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Call to the 2012 OWL Annual Meeting
We will hold the National OWL Annual Meeting on Saturday, September 29, 2012, in Dallas, TX. All OWL members are invited to attend the morning business session 9:30a.m. - 12p.m.
__________________________  Do Something Grand In honor of Grandparents Day on September 9th, Generations United will be hosting a full week of intergenerational activism. For a full schedule of events and ways to participate, click here. __________________________ What is the Plan for Medicare and Social Security? Tell President Obama and Governor Romney: Make your plans for the future of Medicare and Social Security part of an open, public conversation. AARP is collecting signatures to deliver directly to the presidential campaigns, so don't wait to make your voice heard - sign their petition and speak out today! To sign the petition, click here.__________________________
Share Your Story OWL is working with PBS to profile voices of real women for whom Social Security is a crucial lifeline. If you would like to submit your story for consideration, please email us at outstandingwomen@owl-national.org __________________________
Upcoming Book Signing
Margaret Mann, former OWL Field Services Director (1990-1995) will be reading and signing her recent book on September 15th. A Dramatically Different Direction is a poignant, funny and heart rending autobiographical commentary by an old, bi-racial, lesbian, Buddhist in a wheelchair.
Disabled in 1997 by a small blood vessel bursting in her spinal cord she has rebuilt her life with an amazing good humor and a dash of sarcastic wit. The message in her essays is universal, you will suffer in life to the same degree that you sit around wishing things were different.
Who: Open to the public
Date: Saturday, September 15th
Time: 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Where: Silver Spring Presbyterian Church, 580 University Ave East, Silver Spring, MD 20901
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Blogging About Menopause
Check out Barbara Younger's blog, A Friend for the Ride: Encouraging Words for the Menopause Rollercoaster. Barbara and her friends share the ups and downs of the journey through menopause.
To access the blog, click here.
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Salon Gives OWL Activists a 'Shout Out'
Suzanne Kahn discusses the important role women play in this election in her recent article on Salon.com. Kahn cites OWL as building a platform for women's voices to be heard in the 1980s. OWL is proud to continue voicing the concerns of 74 million women in the United States.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the number of single women in this country also grew dramatically. A rising number of divorces and increasing economic opportunities for women outside of marriage created new constituencies. Finding their access to economic resources-from credit to pensions-severely limited in a political economy built around the assumed norm of a nuclear family, these women organized. They formed groups like the Older Women's League and the Alliance for Displaced Homemakers, which demanded legal reform to give single women access to badly needed resources. They proposed creative solutions to the problems single women faced on a day-to-day basis - for example, new ways of calculating Social Security benefits based on a couple's shared earnings.
To read the full article, click here.
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 Know your state's voting rules
All men and women should be equal in the voting booth, but new state laws may dramatically impact women's ability to vote in the 2012 election. According to the National Women's Law Center (NWLC), since 2011, 16 states have passed restrictive voting laws, 11 states currently have these new laws in effect, and 41 states have introduced at least 180 bills restricting voting. These campaigns to restrict voting rights have gone far beyond preventing the rare case of ineligible voters casting ballots and are now taking away eligible citizens' fundamental right to vote.
In order to make your voice heard, make sure you know the voting rules in your state.
NWLC has created a simple fact sheet that summarizes how women are affected by these new laws:
- Because women's names often change in marriage, many women lack state-issued photo IDs in their current legal names.
- Women often lack proof of citizenship in their current legal names
- Women make up the greatest share of older Americans, and older voters are far less likely to have state-issued photo IDs.
- Restrictive voter ID laws put voters struggling in this economy at a profound disadvantage, and women make up the greatest share of these low-income Americans
To access NWLC's fact sheet, click here.
For more information about your state's voting requirements, click here.
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 OWL Board Member Speaks at BlogHer'12
BlogHer is one of the world's largest platforms for female bloggers, reaching 40 million visitors per month. Therefore, it is not surprising that BlogHer conferences translate to the largest gathering of female social media leaders every year. BlogHer held their 2012 conference this month and dedicated a day of discussion to a very relevant topic: health.
OWL board member, Robin Strongin, was invited to serve on a panel to talk about her use of social media to advocate for improvements in healthcare. Robin's blog, Disruptive Women in Healthcare, "serves as a platform for provocative ideas, thoughts, and solutions in the health sphere."
To read Robin's blog post about her debut at BlogHer'12, click here.
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Celebrating Working Women this Labor Day
Labor Day is a holiday dedicated to celebrating the contributions of America's workforce. OWL would like to give special thanks to those whose work is often unappreciated: home care workers. This month, the Direct Care Alliance (DCA) interviewed Catherine K. Ruckelshaus, the National Employment Law Project (NELP) Legal Co-Director. Ruckelshaus won the first class-action suit ever for home care workers in New York and has been campaigning to win the right to minimum wage and overtime pay for home care workers nationwide.
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"...I guarantee you, flat guarantee you, there will be no changes in
Social Security... I flat guarantee you."
- Vice President Biden
(as quoted by Maggie Haberman on Politico.com)
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OWL Co-Sponsors National Voter Registration Day
Did you know that in 2008, 6 million Americans didn't vote because they missed a registration deadline or didn't know how to register. This year, OWL is part of an effort to make sure that doesn't happen during the 2012 election.
On September 25, 2012, volunteers, civic groups, and organizations from all over the country will "hit the streets" for National Voter Registration Day. This single day of coordinated field, technology and media efforts will create awareness of voter registration opportunities.
You can join the effort and get more information by visiting the website. Click here.
What: National Voter Registration Day
When: September 25, 2012
Where: Across the nation
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OWL-THE VOICE OF MIDLIFE AND OLDER WOMEN
OWL is a 501(c)(3) national grassroots organization founded in 1980 that continues to be the only national membership organization that advocates solely from the perspective of now over 74 million mid-life and older women.
www.owl-national.org
1625 K St, NW, Suite 1275
Washington, D.C. 20006
Phone: 1-877-OLDRWMN (653-7966) | 202-567-2606
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