Orange County Celebrates International Women's Day and Women's History Month

Thursday March 8 was International Women’s Day.

Carrboro Mayor Lydia Lavelle issued a proclamation modeled after last year’s recognizing the day.

Lavelle said to her, the day seemed as promoted on social media as it has been all year where she said we’ve seen continued activism by many groups such as women’s marches and the #MeToo movement.

“One of the quotes I had in my proclamation yesterday, it’s one of my favorite quotes, but it was a quote by Abigail Adams, who of course was our first lady, our second president’s wife, Abigail Adams, but she said , ‘If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation,’ so I guess that’s been with us since the early days of our country and certainly kind of loud now,” said Lavelle.

Lavelle said that while she feels fortunate about local government representation in terms of gender in Orange County, that other counties are not as fortunate.

“I was at an event sometime within the last year and a study was presented to us of women at the elected local level office and there was some astonishing figure of how many board of county commissioners in North Carolina have no women on them and in fact have never had a woman on the board of county commissioners,” Lavelle said. “I think it was some staggering figure like maybe 25 or 30 percent, which would be like 25 or 30 counties, since we have 100 counties, maybe never had a woman and maybe even close to 50 percent doesn’t have a woman on the board even at this time.”

Chapel Hill local, Kristen Smith Young is using the month to celebrate a woman every day instagram and twitter.

“I thought what if once a day I featured a woman business owner or entrepreneur and so I started March 1st, I featured folks that are local, folks that are national, and just as a way to highlight different women business owners and entrepreneurs,” said Young. “Some folks have had Chapel Hill High School connections, UNC connections, some are local, but I just want an opportunity to highlight the woman, encourage people to purchase their goods or services and then inspire others because even folks who have seen my posts have responded with their advice for women business owners.”

If you want to participate, Young asks that you message her on Twitter or Instagram @kcs_tarheel, ask the business owners questions or start your own posts about women that inspire you.

Orange County Celebrates International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month

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