Nandini Ray: Hello everyone, welcome to the Maitri podcast Between Friends Conversation with Maitri. In today's show, we have Dr. Zakia Afrin, manager of Maitri's client advocacy program, and Protima Pandey, the director for Office of Women's Policy in Santa Clara County, California. They will discuss intersectionality between domestic violence, racism, immigration policy, and pay committee. They will also discuss women's rights, issues, and examine policy advocacy through gender lens, and impact of COVID pandemic on women's lives. Please enjoy the discussion.

Zakia Afrin: Welcome Protima. It's a pleasure to have you with us. Before we get into our conversation, I would like to introduce you to our listeners. Protima Pandey is the director for the Office of Women's Policy in Santa Clara County, California. As part of the county executive, her office works to bring a gender lens to policy decision making, building a pipeline to leadership, and creating equity in governance. Prior to that, she was the managing attorney and Regional Council for immigration at Bay Area Legal Aid beginning her career there as a staff attorney litigating on family law, and immigration cases for survivors of domestic violence, as well as allied legal relief in areas of public benefits, housing preservation, and economic justice. In 2017, she won a precedent setting case in California: Kumar v Kumar, a complex immigration and Family Law cross over case. She was one of the 17 lawyers nationwide appointed as a commissioner to the American Bar Association Commission on domestic and sexual violence to work on issues impacting delivery of legal services to survivors from 2015 to 2018, where she's also a litigation skills faculty. Thank you Protima for being with us. I now, first I would invite you to talk a little bit about your work at present at Santa Clara County.

Protima Pandey: Thank you for having me. It's a difficult time for all of us and I want to begin by saying that if there are any first responders, any caregivers, any healthcare first responders who are listening, I want to thank you for serving our community tirelessly. The Office of Women's Policy has been part of the county executives administrative branch for 22 years. The county executive started the Office of Women's Policy with a focus on gender equity at the level of the business side of the county. We work on four broad areas. One is leadership development for women and girls, and I want to begin by saying when I say girls and women, I do mean expansively so transgender non-conforming individuals, LGBTQ individuals, those who identify with the work that we do, so leadership development for women and girls is one. The second is, economic self-sufficiency. The third area of our work is justice impacted women and girls. These are individuals who are defendants, and or are involved in the criminal justice system, not necessarily as victims and the fourth area is focused on gender based violence in addressing gender based violence. We were fortunate that in September of 2019, we established a separate office of gender based violence prevention, but under the umbrella of the Office of Women's Policy this work continues as well. So that's a, you know, 50,000, foot level view of what we do at the office of Women’s Policy.

ZA: That is wonderful, a lot of great work is being done at the county level, as we can see. So Protima, we have been talking about domestic violence and COVID-19 impacts throughout the last few weeks. Today we wanted to broaden our area a little bit talking about what are the other intersections that we come across as DV advocates, as an agency, what are the important issues that are before us, when we try to work with domestic violence survivors. So I'm first asking you a question that is very close to my own interest and it comes back every year during March. There are many voices in our community, both men, women, progressive liberal who say that, “why do we need to celebrate Women's Day? If women are equal, then there shouldn't be a special day just for women.” So I wanted to hear your perspective on it. Do you think we need a women's day, why do we need it, and then a little bigger question around the same line— Why do we have the Office of Women's Policy?

PP: Okay so, it seems as if you have been reading my emails, because, you know, I get that question too and I know that my predecessor used to get the question as well. Here's one thing that I want to tell you, I don't have the expertise and understanding how men are left behind in the workforce, how men are left behind in decision making, how men are negatively impacted by getting paid less than women, how men are not able to thrive and succeed in our community. I have absolutely no idea how that happens. What I do know is that in policy and decision making, and programming and planning, women are not front and center. And that's why we have structural inequities that women are impacted negatively and disproportionately by. For example, the wage gap is a real issue. For us, the point here is if there was true equality, which in a minute I'll talk about as well. But if there was true equality, we would not have the term wage gap. Right? And there are lots of studies that have been done by social scientists about examining where and how these structural inequalities have arisen and sexism seems to be at the root of that. If you look back at this country or around the world who are the decision makers, very early on the decision makers were not women. And when women started to play a role or needed to play a role, there was a resistance. And today, we would like to believe that it isn't fair that that existence doesn't exist, but the reality of issues like the pay gap, demonstrate that those issues still exist. Second thing that I do want to talk to you about is if you look around the media, if you look around at any of the developments that relate to any sector, that are slivers of opportunities where you can understand the reality of how women are left behind. We talked about the wage gap. Think about the lawsuit that the Women's Soccer Federation had to fight. Why does a team that has won multiple World Cups, why does that team have to file a gender discrimination lawsuit? Think about what happened March 8, you began this question by talking about Women’s Day, well in March of 2019 NASA was supposed to do an all-women’s space launch. Did you know that if you look up, you'll find out that they had to cancel it- Do you know why? They didn't have small size spaces for women astronauts to test and a simple thing like that we're talking NASA, the most intelligent people on the planet, apparently. Correct? And yet, they didn't get gender equity right. And so I also want to take one moment to talk about equality and equity. When we talk about equality we assume everyone is starting at the same place. But we know that not everyone starts at the same place. Think about the first woman who ended up going to college, who still did not completely get fully employed at the level at which she was supposed to get paid. Right, so equality is a concept that exists, if we all have the same starting point. But equity means meeting people where they are that. And so that's why I talk about gender equity. That's why I say women's policy and Women's Day is important because we still, we still know that women are being left behind. And finally, I would say, you want to test the waters about what I talked about, go to a high school, or even go to middle school, go to a career day, and as a woman professional, make a presentation, and see the questions that are being asked of you as a male professional, make a presentation, see the questions that are asked. If you are a female professional, there is a 95% chance that a question that's asked to you is how do you balance career and work. If you're a male professional that question rarely arises. Right? Therein lies the systemic discrimination and systemic lack of equity still exists, and that's why my office still exists. I'll tell you in the world of social justice. I always say put me out of the job, wouldn't it be amazing if I didn't have to run the Office of Women's Policy, but unfortunately, my work is cut out for me.

ZA: Thank you Protima. Seems like you are just speaking my mind, only more beautifully and more articulately than I can ever do that. So yes, I definitely agree with you that we need Women’s Day, we need the Office of Women's Policy, just because we did not start from the same point. So, right now, if we gave the same benefits, it would not make us equal. We still need a little bit of extra boost. Thank you for that! Now, you are a leader in our community so I want to go to a question that revolves around leadership. Now, if we look at the COVID-19 situation around the world, we have some really exemplary leaders, and the most interesting leadership has come out from Taiwan, from New Zealand, from Germany, and all three countries are led by women, head of states, right? Is that a coincidence? I don't think so. We also know there are women leaders or women in positions of power, who continuously promote sexism, racism, many conservative values that hurt women and all the minority groups. So, how do we balance this need to see women in leadership, support women wholeheartedly to see that they lead those leadership roles? However, how do we also balance this need for social justice, as you mentioned before? Right? Not all women are focused on social justice, not all women are liberal or want equal rights for every human being. So where is the balance, what do you think about that?

PP: So, this is a very deep question, and there are multi-layers in the answers. I will begin by saying that when women are welcomed into society in spaces that have traditionally been dominated by men, there is an expectation that this woman is sitting at our table, because she can perform much like the men. Okay? It's that expectation that leads to the same old. As you were talking about female leaders who are still promoting policies that are harmful, that are racist, that are sexist, that are discriminatory, right, that's because there's a pressure. I'm not condoning those decisions, please don't get me wrong. I'm not condoning those decisions. Last year, our county office work with the Board of Supervisors, to have a plan in place for Title IX for all the title nine protections that are going to be rolled back, and we explicitly realized that we need to have a plan in our county because the Title IX rollbacks that are happening under the leadership of a woman will be harmful to women and girls and their ability to thrive in educational environments.

ZA: Protima, for our listeners can you give us a brief introduction into Title IX?

PP: Yes, I should stop assuming that Title IX is a constitutional amendment that actually talks about equity and equality in educational institutions and educational spaces. Most of the people know about Title IX as a law that promotes women in sporting events but it's much broader than that. And so protections around safe campuses, safe schools, sex education all of that. And to your point about here are women leaders who are not really making equitable decisions so how is it that we talk about promoting women leaders, as an important piece. I would say that the examples to look towards are the examples that you began with about the leaders and nations where there is a recovery cost to us post pandemic because of the COVID-19 crisis that is demonstrating equity, that is demonstrating gender equity, racial equity, and that's demonstrating ways in which all populations can be brought up to speed, all populations are given what they need to be able to recover from the pandemic. And that, to me, the most important conversation around women leaders, around promoting women leaders, around making sure we have women leaders at the table is about perspectives and viewpoints. As long as we are opening up, and I will actually go so far as to say this is diversity-inclusion-belonging, if you're opening up your table and bringing more people in, are you expecting for them to continue to toe your line or are you bringing them in, because they have unique perspectives and unique tools in their wheelhouse that'll help us be better. Right? And to me, that's the crux of why it's important not only for us to instill gender equity as well to make sure that when we are welcoming people at our table who have not been at our table before, we are valuing their input. I give the example, a couple of years ago there was a toymaker that decided to have a seven cent promotion in the peak of summer, and they didn't realize, they basically said go to any of our stores throughout the mall throughout America on this particular day and you get a discounted rate right now on our toy. They had to shut down that promotion within a few hours of starting, and I want to ask whether there was any woman at the table or anybody who took care of young children during the summer at the table and the decision was made, because if you are promoting a toy-related discount in the peak of summer holidays, people are coming to the mall, people with little children, people are looking after little children, people are looking after multiple little children. It's not just the family that would be excited about this product. It was all the families that were, oh my god this is a good opportunity for me to take the children somewhere. And I would say that if there was a pause around making that decision about who is at our table, what is the perspective that we're missing that would never have happened. Or a nine-year-old girl in Northern California, who wrote to Steph Curry, basketball legend, about the fact that a particular shoe that she wanted was not being made for girls. Steph Curry, who is an outstanding activist in our community, he forgot gender equity, and I'm just saying, that's the value. Right? That's the value of the perspective.

ZA: Thank you Protima. That was wonderful. Yes, I also believe that the visual attraction, or even the visual cue that women can be leaders that's very important looking at women in different leadership roles, especially heads of states and others are very, very encouraging for little girls, but we cannot sacrifice the values that are important. We cannot sacrifice the social equity, the over all humanity that we are all trying to achieve, so we have to create a balance that we want to see women leadership, but also calling out when the leadership is not following the progressive path that we expected from them. So you brought out the toy store example, I remember it very clearly. Yes, it closed down and all of that. And you mentioned that summer, taking care of children and that summer is coming, and we are in a pandemic situation. I think most people that can work from home, are working from home. And I've been seeing in the news, I've been hearing from friends, I've been hearing from my colleagues, how women are extraordinarily burdened with childcare. Now, there are many of us we're very happy that we have extra time with children. That is great. That is there. But then, this extra work that comes with having a child around you 24/7 and many of the working parents are not used to that for many years or many months. Now, I want to hear from you, not just as a leader in the county office, but also as a woman. Why are women taking the bigger load in this part? How is it affecting someone's productivity, someone's mental health wellbeing, and also, going through with this stressful situation? So I want to hear your input on that. Why this expectation is, and what are we going to do about it?

PP: Yeah. Isn't that the million-dollar question! I want to say, let's begin by thinking about the conversations that happen around successful women. The concept of soccer mom. That came about, why? It came about because there were these women who were able to, whether they were able to or because they had to but the understanding was they work hard in their career, that their children are perfect, all of those all of those boxes will be checked, right, because patriarchy gave a space to women to go outside the house. Right? And because we're on a podcast I would say, I did air quotes when I said outside the house right to work, again air quotes, because it's not as if inside the house they were not working right but when they did that the overwhelming majority of understanding by the society was you're not abandoning your traditional homes whatever those are. And today, what has happened with everybody. Most people who have to shelter in place, who can't go to work more women who have to perform their work, work during the work hours. There's a resurgence of implicit bias, around the role of a woman in the home. The role of an older sibling to the girl in the home. The role of care taking in a home. All of the things that allow our houses to function completely. And I will say that as a woman leader, as a woman, I feel acutely aware of the fact that it's as if we're taking a bunch of steps back in all of the work that we've been able to do. And if you're listening to the podcast today, I want you to pause and think about what you have done to ensure that there is still equity and balance in your household and in your behaviors as you are even running work from your home. Right? Are you paying attention to the fact that the adults around you, mostly women who are probably feeling the burden of taking care of the children and taking care of the house needs, and performing. There could be people who could do a spreadsheet presentation at 11am and run to eat lunch at noon. But whether you can do that right and for everyone listening, Zakia here just raised your hand- I would say you know for everyone who does that more power to you, but are you expecting that will be the norm. Right? And are you attaching a gender label to the person who's able to accomplish that, that's the crux right now. If you are asking the older child in your home to manage the younger child while you're on your spreadsheet presentation at 11 o'clock. Pay attention do you ask the older child who is of a particular gender to do that. There are small things that we in our own homes and in our own communities can actually look at to see how we are promoting gender equity, because in this pandemic right now there are several different inequities that are surfacing, the racial inequities that are leading to a negatively disproportionately large number of communities of color being impacted by the disease. The fact that social determinants of health is a real thing, because we are now seeing communities of color and low income communities negatively impacted by the pandemic health wise, the fact that unemployment numbers equal unemployment number 20.5 million people who are unemployed majority of those are women. And when you break that down further majority of those are women working in low wage jobs, working on unstable hours at those jobs. All of these are inequities. As we began this call, we talked about how the starting point is not the same for everybody. And so today, patriarchy is demonstrating how it's back in full form, and we know the pandemic will be behind us. The question is, will the patriarchal system also be behind us?

ZA: Yeah, I mean, you said the P word, so.

PP: (laughs)

ZA: So, you know, Protima we're talking about wage gap. We're talking about women leadership, and then we also touched on progressive values, progressive policies that we want: immigration, racism, and others. We want society free of all of these evils. Now, going back to Maitri’s work on domestic violence, right, how does all of this affect the survivors? Survivors who are working, either in a very high income job or even in a low income job, they're always getting paid less than the other gender. An immigrant women going to domestic violence is going to a much more complex situation than somebody who doesn't have that immigration situation with her, so maybe you can share, this actually may relate to your work previously before you came to your current position when you are at Bay Areal Legal Aid and we just heard in the introduction about that case: Kumar versus Kumar, maybe you can talk a little bit about how all of these issues are intersecting with domestic violence, and that is the reason why even being a domestic violence agency we are so eager about other issues- we are talking about other issues, we are showing up where these issues are being discussed and demanding that action be taken.

PP: I thank you for the intersectionality because I don't believe that any social justice work can happen in a vacuum. There are moving pieces in our lives. That has never been more clear than it is right now, right, because you think working from home is about having a computer, no it's about having a household that functions without you, it's about having access to the internet, it's about making sure that you have a space in your studio apartment or your mansion whatever that may be where you can actually work- all of those pieces. So every social justice issue, also has many moving pieces, and at the Office of Women's policy as well, ee are very much intersectional. We recently became part of the Division of Equity and Social Justice, where we are talking about ways in which all of our work needs to be interconnected, because a survivor domestic violence could be a member of the LGBTQ community, could be undocumented, she could be limited English proficient, she could have a wage gap issue. Right? All of these are intersectional issues that we need to think about as policymakers to make sure that we actually instill every piece of intersectionality into the way we are planning and programming. When we in 2018 the Office of Women’s Policy worked with the Division of Planning in the county to pass an ordinance for baby changing stations in all restrooms. Right, we don't see baby changing stations in men's restrooms mostly. And now if you're a county building or an unincorporated part of the county, any new construction or any renovation requires that all bathrooms have baby changing stations, and this is not because we want men to change diapers as well, it's because we don't want to be a society that says, the job of changing the diaper only belongs to somebody who uses the women's bathroom. Right? We want to talk about family equity, we want to talk about how our community welcomes all types of families, right, and a simple act like making sure that this baby changing station, which I know doesn't feed anybody and doesn't clothe anybody, but it is our way of saying this too matters to us. And so I feel that you know you talked about Kumar versus Kumar. It began as a domestic violence case, it morphed quickly into a case where there was an annulment of knowledge, and we realized that, wait a minute, the annulment will be sought because the survivor had an immigration benefit. When we peel that annulment layer apart, we realized that what was underlying was a particular benefit that is accorded to somebody who moves to the United States as an immediate relative by the US citizen or the legal permanent resident. So all of those layers were discovered, because back in my previous job at Bay Area Legal Aid, as well as here Office of Women’s Policy, we don't just look up one sliver. Right? And the way I talk about it is when we remember that people who we are serving have different identities, different values and different ways of how they present themselves, that's when we are able to plan around it. The word wrap around services we use a lot. What does that mean? What it basically means is remembering that when somebody is coming through the doors, there is a service that you are competent to provide, but that person may need a lot more. Does that mean you shut your doors? No. What that means is you pause, you expand, and you bring in stakeholders that can help you address those other leads right when I had a survivor who had to move to a location that was a domestic violence shelter, their child was unable to get admission into the school district, so I had to advocate under McKinney Vento Act to say that you can get admission to a school district because of your condition. I never thought I would do education work but I was able to do. So I'm saying that it's important, and it's intentional when you say intersectional, thank you, because you're being intentional in the way that you're serving a survivor.

ZA: And thanks to you for mentioning the wraparound services idea. That reminds me how Maitri came to be. We started out as just a crisis intervention phone line that could provide multiple languages to South Asian survivors and within a few years we realized just taking the call and going here and there with this person is not going to do it. So now look at us after so many years, we have created all these wraparound services right, housing and legal advocacy, immigration program, economic empowerment, mental health support, peer counseling, it's almost a complete wellbeing of a human being, right, and that's how it's supposed to be. Domestic violence, just like it cannot be solved by being focused only on domestic violence, you have to look at other things… for a human being also, the person is a full person, they have many-many different issues, many complexities and otherwise, that we need to take care of. Now, I wanted to ask you about another topic that really is very close to my heart because coming from South Asia, there are so many conflicts that I have heard about when I was growing up, and even now, I'm experiencing this refugee population coming in from Myanmar in my country Bangladesh, where we see that majority of this refugee population is women, and the United Nations, when they put out the numbers for the refugees they mentioned that 50% of refugee population around the world is actually under 18. That means they are children, boys and girls. Now, we know that whether it be the war, a pandemic or an economic downturn, women seem to be suffering more than anybody else. You look at a warzone, you look at the refugee camps, you look at when the economy is crashing in a country, or any natural calamities happening- women are there to pick up the pieces, right? so we are going through such a disaster right now and I'm thinking, what can we do today to make sure tomorrow when this COVID is gone, we can prevent this really burdensome grief that many women have to bear, and not just the grief, but also the responsibility of taking care of themselves, the children and everything else… so I want to hear your perspective on that.

PP: Thank you, Zakia. I want to begin by saying thank you for saying when this pandemic is done because, make no mistake we will come out on the other side. I was listening to a podcast the other day when I heard, “Life has to win every day, death has to win just once.” And so to me it's important that we keep that in perspective, that's why we're hunkered down right now. And we will come out of this. What I want to reflect on is the hard choices that are being made by many families, not only in our county, in our state, in our country, around the globe. Choosing between getting a job and feeling safe at work, right. The crisis. Right. We shouldn't make anybody have to choose between whether you're going to keep a job or be safe at work. People who are struggling with poverty and have to choose between putting food on the table and showing up at work. Right. People who've had to choose between caring for a sick parent or a child or a family member, and going to work. These are all crises that we are now starting to talk about during the pandemic. I am here to say to all of the listeners, everybody is concerned about this topic. These are choices that women have made for decades. They have had to choose, should I take that, that job, even though the hours don't match my house duties, or my responsibilities to my family? Should I take that job, even though it doesn't pay for childcare? Should I take that job even though I don't have enough to be able to put food on the table? All of the choices, and we're now at a time and place in our society where we call upon the federal government to protect all workers and their families from the devastating impact that this pandemic is going to have. Private sector leaders can take a different step, but in a similar direction: pay transparency, flexible work hours, policies that support those who have families. Right? And definitely, one thing I want to highlight. We cannot make these choices at the cost of somebody else. When we are advocating for social justice and inclusion, we're not advocating for one over the other. This is not a zero sum game. There is enough in the pie for everybody to have a share. You know, Shirley Chisholm, who was the first Democratic Party nominee for President candidate, she said famously, “If they don't give you a seat at the table, bring a folding chair.” Correct? And so I'm saying that this is a time for people to look around and say, I can take steps in ensuring that our organization, our private sector company has policies that are conducive to those who have a family, and policies that don't end up overworking those who don't have a family. Just because you don't have a family doesn't mean that you can spend hours and hours and hours at work, and somebody who has a family gets to leave at 4pm for a soccer game. Right? There is a balance that has to be driven and it has to be equitable for everybody. Policies that support women in the workplace are important. Paid family leave, is a thing that's finally being recognized, because of the pandemic. It shouldn't take a pandemic for us to know what’s important. But if you are an advocate and have a voice and have faith in our communities, please promote paid family leave, please promote work hours that are flexible, please promote policies that don't adversely impact somebody who has to choose between work and family. That's not a real choice. You know I never talked about work life balance because what is that? I don't get it. Is there a perfect somebody who has done it perfectly and here's the formula? No, what you need to do in your home and your work is very different from what I need to do in my home and in my work. So I would say that now, we have an essential responsibility, a responsibility we build a better future for women that work, a better future for those who have families that work, a better future in the educational sectors, in the healthcare sector, all of the sectors of overwhelmingly employ women, an opportunity to create policies that ensure everybody inside can succeed at work and nothing else in your life has to suffer.

ZA: Yes, and all of these equitable measures that you're talking about, they can go a long way to prevent violence in our community, not just any type of violence, all types of violence, including domestic violence, and they can foster healthy relationship with individuals right, and that would be such a wonderful thing if we could achieve that sooner rather than later. Now, Protima, we are almost out of time, so I'd like to invite you to share with us activities at your agency that interested individuals can get involved in, where do we get more information, because it looks like you are doing a lot of really exciting things. So, tell us where do we find more information and how do we get involved.

PP: Yeah, thank you. So yes, a big part of what we have to do at our Office is community engagement, because we all learned very early on, community engagement that had been planned was on pause and was very excited that we've been able to bring everything back in a completely different format, a format called Zoom maybe you have heard of it, a format called Facebook Live maybe you have heard of it. I want everybody who's listening and is interested to look up the Office of Women's policy, come up to Santa Clara County and find three very important future upcoming public engagements. One is a three-part series called Youth Voice Live. The first one is on Saturday the 23rd, our guest speaker featured is the National activist, Emma Gonzales, from the March for Our Lives movement, and this three-part series is targeting high-schoolers throughout the county of Santa Clara from grade 8 to grade 12 to learn about how you can have your voice heard as a young person in our community, as somebody who's the future of our community. Registration and all details are on our website. The second thing I want to talk about is missing and murdered Indigenous women. Missing and murdered Indigenous women issue is something that gender based violence activists throughout the country are trying to put a focus on for the last twenty years. The first time in Santa Clara Country in 2019, we commemorated a national day for missing and murdered Indigenous women last year in May, and this year on May 27 at 5:30 there is a Facebook Live event where we brought together a panel that's going to discuss the crises that our indigenous women are facing and responses from the community and what can happen if we work together to raise a voice on this issue. The third thing that I do want to talk about is Strong Girls, Strong Women. For the last nine years, the Office of Women's Policy has been organizing an annual conference, by our girls’ advisory team which is our leadership cohort of young high school girls throughout the county of Santa Clara. We put together a conference for girls and women, and that conference obviously could not happen in March. It was supposed to be on the 21st. And so we are going to have a three-part conference that will be announced on our website for Strong Girls, Strong Women. You can participate if you're a woman, a girl, an ally, or a supporter. And the idea behind our Strong Girl, Strong Women conference this year is to find a way to create space for young girls to advocate on their needs during the pandemic or women to advocate about what it is that they will need to go through this pandemic and recover and for us to work together. So these are three public outreach and engagement pieces. Finally, we will be announcing a training for women on finding work Post pandemic. We know that unemployment is at its highest right now. We also know that in the workplace, what is going to happen when we're looking for jobs post pandemic is there’s going to be biases that women will have to tackle while looking for jobs. And so with the American Association of University Women, we're going to be piloting work-smart training geared towards training women on tools, on how to negotiate at their new jobs, and how to pitch themselves as the ideal candidate, and what it is that they need to do to prep post-pandemic for job search.

ZA: Wow, I wish that, not I wish, I'm planning to attend, you know at least one or two, if not all three of these events. They sound really exciting and I'm truly inspired speaking with you Protima. Thank you for your leadership. And I hope that many counties around this nation, if not all counties, take cues from Santa Clara County on some of these really progressive issues that they are working towards. I would say human development, you know, as a goal, taking the complete human being and, you know, seeing how we can improve their life situation and everything else. So, I like to thank you again for coming to our program, and your support is invaluable to Maitri. We hope to continue to get your support in the coming days.

PP: Thank you for having me on and as you know if this does air during May, it is Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month. To me, it's an honor to have been asked to be part of this podcast and I'm reminded that we have come a long way, as an API population and I'm very honored that I can be part of what Maitri does. I have been for I can't even count how many years and I wish we would all be out of business out here but we're not so let's keep going. Thank you!

NR: Friends, I hope you enjoyed today's discussion. I would like to mention that today's show is part three of our domestic violence and COVID series. If you have missed part one of this series that is Shelter in Place is Not a Safe Option for All, and part two, that is, Be Kind to Your Mind. You can find these episodes, along with all our shows on different topics that matter to our community on SoundCloud, Apple, Google, Spotify, YouTube, and other podcast apps. Search for Between Friends Conversation with Maitri. Please don't forget to like, share and comment. Thank you.