>> good morning, and welcome to "new york viewpoint." i'm ken rosato. today we bring you a new book, "the working dad's survival guide," which has great information for dads on combining fatherhood and the world of work. we'll also have with us the organization my elder advocate with advice for seniors and their caregivers. but first we bring you dumbo moving and storage, which is one of new york's top moving companies, with 56 trucks and 4 tractor trailers. just this april, in fact, they announced a partnership with nyc mammas give back. that's a nonprofit that provides support for the more than 11,000 at risk. joining us in our studio are lior rachmany, who is the founder and c.e.o. of

dumbo moving and storage, and shana rubin, the founder and executive director of nyc mammas give back. thank you so much for both being with us today. >> thank you. >> well, first off, how did this partnership come about? >> well, we received an e-mail from the co-founder, allison, about reaching towards providing, as you said, to needy families. we are actually getting more and more calls from customers -- what to do with items that need to be disposed or to be given away, and we didn't know how to go about it. so, we are happy to get that call, and we reached out right away, and from that point on, we established this relationship, and we are more than happy to provide the services, and i'm sure nyc mammas are happy as well, providing this to the families. >> wow. so, what are the

tangible things that you do to help get donations? >> so, basically, we've partnered with dumbo moving because we needed help with pickup and storage and delivery. >> yeah, i can imagine. >> so, what do we do? so, basically, we get e-mails every day and we have people responding to these e-mails, and then we coordinate deliveries with dumbo to get the items picked up to our storage facility, and then at that point, we have volunteers going through and sifting through the items to match them and assess them and clean them, and then we deliver them to the agencies. >> let's take it back to the very, very beginning. what was your mission statement? what made you have the impetus, the spark that gave you the idea to start this out? >> so, the very beginning. so, my son was 3 months old. i had just basically given birth. and i looked out my window, and i saw a homeless pregnant woman on the street, and she was there every morning. and i just had this visceral reaction to help her.

items that we weren't using to her, and she wanted them, and she was very gracious. she was seven months pregnant with a baby girl. and she didn't even care that i was giving her some boys items. that's how much need that she needed. that's how much she needed. so, basically, she needed a couple items that i didn't have, so i reached out to the upper east side mamas. it's a facebook page. and we got -- it was so moving. we got hundreds of donations and responses. it was very overwhelming, and it was so powerful. we've got items, we had mothers saying, "i'll store items." and that's when we started storing items citywide. we had five drop-off points. and then people would be e-mailing me saying, "where's the nearest drop-off point?" and i would send them to that mother's apartment, and then we'd have another mother picking up items and bringing them, and we all stored in our apartments, including my own. >> that's awesome. lior, we got to take a minute here. just tell us about your company, because you're a new york company. we need to find out -- 56 vehicles and tractor trailers, one of the biggest in the whole city. tell us some background about

>> so, we established it 2007. we launched our operation. since then, because we provide competitive pricing and the flexibility and basically the operation for the need of new yorkers got us to be one of the largest companies and fastest-growing company. our product is for all segments of the economy map, from lower class to upper class. >> so, because you are geared to the new york lifestyle and mentality, that's what makes you a success. and the question now is, what do you specifically do to help this group, nyc mammas? you guys literally take your trucks when they're not being used for moving, when they're kind of docile, if you will, on the rare occasions that they're not being used, and go out there

and do pickups of donations? >> correct. so, i think shana mentioned the biggest challenge that we have -- i mean that they have in terms of door-to-door service. there are a lot of trucking, and salvation army and whatnot that basically pick up to a larger scale of warehouses and stores. but the door-to-door service with all the small details -- certificate of insurance for the building, timing, time restrictions of the building, time restrictions of the warehouse. so, we kind of answer all of that. for us, it's just a walk in the park. >> that's the key because this stuff could get damaged otherwise, but because you have storage, you have all that, that's all taken care of. you already have your insurance, so that's all in a one-stop shop. so, what's been the reaction now from the people you've been helping through nyc mammas, et cetera? >> so, we have partnered with very large social agencies, social-work agencies -- sanctuary for families, henry street settlements,

safe horizon. we just got an e-mail from wic, and actually sanctuary for families reached out to us actually from that first response. so, we've -- i mean, i think the number is concretely -- we've helped 400 children, but it's many, many more because a lot of these agencies haven't been keeping track of the donations being provided. but we get e-mails on a daily basis. can you help this family, can -- we just got an e-mail from the hip-hop summit youth council via henry street settlement. some children just went through, like, a severe trauma and they were living in poverty and they needed specific items, so we called dumbo moving and we had a truck sent out and delivered each family packages. prior to that, we had volunteers go and match at storage, and i just want to say we also have donated storage space from manhattan mini storage. but we have outgrown that storage, so dumbo is providing us with extra storage as well. >> oh, how nice. dumbo's doing a great job. so, this is basically your public-service outreach to the community. >> one of them, yes. >> that's amazing. good for you guys for doing

that. that's awesome. truly a new york company all the way. that's fantastic. >> we are very surprised to see the reaction from the donating families. they are very happy to donate, and obviously to find shana's organization because the problem is people don't know what to do with their items, so that's a >> that's fantastic. >> and i was thinking about it because i think new york sometimes gets a bad rap. no one says hi to each other in the street, we're kind of cold, but it's so the opposite, especially -- i was getting a little sentimental just this morning thinking about just the community and how everyone's really come together -- dumbo moving, manhattan mini storage. we have proskauer law firm helping us. we have many, many agencies just coming forward, e-mailing us saying, "we'd like to help." agencies, mothers in any way that they can. i mean, we need more help, but it's really moving to see the community come together, and i think for lior and i both, it's

building new york. and i think that new york city mammas not only helps these women and families and children we're donating to, but it helps us 'cause a lot of women in a lot of families want to know and moms want to know, "where do my items go to?" and we can tell them directly where they're going to. >> that woman right there, that man right there. >> right, 'cause the agencies reached out to us and said, "hey, there's an emergency in the domestic-violence shelter. "there's a mother who just had twins who had to flee her relationship and now she's living in a shelter and she left everything and she doesn't have a stroller." so, you know, i'll reach out to the community online and i'll say, "hey, does anybody have a twin stroller?" then i'll reach out to lior. "can you come and pick this up for us?" and then that's how we get it to the agency. >> it's because of good, compassionate people like the two of you that this city still functions and has a heart. thank goodness for both of you. thank you for dumbo moving and storage, lior. thank you for you and your company. and thank you so much for your compassion and your goodness, shana. it's a nice thing that you're doing and nyc mammas for all the help. >> thank you.

and we're 501(c)(3) now. >> there you go. so make a donation to this group, and you can do it with dumbo moving and storage. thanks for being on this morning. we're gonna be right back with a new book, "the working dad's survival guide," and it takes a look at dads as parents and

>> welcome back to "new york viewpoint." i'm ken rosato. when it comes to working parents, the focus is usually on mothers and issues like maternity leave. as an indication of how much things are changing, we bring you a new best seller, "the working dad's survival guide." it's a book that takes a look at what dads can do to be better parents and employees. please join me in welcoming the author, dr. scott behson. he is a professor of management at fairleigh dickinson university and a national expert on working-family issues. good to have you here. >> hi. thank you for having me. >> terrific to have you here.

well, what inspired you to write a book about this balance of issues, if you will, especially in a man's life? >> well, there are millions of dads outside there, myself very much included, and lots of people watching, who care very much about our careers and work very hard at our careers, but also we're putting the time and the work in to be really involved, hands-on fathers, and i had never seen a book that really spoke to that reality, and so i'm excited that "the working dad's survival guide" will provide my fellow busy working dads some advice, some encouragement of how they can still succeed at work while being very involved fathers, the kind of dads they always wanted to be. >> do you see a changing in society? because you had, of course, the "traditional" old role, the moms at home raising kids and the dads would come home, smoke a pipe -- heaven forbid today -- smoke a pipe and read the paper and then their relationship with the kids would be "hi, son" and pat on the head and that would be it. of course, that was -- we're talking about something 60 and 70 years ago.

what was the impetus in changing that relationship? >> well, i'm not exactly sure that was always the accurate perception. >> maybe in tv and movies that was the relationship. >> dads have always been involved parents, but today's dad faces a new set of challenges. and in fact, research shows that dads today work as much as they ever have but spend three times as much time with their kids and do twice as much housework than just a generation ago, and in large part this is because of most of us live in dual-income households where the husband and the wife -- the two spouses -- are splitting the responsibility for earning outside of the home and doing all of the work that still needs to get done to run a household and to raise children. so, roles are different today and are much more fluctuating, and it's a time of change for a lot of dads, and as you said before, a lot of us maybe our role models or our fathers did it a little differently, so that's why i think it's important that there's a book that provides some guidance, some stories of fellow dads who feel pretty successful in

balancing work and family, some who haven't quite gotten there and sharing some of their stories and advice, and that's what i tried to do in "the working dad's survival guide." >> so, what are some of the secrets to the proper balance? >> well, i think first things first is too many of us kind of drift through life or we get stuck on a path and we don't really think about it. so, the first step is really to consider our priorities. what is it we want out of life and out of our family and out of our career? one shot at our kids' childhood, and we need to think about this. too many of us choose a career right out of college or when we're young, before we have a family, and sometimes we get stuck on a path that's not right for us anymore, so we need to consider those types of things, and once we think about our priorities, then there's a whole host of decisions we can make in our workplaces, how we can advocate for ourselves or navigate our workplace. and also things we could do at home in order to open up more family time, but it starts with really understanding what our priorities are and then trying to make choices that lead us to our priorities.

>> well, there you go. i guess that answers the next question because i was going to ask you -- what about you work your whole life toward that great job or that great position. you get the great position. you thought you had your priorities as "x," and all of a sudden now "y" presents itself, if you will. position. now do you adjust your priorities a little bit? what happens in that case? >> something that a lot of people forget is that careers are very long. careers are 40, 45 years, right? so, there's different paths you can take and there's different roads you can take within your careers. so, if it turns out that what you thought was a dream job, it doesn't fit with the rest of your life, now we need to consider what needs to change. does our career need to change or do we need to build support or other things around our personal life? in the book, i very much say you do not have to do it like i do. you do not have to be a "modern dad" who's doing 50% of the household. it's whatever suits you, your priorities, your spouse's

priorities, and what suits your family. so, if you want to go for that corner office, go for that corner office, but just be clear about what you're getting into and you understand the choices that you're making. and if you want to have more of a shared-care approach with your children and your spouse, well, then that's another set of choices, but at least we're making intentional choices, which is really the key to leading what's a successful balanced life. >> and what kind of conversation do you have with the children so that they understand that they're still number one, if you will, that they're still a very important part of a life or the most important part of a life and not second fiddle to the career? >> sure. well, i think the real important thing is to manage our time both at work and then outside of work, and make sure that we set aside chunks of dedicated family time where more spontaneous things can happen during those periods of time. so, if we have every saturday morning is your bike ride with your kids or family dinners are always family dinners or, as one dad who i interviewed in "the

working dad's survival guide" did, there's no screens in his house from 6:00 till 8:00 p.m. for anyone. no cellphones, no tvs, no computers, and that's two hours of family time that they get to be together, and by sending that signal that "when i'm with you, i'm with you," that's a very important signal i think that dads and all working parents need to show their kids. >> are there more companies today -- or are companies today, would you say, more open to allowing their employees to have that shall we say priority with their families? >> well, we're getting there. i think that corporate america is finally recognizing that this is a very important issue in order to get good employees and keep good employees, that we support them in the reset of their lives. now, a lot of companies recognize this and they're starting to wrestle with it, and we're not quite there yet, but the progress we've made in the last 10, 15 years in a lot of workplaces is quite remarkable. but the fact is for many working

safe to out yourself as a very involved parent sometimes because there could be blowback in your career because of that. but if we manage our careers and if we understand how to negotiate and we understand what the dynamics of our workplace are, we can start making choices and start advocating for ourselves better in a workplace. >> i've seen -- hey, abc is one of the biggest companies in this country -- disney. and i see what this company does for its employees when there are family issues, and it's like family's first. so i can't understand why midsize companies can't look at the big guys and do the same thing. it works 'cause it builds a loyalty among employees. >> right. well, actually big companies tend to be leading the way and companies you wouldn't think of. places like bank of america have extremely long paternity leaves that they offer their employees, and the big global financial firms and silicon valley tend to be very generous when it comes to family time and other things, which you wouldn't think of. they're very competitive workplaces.

but the fact is they see the need to hold on to their really good people and they're willing to take a long-term view of their employees, and i think when employers take a long-term view, then the business case for supporting employees as parents really becomes apparent. >> dr. behson, thank you very much. wise words. >> thank you so much. >> and good luck with the book. it is a very important thing for people to consider, and if you run a company, listen to this. all right, for information on all the organizations featured on "viewpoint" and if you've missed part of the show, you'd like to see it at your leisure, do visit us at abc7ny/viewpoint. we're coming right back with an organization called

>> welcome back to "new york viewpoint." i'm ken rosato. with the growth of aging baby boomers, the number of americans

age 65 and up is expected to double in the next 25 years. elders and their families face a host of care-related challenges, including struggles over guardianship, long-distance caregiving, as well as the potential for abuse. please join me in welcoming jack halpern, who is the c.e.o. and founder of my elder advocate, who has had more than 41 years experience as a former nursing home executive. good to have you here. >> thank you very much, ken. thank you for having me. >> thank you. what led you to create my elder advocate? what was the impetus and your mission in that? >> the impetus was i started to work in nursing homes when i was 24 years old. i'm now 66. at first, i thought i was a little crazy, but when i got into a nursing home, i started to meet a lot of the elders. and i discovered from them the way they wanted to be treated and had sort of an epiphany. i met a guy named sam, who's a quadriplegic, and he taught me a

the field that i was going to stay in and help elders get dignified, safe, and good care. >> okay. well, what are some of the most common care-related crises are affecting elders today? >> some of the most common care-related crises are certainly people over 65 or 70 have a very good chance of ending up in a hospital, maybe with breaking a hip or having a stroke, so they go into the hospital and face what i call hospital chaos. they might have to spend some time in a nursing home for rehabilitation. some have to spend time long-term. they might face a situation with long-distance caregiving, where mom's in one state and the children are in another state. they might even face issues with nursing homes where there's neglect and abuse.

>> so, what tips would you have in anticipating potential challenges among the elderly? what should we do to prevent any potential challenges that could arise now? >> well, certainly elders, after a certain age -- i would say about 60 -- they have to get their legal documentation in order. they must have a healthcare proxy. they must have a power of attorney. they must deal with geriatric physicians -- not just regular g.p.s. they have to see them on a regular basis. they have to have their financial house in order. they have to consult aging in place, make sure their homes are ready for when they become older. and certainly they should have discussions with their families. let their families know what their situation is so the family can help at the time of crisis. >> mm-hmm. and i know it's something that people never like to think

about -- getting older and being a burden. so, i mean, should they plan the inevitable? should they plan the -- when the day comes -- the funeral and the expenses? should that be something that advance? >> planning is the essential element in all of this. i think many people think that they're going to have an elder -- care event or you might have to go to a hospital. they think they're going to be in the hospital and be able to recuperate quickly. or they might go into a beautiful facility for rehabilitation. but that's not the way it happens. hospitals are quick to get people out, quick to get them into rehab and nursing homes, and so, certainly planning is an essential part of this. >> okay. and what about the difference between, say, some of the public hospitals, some of the private facilities? i mean, there are different

so, should people be really doing their homework now to see what is best in terms of what you have in terms of your income? >> absolutely. they have to do their homework. they have to do things like get long-term care insurance. they have to see what resources are in their areas. they can't just wait for the event to happen, so they must be aware of many, many situations. they have to consult professionals earlier, consult elder advocates to do planning with them so they know what to do every step of the way. once you plan these things and there's an emergency situation, a professional can come in and deal with it right away. >> yeah, i'm in my late 40s, and i now am at the age where i have all my friends who are now going through and i am in the process of going through with my parents -- this is the age where you prepare, and i now know people who are just 10 years older who some prepared, some didn't, and

the ones who didn't are the ones going through the nightmares. so, it really is so important to prepare, isn't it? >> it is very, very important to prepare. it's important to become knowledgeable. it's even important to begin to go to support groups, maybe with their parents to find out what's going on. this is something that you can't be in an emergency and then suddenly hit a website and start to learn what the process is. >> what about setting up like a trust or things like that with parents? >> well, certainly for medicaid purposes, people should be setting up a trust. they should be consulting elder-law attorneys to help them do with that so that they can cover the cost. so, many people will go to an elder-law attorney to prepare a trust for them and trust for their children so that they

have to spend $125,000 a year. >> look into it. >> look into it. and get long-term care insurance. long-term care insurance is like life insurance of the old days. >> it pays for everything. mr. halpern, thank you so much. we're out of time, but it is so essential. don't think it'll just get done. it is good to have you here today, sir. and i'm ken rosato. we thank you again for joining us.

>> thank you so much. whatever life throws your way, you've got it in the bag. you've got t.j. maxx! keep your standards high, and your spending low.