PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — With the birth this week of her daughter, Taglia, Sen. Amanda Cappelletti has become the first person to give birth while serving in the Pennsylvania Senate. As the senator deals with something that, to many working Pennsylvanians, is a common occurrence, there is hope that the learning curve might actually help promote gender equity in the state.
If Cappelletti is the first Pa. senator to give birth in office, it must also naturally follow that no sitting senator has ever taken maternity leave. Her communications director, Sara Kelly, says they’re all still trying to figure out the logistics.
“There's actually no formal maternity leave in the Senate. This has kind of been a ‘flying the plane as you build it’ situation,” Kelly said, adding Cappelletti is voting remotely while on legislative leave, formally.
“And while everyone has been really supportive on both sides of the aisle, it's been a challenge to figure out what our day-to-day office operations would look like.”
Kelly says her boss’ pregnancy has brought a lot of workplace issues to light.
“A lot of them are seeing the challenges that come with figuring out how to talk to women who are going through a pregnancy, especially in a workplace environment,” Kelly said. “I mean, Sen. Cappelletti has had to field a lot of interesting questions about how her pregnancy will affect her workflow or affect whether she runs again next term.”
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Michelle Feit with the National Partnership for Women and Families says, as more women get involved in politics, more policies will reflect the challenges they face.
“Thirty percent of women in elected office is more than we've ever had, but it will not be enough until we hit 50%,” Feit said.
She says issues relating to parental leave are crucial to equity and it’s during the childbearing years when wages of men and women tend to diverge.
“When women are becoming moms, that is when their wages start to fall below the wages of their male counterparts. And dads actually get what we even call a ‘dad bonus.’ They start to make more when they have children,” Feit said.
“But if we were to have paid family and medical leave for men and women, they could both take time off of work to care for their families, and then reenter the workforce and not really lose that ground,” Feit said.
Kelly says Cappelletti's pregnancy has increased awareness around the accommodations needed: “It brings this perspective to the Pennsylvania Senate that's never been there before.”
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