This special report originally appeared in the September-October 2001 issue of the Children's Advocate, published by Action Alliance for Children.

Prop. 10: Weaving a web of support for young children and families

Creating a network of support

When the Santa Cruz Prop. 10 Commission surveyed parents, "one of the main responses was that parents lack information on existing resources," says Executive Director Rafael Lopez. "There are a myriad of [programs] and how do you navigate it and figure out what to do for your family?"

Prop. 10 calls on county commissions to develop an "integrated, comprehensive, and collaborative system of information and services" for young children and their families. But that's "very challenging," says Diana Altschuler, director of Jewish Family and Children's Services in Sonoma. To integrate their programs, she says, providers of children's services have to overcome obstacles such as "competition, territory, geography, limited funds, legal issues," and more. Nevertheless, county Prop. 10 commissions have come up with a variety of strategies.

Access to information

Home visiting

Most counties are creating or expanding home-visiting programs as part of their Prop. 10 plans. In addition to providing parenting support, the home visitor "hooks parents into existing services in the community," says Altschuler. The home visitor might help families find child care, low-cost health insurance, or ESL classes. She could connect them with help for problems such as domestic violence or an older child's learning disabilities.

Several counties hope to eventually offer home visiting to all families with new babies. Deborah Bremond, family services director for Alameda Prop. 10, says that at first, some people didn't want to offer home visiting to middle class families. "They felt like these are public services for people who are poor. And we said, 'look, that was the whole intention of making it universal, that we could say, we know that all families need support at some point.'" The program, offered to families at all income levels, has had a 95 percent acceptance rate.

Family resource centers

In Santa Cruz, Lopez says, "We heard a lot about people wanting community-based places where they could go to get information on how to help their family." Most counties will use Prop. 10 funds to expand networks of family resource centers.

As envisioned, parents who walk into any family resource center will be able to receive any service they need right there or find an easily accessible link to that service. "For example," says Judy Darnell, director of Santa Cruz's Family Resource Center Network, "if there's [an agency] that specializes in domestic violence prevention, they will offer classes at these five [family resource center] 'hubs.'Or the Parent Center will offer a counselor who will be available a certain number of hours each week at each of these five centers."

Darnell says family resource centers aim to become "community gathering places" with "activities that appeal to the entire community," such as play groups, dental clinics, neighborhood organizing, or family events. The family resource centers will also do outreach to child care providers so they can tell parents about services the centers provide.

Partnerships between programs

Prop. 10 commissions have been encouraging service providers in different agencies to bring their programs together. Jackie Dollar, the Napa County Prop. 10 Commission chair, describes the commission's job as creating "the connective tissue for children's services in the county."

Cross training

Links between programs require service providers to understand each other's areas of expertise. In Alameda County's new home-visiting program, says Deborah Bremond, "training is the huge issue. because no one discipline can provide everything to all families." Home visitors, for example, need to understand infants' developmental delays or mothers' post-partum depression well enough to know when to refer the family to a specialist. Cross training can help child care providers deal with children's health problems and help health care providers learn how to foster literacy.

Tracking families

Several counties are developing systems for sharing information between agencies working with the same families.

It's challenging to create new systems, says Contra Costa Commission Chair Kathy Tabor, "because we have so much to do-it's easy to let it wait. But systems collaboration or policy development-that's where we can make long-term change, sustainable change."

-Melissa Bowen

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