“A gender line…helps to keep women not on a pedestal, but in a cage.”                                            – Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Supreme Court Justice 1993-2020

Ambition and resilience. Connection and growth. Sharing power. In order to survive—and thrive!—as women in the world, we must keep our toolboxes packed with evolving strategies and skills.

Limiting gender roles and qualities are still too often prescribed at birth, especially to girls. Only by removing fixed lines of gender—and including the experiences of BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ women within a broader vision of “acceptable” and possible identities—can our society expand and make equitable the landscape of opportunity. The vibrancy of individuals, families, communities, and workplaces depends on it.

As we celebrate Women’s History Month, Metro recognizes the challenges, diversity, and tenacity of all women, in their unique quests for safe and fulfilling lives. We interviewed a panel of women from King County Metro—working across divisions and spans of time— for this feature. We applaud their accomplishments and appreciate their time, vulnerability, and valuable insight.                    

Trang Pham, Web Producer

If you could talk to your younger self about what you’d face in the workplace, what would you say? 

Growing up, I was taught to listen and follow the rules and the guidelines that are already set up. Working with new technologies, I have learned to pay attention, questions things that are out of place, and make room for changes and improvement. Because often times technologies and people are in constant state of changing and improving, so you need to adapt or you will be left behind. I would also tell my younger self that changes don’t have to be scary and can be exciting, fun, and refreshing.

How have you built and maintained confidence and resiliency over the course of your career? 

As a woman in tech, I have found being around or in talks with other women—and by joining webinars and social hours—has opened me up to many topics and tips on how to have more of an alliance to your fellow female coworkers.

What systemic changes are still needed for women’s equity in the workforce? 

The working system is set up for people who are assumed to have help and support at home. We should have a better working system and hours in place, and could follow suit like Greenland, by working 35 hours/week.

Also, having more supports in our value system, as in better maternity leave, universal healthcare, and affordable daycare, would take away a great deal of the stress from us working women. Which would also help build toward a better future for the younger generations, where they are able to receive moments of connections and guidance much needed from us adults, to learn healthy ways of working. 

Janine Anzalota, Organizational Health & Development Manager

How have you built and maintained confidence and resiliency over the course of your career?  

My parents migrated from Puerto Rico to New York as teenagers. Growing up, I always navigated not being treated as fully American or fully Puerto Rican. Not always feeling belonging is a common theme for people of color living in the U.S. I learned to be confident and resilient because I didn’t have a choice. As a child, my family was really poor. My survival, and that of my family, depended on my ability to navigate systems, be the Spanish interpreter for my mother, and work to contribute towards bills. I started working as a babysitter and cleaner when I was 9 years old and kept working ever since. Resiliency isn’t something I think about as a thing I tap into, it’s something that has protected me. I’ve learned to be confident because as a woman of color, I have had to work harder than men and white women to be seen and valued.

What systemic changes are still needed for women’s equity in the workforce?  

I think it’s really important we center the intersection of marginalized identities of women of color, cisgender, and transgender women. I see it as the responsibility of cisgender women to center all who identify as women, because for me, I can’t separate out my race/ethnicity, my sexual orientation, or my gender identity from the way I live or I am perceived as in the world, and we cannot ask other women to do that either. We also cannot lump the struggles of all women together when we do not experience the same rate of opportunity, pay, safety, or access, because of these intersections. It is everyone’s responsibility to use their privilege to support women of color, cisgender, and transgender.

Kari Lathrop, Transit Facilities Specialist II, and co-lead of Women of Metro Empowerment Network 

If you could talk to your younger self about what you’d face in the workplace, what would you say?  

My first day on the job at King County Metro, I was 19 years old! If I could tell my younger self anything: You are so much more than your job. All of the kind words that people are telling you about you are true. Leave the imposter syndrome back in the past! And listen to your co-workers when they said sign up for a retirement ROTH/IRA back then…retirement is surely coming! I blinked twice, now I’ve been here for almost 11+ years!

Have you ever felt “imposter syndrome”? What people or outside forces contributed to these feelings? Do you feel that your gender is the ultimate reason?             

EVERY. SINGLE. DAY! “Custodians/janitors don’t know anything, they’re too dumb to get a real job.” I’ve heard this numerous times throughout my life. My crew has some of the smartest people I know, having other trades from other countries, and feeling blessed to have a stable job to provide to their families & loved ones.

“Who would listen to the kid in the room?” I’m usually the youngest or only female in the room. It can be daunting at times. The thing is many people in this organization make room at the table for you. It does not matter what your background is or any other factor (sexual orientation, gender, age, place of origin, etc.), most people I’ve encountered here, they’ve made room or made the space safer for me.

I’ve had many factors against me since day one: being young (21 in the custodial crew, or 19 in the landscape crew) and being a female in a highly male dominated environment are major factors. I believe out of almost 40 shop custodians (maybe 34-35?), I am one of three females. And the most senior!

How have you built and maintained confidence and resiliency over the course of your career?  

Ever since I was little, I’ve had this Disney quote stuck in my head: “I’m a damsel. I’m in distress. I can handle this. Have a nice day.” – Meg from Disney’s Hercules

That quote has always resonated in me for some reason. Just because I’m a female doesn’t mean I need a “big strong man” to handle my concerns. I’ve always wanted to be my own hero in my life. Someone has to break that glass ceiling.

What accomplishments and contributions are you most proud of at Metro? What have you been the most frustrated by?  

  • Being nominated for head chairperson and recording secretary for our facilities safety committee meeting.
  • Being voted into our women’s ERG leadership team. To be honest, this seemed the most out there to me.  Many of the participants in the first ever meeting were mostly working in an office.  I came in my filthy uniform, and for the first time, I wasn’t the only female in the room.  I thought to myself when I saw my name on the voting form, “Who would vote for me?  A custodian that is too vocal, too loud, will not fit in with this crowd.” Pigs were flying that day…
  • Having the opportunity to represent Metro in the Women in Trades conference in Seattle Center every year (before the pandemic). The surreal feeling that when I was in high school, I was on the other side of that same table, asking arrogantly why should I work for Metro? I swear I was tricked by awesome people, amazing benefits, opportunities that I knew I wouldn’t get anywhere else, and good pay.

Jan Berlin, Retired Transit Control Center Chief

If you could talk to your younger self about what you’d face in the workplace, what would you say?  

Show up (on time), do the job, get along. Hold my head high, try to get sufficient sleep, and maintain my sense of myself as an intelligent, talented, and creative woman. Make friends with as many women & men of diverse races, cultures and languages as I can. Take advantage of opportunities to learn new skills and work in different areas of the organization, and to eventually be promoted to positions of greater responsibility. Have fun and stay healthy.

Have you ever felt “imposter syndrome”? What people or outside forces contributed to these feelings? Do you feel that your gender is the ultimate reason?  

I didn’t hear this term until the early ‘00s, but its meaning absolutely illustrated my feelings once I started working as an Acting Chief in the Transit Control Center (TCC). Naming and defining imposter syndrome helped me realize how frequently woman experience it. Absolutely my being a woman contributed to the sense that I was “just pretending” and fooling people and that eventually I would be discovered as the imposter I was. I recall one instance, in particular, when I addressed a room full of Vehicle Maintenance chiefs at North Base, around 2010. There were maybe two women in the audience of 50 or so, and I was outlining our new Adverse Weather Plan. I absolutely knew the material and enjoyed the experience and their reception of me was uniformly positive. Still, the entire time I was speaking, the little voice in my head was insisting I would be “discovered”. 

How have you built and maintained confidence and resiliency over the course of your career?  

Mentors. Mostly men, but also some wonderful women that helped guide me. I always maintained confidence in my intelligence and communication skills. Probably the most instrumental person to my career was Carolyn Purnell who served as Metro Transit Executive Director in the early 90s. I was selected to be a Special Assistant to the Executive Director, a 6-month detail that exposed me to high level meetings and negotiations and helped me to develop my confidence and skill set.

What accomplishments and contributions are you most proud of at Metro? What have you been the most frustrated by?  

That I recognized opportunities for short/long term positions in the organization. The variety of jobs I did allowed me to improve my skills and knowledge, not just in transit but also Water Pollution Control (before Metro joined King County) and thus made me more competitive when I applied for permanent promotions. Specific accomplishments and contributions of which I am most proud are:

  • Documenting the need for a fully enclosed driver’s compartment as a response to spitting and assaults on transit operators (1993)
  • Developing a proposal for on-site childcare center for transit employees (1993)
  • Being promoted to Transit First Line Supervisor (1998) and qualifying in the Transit Control Center as a Communications Coordinator
  • Being promoted to TCC Chief in 2009
  • Applying for and acquiring a grant from King County to develop an exercise facility for staff in the TCC 2012
  • Revamping TCC training program for coordinators 2012
  • Rewriting TCC policies and procedures 2012
  • Making friends for life, having fun, and working with some amazing people.

Judi Fisher, Retired Bus Operator

If you could talk to your younger self about what you’d face in the workplace, what would you say? 

I would say you are going to be strongest by how well work you with other people to make your job better. When I started at Metro, they had only been hiring women for a year – maybe 20 women drivers when I started but very few compared to the thousands who were employed. Many of us were gay women as we needed to support ourselves with a full-time union wage job. Many of us got involved in the union and worked to make it more democratic. We became very close and supported each other. Our power was really in working well together. The men, on the whole, were very accepting, although we did have to deal with women driver jokes. 

What accomplishments and contributions are you most proud of at Metro?

I only worked at Metro for six months before we went on strike. Back then, we didn’t have an 8-hour shift guarantee as full-time employees. So sometimes you would get, say, five hours for the first part of the month, for example–and then end up with 13-hour days at the end of the month. We won the 8-hour guarantee.

We also didn’t even have sun visors on some of the buses we were driving, which were old Greyhound buses. Safety was always our major issue. I feel really good about what the union was doing at the time. We were instrumental in many good changes to working conditions.

After 1978, they started hiring part-time drivers and lots more women applied. All the women really connected with each other about the way we were seen as newcomers and excited there were more of us. I am really proud of what we did to advance equity.

I know everything has changed dramatically but in the 1970s, we would reach out to dispatchers when we saw people down on the streets or needing help. We were the conduit for getting people to services. There were a lot of facilities organized to take care of people. After [Ronald] Reagan came in, the money went away and those support systems were taken away. Being out there every day, working the roads, you could really see the change.

When I was the Operator of the Year in 2002, I wanted to do more with that job. My chief at North Base, Patricia VanKirk, set up a plan so I could speak to all the new operators who were coming through the training program. I got to talk to each group about how to survive the job, how to stay on time, how to deal with stress, stuff like that. I was well accepted by these folks. I always thought Metro should do more with the Operators of the Year.

Do you have any advice to female transit operators?

Share your frustrations with each other and take care of yourself physically. It’s a hard a job to do for 30 years and not deteriorate. If you can find exercise that makes you happy, that is really important to surviving the job and doing it well. I have been a recreational dancer all my life. I found ways to have dance classes my whole 30 years [at Metro]. It is so tense being in the driver’s seat for such long periods of time.

The other thing is having a community of friends who are really supportive to share stresses and successes with. You really have to deal with a lot of tension and not let it out with your passengers. 

I got breast cancer in 1999 and went through surgery, chemo, and radiation. I was overwhelmed by the amount of sick leave donations I got. I came back to work in 2000 and had not lost any pay. That was miraculous. I never knew who donated, so I assumed everyone did and I treated everyone like they did. That was 23 years ago. I can’t thank my co-workers enough for being so supportive and loving.