California's Children

CA School Bds Ass'n endorse *both* tax initiatives for school $$

UPDATE, May, 2012: In an "unprecedented move," the California School Boards Association (CSBA) has voted to endorse both tax initiatives that would raise revenue for K-12 schools on the November ballot, reports Kevin Yamamura for the Sacramento Bee.

The two initiatives on the ballot are Governor Brown's compromise tax proposal with the California Federation of Teachers that temporarily raises sales tax and income tax on the wealthiest earners, and Molly Munger's  "Our Children, Our Future, 2012," an across-the-board tax hike sponsored by the state PTA. Read below for previously reported details.

30,000 kids dumped from early ed w/May revise cuts

May 22, 2012: If the $517 million in cuts to early education -- proposed in Governor Brown's "May revise" to the California 2012-13 budget -- are enacted by the Legislature, approximately 30,000 children living in California's lowest-income families will no longer have access to early education programs. (In the past four years, early ed has taken a 42% hit -- nearly $1 billion.)

According to Giuliana Halasz, above, CEO of the Professional Association for Childhood Education Alternative Payment Program (PACEAPP):

 "These cuts will also drive many small [early education] centers out of business, resulting in more than just a business closing: [these changes remove] a child care infrastructure that will be difficult and costly to replace...Early childhood education adds 200,000 jobs and $11 billion to California's economy. This proposal is a job killer for the clients we serve. Women are the losers here. They are a majority of the clients, small business owners and teachers. Governor Brown's drastic budget cuts are a direct attack on our children and their future..."

Also included in the May revise is the Governor's proposal to move administration of subsidized child care from the Dept. of Education to the Dept. of Social Services, essentially gutting the early education component of the program and reducing it to a babysitting service. [Full disclosure: California's Children is sponsored by Human Services Management Corporation, a San Francisco-based company that administers the PACE Alternative Payment Program. The editor of this site, Wendy Lestina, has been an advocate for early education in low-income neighborhoods in California for nearly 50 years.]

May Revise, Part 7: Early ed & child care sliced into fatal nuances

May 15, 2012: The California State Assembly's report on the highlights of Governor Brown's May budget deals a series of blows to children, child-care providers and centers for early education -- and that fact is about all that is clear to the average (or even above average) reader. 

We called Nina Buthee, at left,  executive director of the California Child Development Administrator's Ass'n (CCDAA), for an explanation.

We'll begin with this detail, from the "highlights":

[The proposed budget revisions will] reduce reimbursement rate ceilings for licensed voucher-based providers from the 85th percentile to the 40th percentile of the private pay market, based on the 2005 Regional market Rate (RMR) survey data. License-exempt providers will be reimbursed based upon 71 percent of the lowered licensed ceilings.  This proposal generates $184.2 million in savings.

"This is the really, really bad, dramatic reduction," Buthee says. "First, the reimbursement rate for the voucher programs went from 85% of the RMR to 40% for the licensed programs, and then, for the license-exempt programs" -- this would be payments to, for example, a grandmother, who cares for the child while the mother works or goes to school --are eviscerated. At first you read the number --71%, and you think, okay that's not so bad. And then, you look at the wording closely, 'lowered licensed ceilings,' and you realize, holy mackerel! they mean 71% of the 40%! I don't think that's even minimum wage."

We asked about this change:

[The revision] redirects $95.1 million in savings from the proposed elimination of Transitional Kindergarten to the State Preschool Program.  Specifically, the May Revise proposes to:

Restore the 10 percent reduction to the Standard Reimbursement Rate (SRR) only for the part-day preschool program ($34 million Proposition 98 General Fund).

Expand access to part-day preschool for 15,500 children from low-income families ($57.5 million Proposition 98 General Fund).  However, this proposal continues to disassociate that the State Preschool Program is linked with the General Child Care Program, which allows families to fully maximize the utility of this service by providing full-day/full-year services. 

"What the Assembly [in the "Highlights" document, link above] is saying," Buthee explains, "is that the Governor is doing an artificial separate between part-day state4 prescchool and full-day state pre-school." [NB: "state preschool" are programs that receive state money; i.e., independent centers under direct state contracts, such as, for example, many of the Kidango centers in the SF Bay Area.] "There was initially a division between part-day and full-day. In 2008, the California State Preschool Program Act, known as the Jones Bill, was passed to combine the two programs into one contract and let the centers decide what combination of half- and full-day programs best served their communities. 

"What the Governor did yesterday was to separate them again, artificially -- legally, there is no separation -- and keep the half-day on one budget line, under Prop 98, and full-day on another budget line. The May revise as put more money into part-day and has not cut any provider reimbursements -- and has cut reimbursements for the full-day. The separation is complicated further by another, unrelated division between the two programs -- which, not incidentally, serve exactly the same population of low-income families -- and that is a division between half-day program, that fall under Title 5 requirements of the education code (which is how it came to be classified as eligible for Proposition 98 funding), and the Title 22 vouches for full-day. This is a very complicated, entangled situation.

"Brown's manuevering here gives the appearance that he is keeping preschool slots and not cutting preschool education, when actually, he is. But he is trying to save face with the education community, showing that he is protecting early education."

 

Brown's May revise: Part I, preschool & child care highlights: CCDAA

May 15, 2012: The world of health, education, and welfare in California spent last night analyzing what Governor Brown's adjusted 2012-13 budget, the "May revise" released yesterday, will mean for programs and institutions that rely on state money to provide for the poor, the sick, the disabled, the imprisoned, the unemployed, the very old -- and the children.

"We just don't have the money. This is the best we can do." -- Governor Jerry Brown, unveiling the May revise in Sacramento yesterday.

First, the preschool and child care facts, courtesy of the California Child Development Administrators Ass'n. (CCDAA): 

Eligibility and Reimbursement Levels 

• Continues reduced eligibility from 70% of SMI to 200% of federal poverty level.
• Allows families in education or vocational training to receive child care services for 2 years.
• Expands part-day State Preschool for 15,500 children.
• Restores the 10% SRR reduction to part-day State Preschool programs. Maintains the 10% SRR reduction for full-day State Preschool.
• Reduces licensed provider reimbursement rates from 85th percentile to 40th percentile of the 2005 RMR survey. Reduces license exempt reimbursement rate to 71% of the lowered licensed ceilings.

Realignment for 2013-2014

• Maintains realignment of child care from CDE to CDSS, however, this would be as a separate county block grant to maintain child care funding.
• As a condition of the block grant, county welfare departments will contract with Title 5 centers. Title 5 centers will be “maintained” by CDE, though an annual assessment of the education program.

Other Items

• Maintains no COLA.
• Maintains elimination of Transitional Kindergarten
• Maintains elimination of supplemental reimbursement for Child Nutrition program subsidy for private entities.

CDPI Spring Institute: "Child Care in the Cross-Hairs"

May 1, 2012: Prepping for its annual Spring Institute (Convention Center, Sacramento, May 16-17, the non-profit advocacy group, Child Development Policy Institute, has released the "draft agenda" of the event, which includes noting that state superintendent of public instruction, Tom Torlakson, is an invited but unconfirmed speaker at the evening reception on May  16 at the Citizen Hotel.

At left,  Rachel Ehlers, analyst for the Legislative Analyst's Office, one of the confirmed speakers.

 

DRAFT AGENDA

 8:30 – 8:45 Welcome – Dennis Vicars and Catherine Goins

8:45 – 9:30 The Governor’s Child Care Budget: The Political View -- Senator Carol Liu, Chair, Senate Budget & Fiscal Review #1 on Education (confirmed); Assemblymember Susan Bonilla, Chair, Assembly Budget #2 on Education Finance (confirmed); Assemblymember Holly Mitchell, Chair, Assembly Budget #1 on Health & Human Services (confirmed).

9:30 – 10:00 The Governor’s Child Care Budget: From 30,000 feet; Scott Graves, California Budget Project (confirmed).

10:00 – 11:00 The Governor’s Child Care Budget: The May Revision Detail -- Rachel Ehlers, Legislative Analyst’s Office (confirmed); Sara Swan, CA Dept. of Finance (invited); Frank Mecca, Executive Director – CA County Welfare Directors Assn.(invited)' CA Department of Social Services (invited).

11:15 – 12:00 Early Care and Education In the Cross-hairs; Camille Maben, CDE Child Development Division Director (confirmed); 'Erin Gable, Director, CDE Governmental Affairs (invited).

12:00 – 1:00 Lunch

1:15 – 2:00 Early Education: Selling What Works -- Greg Hudson, Administrator, CDE Child Development Division (confirmed); Eloise Appel,  California W.F.G. Even Start Family Literacy Program – 2003-2011 State Longitudinal Data (confirmed).

2:00 – 3:15 How the Field Sees the Budget Crisis and What is Being Done -- Nina Buthee, Executive Director, CCDAA (confirmed); Michael Olenick,  President, R&R Network (confirmed); Denyne Kowalewski, Executive Director, CAPPA (confirmed).