By Nicole Maharaj
June 23, 2003

The Women Mayors convened their second semi-annual meeting on June 6. San Leandro Mayor (CA) Shelia Young serves as the chair of the group. During the Denver meeting, the women mayors voted for Young to serve an additional one year term to finish completing a full two-year term as chair. In addition, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin was voted as the new Vice Chair of the group. The Vice Chair will serve alongside the Chair and will automatically advance to Chair at the end of the 2004 Annual Meeting in Boston. This new process will help add needed continuity over the coming years.

The Women Mayors was founded in 1983 by United States Senator Dianne Feinstein, then Mayor of San Francisco, to provide informal time for networking and idea sharing during both the Winter and Annual Meetings. Its purpose is to help, on a non-partisan basis, to recruit and advance more women mayors into leadership within the Conference.

"We have made strides to make our group more effective over the year, and I am committed to completing the work that I have begun. We-ve come a long way since then San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, founded the group twenty-years ago, but to a great degree we still need to be shepherded through the leadership process of the organization," said Young. Since serving as Chair over the last year, Young has been able to successfully accomplish the following:

• Instituted an Advisory Panel consisting of women in the current leadership to collaboratively move forward the agenda of the caucus
• Created a formal mission and vision statement (through these statements the caucus will be able to now officially be able to forward policy resolutions through USCM Standing Committees)
• Disseminated regular and consistent reminders about leadership opportunities and advancement for women mayors

Under Young's leadership, the Caucus members with the assistance of the Advisory Panel has developed the following mission and vision statements.

Mission Statement

The Women Mayors is dedicated to increasing, on a non-partisan basis, the influence of women mayors within the Conference of Mayors. The caucus seeks to discuss substantive issues of importance to cities and forward appropriate policy recommendations to the Conference.

The Women Mayors is committed to increasing the leadership numbers of the women who serve as mayors.

Vision Statement

The Women Mayors shall promote increasing numbers of women mayors in prominent and meaningful positions of leadership within the Conference and advance policy issues of importance to cities through existing Standing Committees.

Speaker Presentation

Darchelle M. Garner, the Associate Vice President for the CHEST Foundation, a philanthropic arm of the American College of Chest Physicians, an international, 16,000-member educational medical society made a presentation to the women mayors about the foundation's studies on anti'smoking cessation targeted for young women and the harmful effects of tobacco on children and families.

Lung Lessons is a program designed to educate children about lung health and the dangers of tobacco and to help them make smart decisions about tobacco use. It is a partnership between the Congressional Caucus on Women's Issues; the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP); and the CHEST Foundation. Its mission is to promote the prevention and treatment of diseases of the chest through leadership, education, research and communication. The CHEST Foundation offers a speakers kit, including a hip-hop CD-ROM for women and girls, a elementary school curriculum on Lung Health (both English and Spanish), and a anti'smoking audio CD and video for young people. The foundation also offers a complete kit for making lung health and tobacco prevention presentations to children. For more information, please contact Darchelle M. Garner at 847-498- 8384 or dgarner@chestnet.org.