information with Ravi Simon.
Legislative advocacy: To recognize human service workers beyond our gratitude, we will work vigorously to promote support of two bills.
An act relative to fair pay for comparable work will provide pay equity and recognize that human service workers are doing the same work as state employees who are considerably better compensated.
An act establishing an education loan repayment program for human services workers will give eligible human service workers up to $150 month for up to four years while they are working in the field toward student loan repayment
We will be seeking workers to submit written, video and in-person testimony about what these bills would mean for them.
We will hold a rally, if safe and consistent with public health guidelines, involving members of our workforce and speak to legislators and the public about the importance of these bills to our sector and to the people we care for. We will cap off the campaign with a celebration of our workforce in a forum to be determined.
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