This article originally appeared in the July-August 2003 issue of the Children's Advocate, published by Action Alliance for Children.

Children's Advocates Roundtable

Key federal children's programs: expect changes!

This year many key federal children's programs must be "reauthorized" by Congress, including Head Start, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (CalWORKs in California), the Child Care and Development Block Grant (main source of funds for subsidized child care), and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, main source of funds for special education). The Bush administration, children's advocates' groups, and others have used this opportunity to propose major changes, which Congress is now considering.

Head Start big issues:

State control of Head Start-The Bush administration proposed to make Head Start a "block grant" to states and give states control over Head Start programs. Child advocates campaigned against this proposal, saying that it would weaken federal quality standards, including requirements for family support and comprehensive child development programs. The bill now in Congress would give eight states control of Head Start as a pilot project.

School readiness-The administration bill would require Head Start programs to put a priority on instructing children in prereading and premath.

Teacher qualifications-The current proposal would to require all teachers to have an associate's degree in three years and half to have bachelor's degrees by 2008.

Contact: California Head Start Association, 916-393-1600, www.ca-headstart.org

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families big issues:

Increase in work requirements-The Bush administration wants to require parents on welfare to work 40 hours a week-up from 32-and to increase the percentage of families that must meet this requirement, from 50 percent to 70 percent. The proposal also reduces states' flexibility on what they can count as a work activity.

Tougher "sanctions"-The administration would require states to cut off a family's whole welfare check if the parent has broken a rule. Currently California and some other states "sanction" parents by cutting off only the parent's share of the check.

Aid for recent immigrants-Advocates have pushed to allow legal immigrants to receive welfare if they qualify. The administration wants to continue the current ban on welfare for recent immigrants.

"Superwaiver"-The administration's TANF bill includes a "superwaiver" provision that allows heads of federal departments to give states permission to cut or change a wide range of programs to help low-income people, including child care, housing, job training, and welfare.

Contact: Children's Defense Fund, 202-628-8787

Child care & development big issues:

Quality set-aside-The bill currently in Congress would increase the funds that states are required to spend improving the quality of child care, from 4 percent to 6 percent-some advocates proposed to make it 10 percent.

Level of funding-President Bush's budget calls for no increase in child care spending despite the tougher work requirements in TANF. Child care advocates are pushing for an increase in federal child care subsidies for low-income families.

Contact: Children's Defense Fund, 202-628-8787

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (special education) big issues:

Funding-The original law set a goal that the federal government would provide 40 percent of the funds necessary to provide special education-currently it provides about 18 percent. So parents of children with special needs want an increase in funding.

Discipline-When a child with special needs shows problem behavior, current law says the school has to take the special needs into account and address the reasons behind the behavior. Some school districts want to remove that requirement.

Lawsuits-Another proposal is to limit lawsuits against school districts for failing to meet special educational needs.

Individual education plan (IEP)-Some districts want to the law to require an IEP only once in every three years-now it's required every year.

Struggling students-Parents are divided over a proposal to use up to 15 percent of federal special education funds for children who are struggling but lack a specific, diagnosed disability.

Contact: Parent Advocacy Coalition for Educational Rights, 952-838-9000, www.pacer.org or E-Parent, 866-393-3734, www.eparent.com

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A plan to break budget gridlock

Californians for Budget Accountability, a coalition including the League of Women Voters, Health Access, California Tax Reform Asso-ciation, and many other groups, is working to place a major tax-reform measure on the March 2004 ballot (when state Democrats will vote on the Democratic presidential candidates).

The measure, called the Budget Accountability Act, calls for changes in the state budget process. Among other things, it would:

• Allow the legislature to pass tax and budget bills with a 55 percent majority. Now any tax or budget bill needs a 2/3 majority to pass, a requirement put into place by Prop. 13, passed in 1978.
  
  
• Reduce the salaries of the governor and legislators for every day they fail to adopt the state budget after the legal deadline of June 30.

For more information call Anthony Wright, Health Access, 916-442-2308 or Trudy Schafer, League of Women Voters, 916-442-9210.

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The Strategic Alliance for Healthy Food and Activity Environments

This coalition of public agencies and private nonprofits, including the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, California Food Policy Advocates, the Prevention Institute, and others, is leading a campaign to change our schools and communities to promote active and healthy lifestyles.

"First steps"

The Strategic Alliance has outlined "first steps" toward reducing childhood obesity in California:

• Eliminate commercial food sales in elementary school
• Set higher nutritional standards for food sold in middle and high schools
• Eliminate all soda sales and contracts with school districts
• Eliminate advertising for unhealthy foods in schools
• Increase state funding for school meal programs to permit better quality
• Give school district food service directors more control over food served
• Change the "food package" given in the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program to include more fresh fruits and vegetables and less cheese (high-fat) and fruit juice (high-sugar)
• Make school facilities available after school and on weekends for recreational and fitness use
• Enforce current requirements for physical education (PE) and improve PE programs
• Study the effectiveness of these changes.

Key areas for action

In addition to these first steps, the Strategic Alliance calls on the food industry, government, the health care system, and the media to change their practices to create healthy environments. The Strategic Alliance says:

• The food industry should adopt guidelines for the responsible marketing of food to children and stop using popular sports figures and cartoon characters to promote junk food.
  
  
• Government should work to improve the availability of nutritious food and safe places to exercise. It should not subsidize foods that contribute to poor health (such as school lunches that are high in fat and refined carbohydrates).
  
  
• Health care providers should educate their patients and the public about nutrition and activity and advocate for healthy environments.
  
  
• Media should shift the focus of obesity-related stories away from individual weight loss toward healthy eating and activity, pointing to the need for policy and environmental change.

For more information about the Stra-tegic Alliance, contact Leslie Mikkelson and the Prevention Institute, 510-444-7738, www.preventioninstitute.org; Jessica Reich at California Food Policy Advocates, 415-777-4422, www.cfpa.net; or Dr. Harvey Goldstein or Stefan Harvey and the Center for Public Health Advocacy, 530-297-6000, www.publichealthadvocacy.org

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Sacramento: Push for better food and activity

SB 19 (Escutia), which passed last year, banned commercial food and soda and elementary schools and the sale of soda in middle schools before and during lunch. It also called for the state to add 10 cents per meal to school food programs, to make it possible to serve healthier food. But the budget included no funds to make it possible. Children's health advocates are lobbying hard this year for funds to implement this law-but in the current budget crisis, it's an uphill battle.

Meanwhile, though, the legislature is considering some other bills to improve children's nutrition and fitness:

• SB 677 (Ortiz) goes further than last year's bill: It would ban the sale of all sodas and sweetened beverages K-12 by 2006.
  
  
• SB 678 (Ortiz) and SB65 (Torlakson) would both require school districts to hold public hearings before making any contract with a soda or food company and make the contracts public.
  
  
• SB 70 (Torlakson) would require the California Department of Education to offer training to after-school programs on physical activity curriculum.

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AB 231: The Save Money Cut Hunger Act

California Food Policy Advocates (CFPA) is campaigning for a bill that would help many more eligible people get food stamps-and save the state money. CFPA says AB 231 (Stein-berg) would:

1. Stop fingerprinting people who get food stamps. That process costs the state $10 million a year, discourages many people from getting food stamps-and does little to stop fraud.
   
   
2. Take advantage of the federal option to automatically give people leaving welfare five months of "transitional" food stamps. That would bring food to families and bring $80 million in federal money into the state.
   
   
3. Let people apply for food stamps by phone or mail, instead of the current requirement of face-to-face interviews, which are difficult for many people to get to and cost the state more.
   
   
4. Eliminate the rule that a family can't get food stamps if their car is worth more than $4,650. Most states already allow families to own reliable cars and still get food stamps.

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