CA: State oversight sought for preschool program - Prop 10 (Meathead's initiative)

LA Daily News ^ | 12/14/04 | David M. Drucker

[NormsRevenge]

A lawmaker is scheduled to introduce legislation today to provide state oversight for Hollywood director Rob Reiner's much-heralded, but yet-to-be-implemented universal preschool program.

The program -- funded by Proposition 10's 50-cent-a-pack cigarette tax approved by voters in 1998 -- was supposed to make preschool available for disadvantaged children, but has yet to pay for a single child's education -- despite securing almost $3.5 billion in revenue.

The bill is being authored by Assemblywoman Wilma Chan, D-Oakland. Chan was unavailable for comment Monday.

A recent state audit slammed the universal preschool program, the brainchild of actor-director and political activist Reiner, for spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel and administrative expenses, but nothing on educating children.

First Five California, as it is known, was also intended to raise money for children's health care and child-development programs. And, in fact, tobacco-tax revenues have been spent for those purposes.

Chan and Reiner, responding to the audit's criticism of the preschool portion of First Five, are scheduled to appear together today in Oakland to introduce the bill that addresses its recommendations.

"I look forward to working with Assemblywoman Chan, the Legislature and the governor to institute these reforms," Reiner said Monday in a published statement.

If passed by the Democrat-controlled Legislature and signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the bill would ensure that the "First Five" commissions created in each county to administer universal preschool are more accountable and transparent to the public, according to Chan's office.

The bill also aims to control administrative costs, eliminate the conflicts of interest of First Five commission board members and streamline contracting practices.

[NormsRevenge]

A recent state audit slammed the universal preschool program, the brainchild of actor-director and political activist Reiner, for spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel and administrative expenses, but nothing on educating children.

[nothingnew]

for spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel and administrative expenses, but nothing on educating children.

See my freep handle.

FMCDH(BITS)

[ArmstedFragg]

hundreds of thousands of dollars on travel and administrative expenses

A standard routine in these feel-good programs. Essentially, they handed a big bag of money over to a bunch of liberals and told them to go forth and do good things. Unfortunately, they just assumed they'd understand WHO they were supposed to do the good things for.

And, in the large bags of coin handed over to people category, one of the first appointees in the stem-cell program was one of the bigger proponents of the measure. Another will apparently be Sherry Lansing, well known Hollywood liberal. Picture the kind of program John Kerry would design, and you've got the idea.

[seenenuf]

I've noticed a new TV spot that preaches the absolute necessity of pre-school, implying that without pre-school, a life of failure is assured.
I wondering who is paying for this ad? Perhaps it is Meatball's program?

Where's the ad that promotes a Mom for acting as if the
first 5 years of her childs life, is more important than
her career.

I await the ususal flames re the need for all/most/some Mom's to work, etc., as if that is a legit excuse for those working moms who should have choosen to raise puppys instead of children. But they probably would not have trained their puppys either, but let the government do it.

[Chris_Shugart]

It's called the California Children and Families Commission and First Five is the preschool program they've devised and are endorsing. You can check them out here: http://www.ccfc.ca.gov/ . It's a more or less typical bureaucratic boondoggle that does little except eat up tax dollars. They have meetings, they issue reports, blah, blah, blah. If you're a Californian, you may have seen or heard their PSAs promoting the First Five program (at taxpayers' expense). We must be masochists here in the Golden State. We approved Prop.10  which through the use of tax money, turns around and forms a commission that promotes how we can spend more of our tax money. In effect, we're paying these CCFC bureaucrats to take our money. Now a politician wants to add more bureaucracy in the form of legislation to oversee this mess. We need to stop feeding this monster called California government.