The Sentinel

Navigating parenthood and professional life: Cari Rincker’s insights on 'The Billable Mom'

SNS - Shelbyville native and accomplished attorney Cari Rincker has wrapped up another successful season of her podcast, The Billable Mom. With a mission to explore the challenges faced by professional mothers, Rincker's podcast has found a steady audience, offering practical insights on topics ranging from time management to maternal health.

The show, available on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, and ListenNotes, features 23 episodes filled with thoughtful discussions and real-world advice. Rincker, who also operates Rincker Law, PLLC, was inspired to start the podcast during maternity leave after the birth of her second child. “I was home on maternity leave holding my sleeping baby in arm and running my life and law practice from my iPhone in my other hand,” she recalled. “I knew I wasn’t the only professional parent facing this balancing act.”

Guests have included a diverse mix of attorneys, entrepreneurs, and coaches who are also parents. Among them are Manu Brune of Beyond Birth Basics, Laura Hanaford from The Trip Trotter, and Mahomet-based photographer Emily Donohoe. Each brings personal stories and professional advice, covering subjects like postpartum health, sleep training, and travel planning.

Legal professionals such as Tiffany Dowell Lashmet of Texas A\&M University, Bloomington attorney Michelle Mosby Scott, and fellow Shelbyville natives Liz Nohren and Kaylee Boehm have also been featured. “I have absolutely loved getting to know these women on a different level and hearing their stories as they are all unique,” Rincker said.

Rincker is now pausing new recordings to focus on curating recommendations for her listeners, including books, software, and other tools. The podcast is sponsored by organizations such as Beyond Birth Basics, Lawmatics, and Minors Co., which supports task management consulting through Asana.

More information about The Billable Mom is available at www.thebillablemom.com. The podcast can also be found on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter X, Pinterest, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Cari Rincker may be contacted directly at cari@thebillablemom.com.

Through The Billable Mom, Rincker continues to build a space for candid conversations and shared experiences—reminding working parents they are not alone in the daily juggle of career and family.

Viewpoint |
Immigrants are our neighbors, isn't that enough?

by Jocelyn Smith
OtherWords

I recall seeing a sign in a yard in my small hometown of around 12,000 residents. “No matter where you are from,” it said, “we’re glad you are our neighbor.”

It was positioned defiantly, facing a Trump sign that had been plunged into the neighbor’s yard across the street. It poignantly illustrated the tensions in my rural Ohio town, which — like many similar communities — has experienced a rapid influx of immigrants over the last 20 years.

The sign’s sentiment was simple yet profound. I found myself wondering then, as I wonder now, when compassion had become so complicated. It seems everyone has become preoccupied arguing over the minutiae of immigration that they’ve missed the most glaring and essential point: We are neighbors.

Small businesses are the backbone of the U.S. economy, a truth so widely acknowledged that it bridges the ever-growing partisan divide.

While writing this piece, I gathered studies and prepared a detailed analysis of the ways immigrants have transformed and revitalized the economies of the Rust Belt. I was going to explain how immigrants have helped fill vacant housing and industry in this region’s shrinking cities to reverse the toll of population decline.

I gathered statistics showing the economic growth and revitalization that’s happened as immigrants have brought flourishing small businesses to their new communities. Like: Despite making up only around 14 percent of the U.S. population, immigrants own 18 percent of small businesses with employees — and nearly a quarter of small businesses without employees. (And immigrants in Rust Belt cities are even more likely to be entrepreneurs.)

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Small businesses are the backbone of the U.S. economy, a truth so widely acknowledged that it bridges the ever-growing partisan divide. Both Vice President JD Vance and former Vice President Kamala Harris have promoted the critical role of small businesses in economic flourishing.

I was going to tell a story about Joe, a vendor at my local flea market. He and other vendors were heavily averse to migrants purchasing the dilapidated building from the previous owner. Now they laud the building’s new management and improved conditions.

I was going to describe the experiences of my recently immigrated high school peers, who sometimes fell asleep in class from sheer exhaustion after working night shifts at meatpacking plants and attending school for seven hours the next day.

I was going to explain why communities not only benefit from immigrants, but need them.

Without immigrants, I learned, U.S. communities would lose the nearly $1 trillion of state, local, and federal taxes that immigrants contribute annually. This number is almost $300 billion more than immigrants receive in government benefits.

Without immigration, the U.S. working-age population is projected to decline by approximately 6 million over the next two decades — a shift that would carry significant consequences, especially for the Social Security system. Sustained population growth is critical to preserving a balanced ratio of workers contributing to Social Security for every beneficiary receiving support.

As immigration is expected to become the sole driver of U.S. population growth by 2040, restrictive immigration policies threaten to undermine this vital program, as a cornerstone of the American social safety net. With broad public support for strengthening Social Security, embracing immigration is not just beneficial — it is essential to ensuring the program’s long-term stability and success.

I was prepared to comb through every dissent in an effort to prove why our neighbors are deserving of empathy and compassion. But none of these answers address the larger, more urgent question: When did being neighbors cease to be enough?

Most Americans still tell pollsters immigration is good for their communities and reject cruel deportations, especially those that separate families, target people without criminal records, or penalize people who came here as young children. My rural Ohio town, and countless communities like it, are slowly learning the most important lesson about this supposedly complicated issue: Compassion doesn’t need to be complicated.