When influencing politicians, it isn’t so much what is being said as who is saying it.
Like the nice lady who serves politicos of all stripes in Jefferson City their caffeine jolts. She’s also delivering a message that unfortunately has fallen on ambivalent ears or become tangled in politics.
Audrey Johanns is the owner of Cafe Via Roma, conveniently located across from the state Capitol. She’s a recent graduate of Rockhurst’s Executive MBA program.
Her studies piqued an interest in the paltry way Missouri addresses child care for low-income working families. Depending on how the numbers are crunched, Missouri ranks 47th, 49th or dead last of all states for its low eligibility limits for child care assistance.
That means a small raise or promotion often must be turned down by working mothers, or else they lose their child care subsidy. Without the child care, they can’t work. So much for people helping themselves.
Johanns’ MBA class met with Sister Berta Sailer of Operation Breakthrough, the Kansas City area’s tour de force for poor working families. Sailer argues that working mothers mostly need influential advocates to bend ears and shift attitudes.
Johanns didn’t need a lot of convincing. She’d faced the problem from the vantage of a small-business owner.
Last year she tried to reward a valued employee with repeated raises. At first, the woman was pleased. Then she wanted her hours cut. She’d earned herself out of the child care help, but not into a high enough income bracket to pay for the care herself and continue working.
Johanns worked with others in her class, but was uniquely situated for outreach to the politicians.
“Anyone who walks in my door is fair game,” she said.
Most politicians have never lived in poverty. It’s easier for them to stick on the attitude that people can better their lives with hard work and resolve. That’s true, but not when state policy keeps shoving them backward.
Legislators need to understand examples like the woman who lived at a bus stop with her two toddlers for a week last fall. Her kids stayed at Operation Breakthrough during the day. She arrived at the center by bus every morning, dropped the kids off and headed to work at her fast food job. She returned at night, after her shift, and loaded her family on the bus to go “home” to her stop.