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Committed To Supporting Women In New York City

Bill Thompson is a staunch advocate for women in New York City. He's a strong supporter of women's health and reproductive rights, pay equity, and diversity in the work place. He has also worked to ensure that City agencies are providing necessary and required services to women throughout all five boroughs.

As Comptroller, Bill:

• Hired women in many of his office's top positions. Four out of six of his Deputy Comptrollers are women, as are eight out of 16 senior staff, including his First Deputy, Chief Investment Officer, Deputy Comptroller for Budget, and Deputy Comptroller for Public Finance.

• Worked to promote diversity in the work place. Bill called on 16 Fortune 500 companies receiving City pension fund investments to increase the representation of women and ethnic minorities on their Boards of Directors, recognizing the competitive disadvantages that accompany such a lack of diversity.

• Improved the NYPD's Domestic Violence Tracking System by exposing serious problems with the database. Bill worked with the NYPD to correct the problems, which included a lack of formal security procedures, work delays, and data inaccuracies.

• Tripled City pension fund investments in small and emerging firms, many of which are minority and women-owned.

• Exposed serious flaws in the Housing Authority's procedures for placing victims of domestic violence in safe housing. Bill made recommendations to correct the problems which were so severe that in one instance a victim waited 78 days for an eligibility interview.

• Advocated for increased funding for the Equal Employment Practices Commission (EEPC) after finding that the agency did not have enough staff to perform its function of auditing every City agency at least once every four years. The EEPC is an independent agency responsible for monitoring the equal employment practices, programs, policies, and procedures of all City agencies that are funded in whole or in part by the City.

• Urged the Mayor and the City Council to provide access to emergency contraception by requiring all emergency rooms to provide medication as a basic standard of care to all rape survivors. Bill also worked to require that emergency contraception be made available at City-run sexually-transmitted disease (STD) clinics, greatly increasing access to the medication for low-income women.

• Fought for greater economic access for women by setting up new employment opportunities and creating programs to provide micro-loans that give women entrepreneurs the chance to start and grow their own businesses.

• Chaired since 2002 the Comptroller's Task Force on Adolescent Pregnancy, Parenting and Prevention, which consists of nearly 450 governmental and private agencies. The mission of the Task Force is to reduce the number of adolescent pregnancies in the city and improve services to pregnant and parenting teens.

• Published the Task Force's Adolescent Pregnancy, Parenting and Prevention Resource Guide-New York City's first guide to organizations providing comprehensive sex and health education, abstinence, teenage parenting and prevention, fatherhood, and youth development programs.

As Mayor, Bill will:

• Expand domestic violence shelters and ensure that women are connected with all appropriate services.

• Ensure that women are receiving Section 8 vouchers set aside for domestic violence victims and that this is done in a timely fashion.

• Direct the Mayor's Office of Women to convene a permanent working group comprised of service providers and advocates to develop a long-term plan to address this issue.

• Ensure that the New York City Department of Education is equally funding women's athletics, as is required by law.

• Expand Minority and Women Business Opportunity programs so that more women owned businesses receive city contracts.

• Ensure that our City's workforce development programs are integrated into a broader economic development framework and that women have access to job training that leads to the same employment opportunities as men.