November 19, 2025

Dear Friends and Family,

Since Amazon unlawfully terminated me in retaliation for filing an FTC complaint, pushing to reopen my OSHA case, reaching out to the New York State Attorney General’s office, and now appealing an unemployment decision that claims there is no record of my employment at Amazon (two letters, both dated October 9—one denying benefits, the other still mysteriously “in the mail”), I have been living in the trenches with my boots laced tight. It is hard, holy, exhausting work, but the rewards are real.

This past week I got creative. I have been doing something that feels remarkably close to what Jane Goodall did in Gombe: I moved into the middle of the herd, sat on the corner, flew a sign, handed out our postcards to the President calling for his support (the same ones we mailed in 2012 when Obama was President), collected petition signatures, and gave my business cards to those I engaged in conversation. Slowly, the women who live on the margins decided I was safe enough to approach. I now call this particular strategy of building a groundswell for the White House petition and the Power of 10 call-to-action to pass the ERA in the concrete jungle the “Jane Goodall Approach.”

This week I watched one of the women I had just begun working with being chased down the street by a man while she screamed, “Get away from me! Leave me alone!” The police were called. He was gone by the time they arrived, and she was the one detained. This is a woman who will step into the curb to avoid anyone coming within two feet of her. She has now disappeared—most likely on a psychiatric hold and will be released in about 72 hours, even more traumatized. Another haunting image: an elderly Asian woman I observed for hours as crowds parted around her like water. I had already given away  food donated by locals that day. I stood there contemplating the big picture and the deep intersectionality of the Equal Rights Amendment.

My observation-and-action post is the corner everyone in the neighborhood still quietly calls Needle Park—72nd Street and Broadway on the Upper West Side, a place John Lennon and Yoko once frequented. The benches, the subway entrance, the little concrete triangle where people openly use—this is where I have begun phase one: a Manhattan-style version of Olof’s Brothers Love Feast. There is much groundwork ahead, but hundreds have already offered their support.

When Amazon fired me for championing warehouse workers, the universe spoke clearly: Take the whole ministry to the streets. In that same season, memories of my beloved brother-in-law in the faith, E. Olof Swanson, surfaced strongly. I remembered how Officer Wanderlingh reached out on my birthday during my cross-country ERA pilgrimage, how Rev. Kathryn Piccard and I met Olof the following March at the UN Commission on the Status of Women, how the love between us—two souls dedicated to overlapping missions of justice—continued a generational family ministry straight from the heart. William had passed about a year before Olof appeared in this old historic Dutch neighborhood I already knew well, having attended Rev. Cecil Jenkins’ Friday night gatherings at his church just off Broadway. Those nights shaped us. Jenkins would challenge us kids: “Give me a page, a paragraph, a word by location.” We never stumped him. This was no coincidence; it was a relay hand-off.

And here is where the women live—in the shadows, facing violence from men competing for the same scarce help, behind the cardboard signs that read “Disabled… Hungry… Veteran… Need Help.” It is a no-win situation for everyone.

So I began an informal study, and the stories I am hearing are shattering my heart in brand-new places.

Single women who are not mothers with minor children have almost no shelter beds in New York City—fewer than a dozen dedicated spaces citywide, almost always full. Every night they must choose between sleeping outside in the cold or accepting the “kindness” of a man who offers a warm room, cash, or drugs in exchange for their bodies. Most eventually take the deal because exposure and street violence are worse.

This is not the rare exception. This is the unspoken rule of survival. And without the Equal Rights Amendment firmly enshrined in the Constitution, that rule will not change. We are the ones responsible for changing it.

This Thursday, Tammy Simkins of Chillicothe and I have our second meeting with Senator Lisa Murkowski’s staff to press for the Dear Colleague letter and craft a strategy that actually works—no more delays. A woman dies every 24 hours from male violence in this country. We have watched one delay after another. The voters—men and women—who decide elections are watching now. Women’s rights will not be swept under the rug again. With the new budget deadline pushed to January 30, 2026, there is suddenly real space to move. I will carry every one of these women’s stories into that room. When the ERA finally becomes the 28th Amendment, we will have a constitutional hammer strong enough to smash every loophole that still treats women as second-class citizens in housing, wages, safety, and survival itself.

Thanksgiving is almost here, and we will do what the Van Alstyne family has done since arriving on these shores: give thanks for our country, the President, our government, and most importantly God’s love for all people. There is always enough when it is seasoned with love and gratitude.

If you are anywhere near the Big Apple this Thanksgiving week, come find us at 72nd and Broadway. Bring a folding chair or just your presence. I have postcards, hugs, and a stubborn hope that refuses to die.

And please, let’s finally retire the tired trope that church and state are incompatible, or that religion and politics don’t mix. They do—deeply—and they are intersectional in governance. We can agree to disagree while still finding the common ground that lets us break bread and give thanks together. If you are going to than be accurate it is seperation of specific Church not seperation from God.

Thank you for holding me in prayer while I do this work. I have never felt more useful—or more bone-tired—in my life. The cold drains the body, but this ministry warms the soul.

So maybe I’ll see you on the corner, or better yet, I’ll celebrate with you in the streets the day the ERA is finally law—whichever comes first.

I’m betting on the ERA. We are in the home stretch.

On that note: invoke your Power of One this week. Make a couple of calls now that we’ve cleared the first budget hurdle. Then let’s celebrate the holidays with joy.

With love and Light in Christ,

Helene de Boissiere-Swanson

P.S. If these stories move you and you’d like to help keep me (and the sisters) warm, fed, and fighting through this winter, please consider a quick $20 gift to our 20 for 20 Igniting Equality campaign. Every dollar goes straight to hot meals, blankets, bus passes, legal support, and getting these women’s voices heard all the way to the White House and Congress as we push the ERA across the finish line.