CHEYENNE - D.J. Holste wanted to set a good example for her three daughters.

So she applied for a government-sponsored program to become a certified phlebotomist, a trained person who draws blood for testing.

On Aug. 16, wearing a cap and gown, she stood at a podium near the backyard gardens in the governor's residence and spoke on behalf herself and her seven classmates who successfully completed the 10-week course.

Holste, 52, hit a rough patch last year when her husband moved out and left her with a pile of unpaid bills. She worked at a variety of jobs, sometimes as many as three, including delivering newspapers and in telephone sales, but wasn't making it financially.

Although she was a single parent living at the poverty level, she thought a younger woman who had more children under age 18 would have a better chance of getting in the CLIMB Wyoming program, which aims to place women in higher-paying jobs. Only one of her daughters was under 18 when she applied.

"They accepted me, and then I had to prove something to myself as well, so I had to go into the classroom and shine," she said.

Holste, who can earn $10.66 per hour as a phlebotomist to start at the Cheyenne Regional Medical Center, is one of the thousands of single mothers in the state who are not sharing in the fruits of the vigorous economy that is pulling millions of dollars into the state revenue accounts.

This inequity raises the question of whether the state's equality emblem is tarnished, even as the phrase "The Equality State" accompanies the bucking horse and rider logo on the new Wyoming commemorative quarter.

Holste said she believes the label is warranted, in general. But when it comes to conditions for Wyoming women, she and others say the state has room for improvement.

The most glaring indicator: Wyoming has the largest gender wage gap in the nation. For every dollar their male counterparts are paid, women on average receive 77 cents.

"It's a paradox," said state Senate President John Schiffer, R-Kaycee.

"Our unemployment is down to less than 4 percent, yet our wage disparity still is about the highest in the United States.

"I don't understand it," he added. "I don't know the answer."

Holste had been certified as a heavy equipment operator, but had to give up that type of work because of her family responsibilities.

Men in construction, she said, are reluctant to let women in the job field.

"I believe there are more opportunities for women, but women have to pursue it themselves, because I don't think the men are going to offer it to you," she said. "You have to be aggressive."

"But I think it's come a long way from what it used to be," she added.

Outside the boom

Dan Neal of the Equality State Policy Center said statistics from the Wyoming Department of Employment show the "benefits of the boom haven't spread evenly across the economy."

For example:

* Wyoming men's wages rank 15th among the states. Wyoming women's wages rank 48th.

* In the mining sector, a little more than half of the companies offer their employees some form of health insurance. Because the companies are large, this means that 88 percent of mining industry employees are offered health insurance. But in the tourism sector, which includes leisure and hospitality, only 39 percent of employees are offered health insurance.

* About 40 percent of mining industry companies offer retirement plans, covering 80 percent of workers in the mining industry. But in tourism, the state's second-largest industry, only 11 percent of companies offer retirement plans that cover 44 percent of the workers in this sector, which employs large numbers of women.

"Depending on which sector of the economy you're in can say a lot about your economic situation," Neal said.

The state is doing better in wages because of the boom.

In 1996, nearly 36 percent of the population lived in households earning 200 percent or less of the poverty level - the poor and working poor. According to new Census numbers that just came out, that number is down to 27.4 percent.

Yet one-third of children under age 18 live in households with incomes at 200 percent of poverty level or less - about $20,000 for a family of four.

A 2-year-old wage self sufficiency study said it cost $33,400 per year for a family of four in Big Horn County.

"The poverty level has no reality to what it costs to survive," Neal said.

Slight progress

The state has made some progress by expanding the KidCare health insurance program and increasing salaries for teachers, most of whom are women, Neal said.

Still, Montana is the only state in the region with a lower weekly median wage for women than Wyoming's.

In Wyoming, the median weekly earnings for women working 40 hours a week is $481, compared with $477 per week in Montana and $639 per week in Colorado.

Wyoming has an economy dominated by the energy industry, which itself is male dominant, Neal said. Colorado has a better economy for women probably because of the prevalence of high-tech jobs.

Improvement in equality, he said, is needed in the state both economically and socially.

Sarah Mikesell Growney of Cody is heading the Equality Initiatives campaign, a two-year effort to highlight both the successes and the challenges facing women in the state.

Growney said the state should use the equality motto as "a goal, something to strive for."

The dictionary defines equality as "the social state of affairs where people have the same status."

"In Wyoming today, women do not have the same status of men because of the tremendous wage disparity," she said.

But this is only one problem Wyoming women face. They also have high rates of depression, have difficulty finding quality child care, and many households are headed by single women with children under age 5.

"Let's get back to our roots and re-earn our status as the Equality State," Growney said.

The Equality State Policy Center, meanwhile, recommends the state take the following steps to help women:

* Raise the minimum wage for tipped workers. Many women work as servers in the restaurant business.

* Follow through with its quality child care program to build the capacity of child care providers to offer more and better day care so that working mothers, often single heads of households, can take and retain better jobs.

* Push ahead with expansion of the KidCare program to provide health insurance for more people.

* Take bold action to ensure health insurance and access to quality health care to everyone in Wyoming will provide more economic security to the whole state.

Capital bureau reporter Joan Barron can be reached at (307) 632-1244 or at joan.barron@casperstartribune.net.

To view a slideshow of all the state quarters, please <<A rel="external" href="http://casperstartribune.net/shared-content/story_tools/slideshow/?type=newsmaker&id">http://casperstartribune.net/shared-content/story_tools/slideshow/?type=newsmaker&id=24> ">click here. To view a timeline of the events leading up to the minting of the quarter, please <<A rel="external" href="http://casperstartribune.net/shared-content/story_tools/timeline/?id=9">http://casperstartribune.net/shared-content/story_tools/timeline/?id=9> ">click here.