New Breastfeeding Laws Might Be Coming to Wisconsin!

[annettemarie]

http://www.madison.com/tct/news/inde...114045&ntpid=2

New laws to discourage harassment of breast-feeding mothers continue to make progress on two separate fronts in Madison.

Two City Council committees will consider a city ordinance protecting nursing mothers from harassment. On the state level, Senate President Fred Risser, D-Madison, is getting legislative sponsors to sign on to a bill affording breast-feeding women protection.

Women can't be arrested for indecency in Wisconsin for discreetly breast-feeding their children in public, but there's no law on the books specifically allowing the practice, protection from negative comments or being asked to leave public places such as restaurants or stores.

[firstkid4me]

I'm hoping it'll make it to the floor this time, last year it was on the agenda but never heard because something ran too long.

[Sustainer]

Women can't be arrested for indecency in Wisconsin for discreetly breast-feeding their children in public

Hopefully the new law will clarify that you can't interfere with a breastfeeding mother even if she isn't doing it "discreetly"!

[laurdsed]

Sustainer,

There was nothing in the bill or the current county ordinance that say anything about being discreet. I know that Sen. Risser : would never include language like that and the City of Madison ordinance is identical to the Dane County one. I will be testifying at the city committee meeting tonight and hopefully will be meeting with Sen. Risser on Thursday (crossing fingers).
Go Wisconsin!

The reason why the state bill never left committee last year was b/c the head of the health committee wouldn't allow it to (a conservative Republican woman). It was all politics and she didn't want a Democrat's bill to get heard. We're hoping the bill can get heard by the PUBLIC health committee this time. It's really more of a public health issue anyway.

Thanks for posting the article, Janice!

Laurel

[MidwifeErika]

Thanks so much for posting this! We have a LLL meeting tomorrow, so this is a great time to talk about it!