Cat Cora to Receive Alumna of the Year Award at CIA

Cat Cora, the Food Network’s “Iron Chef,” will be honored tonight as “Alumna of the Year” by her alma mater, the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) at the CIA Leadership Awards (“Augie Awards”) in New York City.

Cat and her partner Jennifer welcomed their fourth son last July, with Cat giving birth to him not long after Jennifer gave birth to their third son last April.

In the past two years, Cat has also opened CCQ barbeque restaurant in Costa Mesa, CA and Kouzzina at Walt Disney World, and helped raise funds for Haitian relief through Chefs for Humanity, a charitable organization she founded. She also continues on Iron Chef America and as executive chef of Bon Appétit magazine.

I want to know if she ever sleeps.

Congratulations, Cat!

Wanted: Your Experience with Paid or Unpaid Parental Leave

I’m passing along this request for your comments (and possible participation in an interview) about paid and unpaid parental leave. I’m not involved in the project, but I think it’s vital to have LGBT voices heard in studies like these.

Human Rights Watch, a nongovernmental human rights group, is interviewing parents (including LGBT parents) about their experiences with paid and unpaid maternity and paternity leave, and the impact on their families. The interviews will be used for a report (using pseudonyms, not actual names of interviewees) and, depending on the findings, for making recommendations on US law and policy.

Paid parental leave is considered a human right under several international treaties (not ratified by the US), and 177 countries now have laws guaranteeing paid parental leave. Only a few, including the United States, Papua New Guinea, Swaziland, and Australia, do not have national laws on paid parental leave. Australia is about to fall out of these ranks by offering 18 paid weeks starting in 2011.

In the United States, the national Family and Medical Leave Act requires only unpaid leave. Only two states (California and New Jersey) currently offer paid parental leave, and a handful of others offer temporary disability insurance to mothers after childbirth. States that do offer such paid leave generally fund their programs through small payroll deductions, minimizing the impact on any particular business.

For the most part, it is up to employers to decide whether to offer this benefit. Some people are fortunate to work for generous employers, but the majority of US workers do not have paid parental leave benefits. Read the rest of this post »

Work/Life Balance and the LGBT Community

A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of participating in Fem 2.0’s “Work/Life in Our Communities Blog Radio Series” as part of a panel on “Work/Life and LGBT Families: Reimagining Policy for ALL Families in the 21st Century.” The radio series is part of their larger 2010 Wake Up! Campaign, which also includes a blog carnival running through Saturday.

This is my contribution to the carnival.

My personal story of work/life balance as an LGBT person is pretty boring. My employers and my spouse’s employers have all offered full recognition and benefits to same-sex partners. We’ve never had any trouble with co-workers about our orientation. Heck, my co-workers threw us a baby shower. Sure, there was the amusing issue of sitting in a meeting, obviously flat-stomached, and having to mention that I might have to leave early because I was having a baby any minute now—but my straight, about-to-adopt co-worker was in a similar situation. (They threw her a baby shower, too.)

My work/life issues therefore are mostly the same as those faced by people of all gender identities and orientations—finding the time for both work and family, dividing household work with my spouse, and so forth.

There is some evidence, however (ably analyzed by sociologist Abbie Goldberg in her Lesbian and Gay Parents and Their Children), that same-sex couples as a whole divide household work more equitably than opposite-sex ones. Indeed, when I tell straight moms that my spouse gave birth to our son, and stayed home for the first eight months or so, at which point we switched because of shifting job opportunities, they look at me like I’m from Mars.

It’s nice to have that flexibility.

At the same time, the flexibility has limits. Read the rest of this post »

Work/Life and LGBT Families on Fem 2.0 Radio Today

Work/life balance is an issue near and dear to many of our hearts. Achieving that balance can be even tougher for LGBT people, who may have to contend with a variety of unfriendly laws, policies, and attitudes.

I’ll be speaking this afternoon on Fem 2.0’s “Work/Life in Our Communities Blog Radio Series” as part of a panel on “Work/Life and LGBT Families: Reimagining Policy for ALL Families in the 21st Century.” Thanks to Heather Holdridge and Gloria Pan for the invitation.

I’ll be joining Cathy Renna, head of Renna Communications, and Jaime Grant, Director of the Policy Institute for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, both also lesbian moms. Good company indeed!

There will be a live chat and tweetup of the event (#fem2 and #worklife), and you can also dial in to participate: (724) 444-7444; Call ID: 74229. I hope you’ll join us, despite the short notice.

The show will air 1-2 p.m. ET, but will also be available for later listening. Go here to listen, or try the widget below. (Sometimes it needs a few seconds to load.)

COLAGE Is Hiring

I’m passing this message along from the folks at COLAGE, who are hiring for a couple of positions.

I also want to offer outgoing Program Director Meredith Fenton my best wishes for her future endeavors. She was a great help in promoting Blogging for LGBT Families Day among COLAGErs and has always been willing to help build connections between the community of LGBT parents and that of our children (which aren’t always two separate communities, when it comes right down to it).

Please contact COLAGE with any questions about the below.

COLAGE is excited to announce two opportunities to join our team. We are hiring a full-time National Program Director and a part-time national Communications Coordinator. Read the rest of this post »

Marriage Recognized in D.C.? Act Now for Benefits

Here’s a little piece of advice for families living in Washington, D.C.: The city recently passed laws recognizing same-sex couples who were married or legally partnered in a “substantially similar” way outside the District. HRC warns people, though that if you are already hitched and want to cover your spouse or partner through your employer’s insurance plan, you may need to act quickly. Many employers’ plans require you to make changes to your enrollment within 30 days of when the laws went into effect. If you miss the deadline, you have to wait until the next open-enrollment period, which means  you may not be able to cover your spouse or partner this year.

The marriage recognition law went into effect July 6, 2009 July 7, 2009.  The partnership recognition law went into effect July 20, 2009 July 18, 2009. [Updated dates: The D.C. Insurance Dept initially posted the incorrect July 6 and July 20 dates. Thanks to Chris at HRC for the tip.]

If you are not yet hitched elsewhere, you will have 30 days from your happy date to make the changes.

“She Got Me Pregnant”: Episode 62

Helen and I do what everyone seems to be doing this week, and debrief on The L Word. We offer a parenting twist, however, and show how our own career paths as mothers have paralleled those of Bette and Tina (though without the high salaries and glamour). What does this say about lesbian parents in general?

We also offer insight into tax season and explain why even being married in Massachusetts is no guarantee your taxes will be any simpler–and may even make them more complicated. Why can’t tax software keep up, we wonder, and is there a secret cabal of accountants driving the fight against federal LGBT rights?

Brought to you in partnership with After Ellen.

Philanthropy and Family a Sweet Combination

(Originally published with slight variation in Bay Windows.)

For Jen Rainin, creating a lesbian travel company based on the idea of giving back to the world was an extension of her role as a philanthropist, but also a way to convey positive values to her children. Rainin is one of the founders of Sweet, which will offer “voluntourism” vacations that combine fun and relaxation with opportunities for giving back to the communities they visit. Her co-founder and the company’s CEO, Shannon Wentworth, is a marketing executive with experience at established lesbian travel company Olivia, PlanetOut, and Care2, a social network for people who want to improve the world.

For Rainin, philanthropy is a way of life. Her primary job is as chair of the Kenneth Rainin Foundation established by her father, an entrepreneur who built a leading scientific instrument company. Now she is carrying on both his entrepreneurial and philanthropic traditions through Sweet. “I feel like if I didn’t share the good fortune that I’ve experienced in my life, then shame on me. With the foundation, I’m able to do that. Then Sweet came along and the idea that there will be even more opportunity for hands-on giving back really appealed,” she says.

As the mother of two young boys, part of the appeal for Rainin is also what this work can teach her children. She explains, “As a mom, a big part of my job is instilling values in my kids and trying to be a role model. What I’m doing is what I hope my kids will want to do in the future, to find something that they feel passionately about that really does make a positive difference in the world and pursue it with their whole hearts.” Read the rest of this post »

Staying at Home vs. Outside Employment

Nina over at Queercents has posted her thoughts on Leslie Bennetts’ The Feminine Mistake: Are We Giving Up Too Much?, a book that warns women of the financial risks of staying home as full-time caregivers. The book spawned much controversy when it first came out, with the media hyping it as part of the “Mommy Wars” that supposedly pitted stay-at-home and employed moms against each other in some kind of playground death match.

There’s a good discussion going on about all this in the Queercents’ comments thread. I’ve offered some thoughts of my own there, based on an earlier Mombian post about Bennetts’ work. Pop on over if you want to join in or just read everyone else’s opinions.

HRC Tackles FMLA for LGBT

I’ve written before about how the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leaves same-sex families behind. Looks like HRC is stepping up to the plate here:

The DoL [Department of Labor] issued a notice that they plan to make changes to some of the regulations governing how the FMLA is administered—and asked groups to comment. HRC submitted written comments to DoL last Friday detailing our concerns with the proposed rules. We also made recommendations that FMLA leave be expanded through regulations and legislation to fully protect the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community. . . .

While some of these expansions can’t be done by DoL, there is a bill in Congress that could do this. The Family and Medical Leave Inclusion Act (H.R. 2792), introduced by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), would expand the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 to permit an employee to take up to twelve weeks of unpaid leave from work if his or her domestic partner or same-sex spouse has a serious health condition. It would also permit employees to take unpaid leave to care for a “parent-in-law, adult child, sibling or grandparent.”

I continue to have concerns over HRC’s handling of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), and its willingness to forge ahead without the inclusion of gender identity/expression, but on the matter of family leave, they seem to be right on target.