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UD 022 527
Rubin, Victor; And Others
Children's Out-of -School Services and the Urban
Fiscal Crisis.
California Univ., Berkeley.
National Inst, tff Education (ED), Washington, DC.
Nov 80
G-80-0004 *
186p.; A publication of the School of Law, Children s
Time Study. Some tables marginally legible.
MF01/PC08 Plus Postage.
♦Children; City Government; ♦Community Services;
♦Cultural Activities; Economic Factors; Equal
Facilities; Family Characteristics; *Financial
Problems; Libraries; Local Government; Museums;
Policy Formation; Political Influences; Recreational
Facilities; *Recreati,on Finances; Summer Schools;
Urban Areas; Urban Problems
♦California; *Propcsition 13 (California 1978); Time
Studies
ABSTRACT
The impact of urban financial ciises on the provision
of recreational and cultural services for children, primarily by
local governments, is explored. Emphasis is on the effects upon
California's children's services of Proposition 13, a tax relief
initiative limiting property taxes in that State. Data from an
Oakland, California, surveyors presented to provide background on
the characteristics of children who use such services as parks,
museums, libraries, and zoos, and on the frequency of service use.
This is followed by a description of the political and economic
contexts of services provision, including decision making processes
and financial considerations. It is emphasized that, wh^e public
support of Proposition 13 was not a mandate to reduce or eliminate
children's services, the resulting reduction in government revenues
had that adverse effect. County and local government responses to the
need for austerity in a period of financial crisis (such as closing
of service site, staff reductions, user fees, and private
sponsorship), and the inadequate consequences of these responses for
different children, are described. In conclusion, the future of
children's services is considered. (Author/MJL)
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* Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made *
* from the original document.
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U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION
CENTER (ERIC)
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CHILDREN'S OUT-OF-SCHOOL SERVICES
AND THE URB/IN FISCAL CRISIS
ERIC
BY
Victor Rubin and Elliott A. Medrich
with
Hedva Lewittes and Mary Berg
A Report to the U. S. National Institute of Education
(Grant No. OENIEG800004)
^ Children's Time Study
^ School of Law
lT> University of California
Berkeley, Ca. 9^720
o
November, 1980
CHILDREN'S OUT-OF-SCHOOL SERVICES
AND THE URDAN FISCAL CRISIS
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter I
Children's Out-of-School Services in
an Era of Uncertainty •
Chapter II
The Clients: Who are the Users of Out-
of-School Services
Chapter III
Urban Fiscal Strains and Children's
Services
Chapter IV
Children's Services Under Fire: The
Struggle for Survival after
Proposition 13
Chapter V
Children's Out-of-School Services and the
Fiscal Crisis: Present Circumstance
and Perspectives on the Future
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
Summer School in the Wake of Proposition
13: Ancillary Educational Services
Under Fire
Children's Time Study: Setting, Sample,
Design
Source Material for the Analysis of
Proposition 13 Impacts
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3
/ 1
CHILDREN'S OUT-OF-SCHOOL SERVICES IN AN ERA OF UNCERTAINTY
In Paul Goodman's remarkable retelling of the Horatio Alger
myth an advocate of experiential learning intones:
What we want for you, boy, is a life worth living,
and that's Culture, that's Education .. .What we
want to give you, boy, is the Habit of Freedom.
The streetwise truant remains skeptical, however:
First you say, no school! Grand! Then you say
there'll be a leader draggin' me around. Not
so grand. Then you say we don't get life but
a selection of life. So you have a school
after all! I seen 'em walkin 1 along the street
two by two on the way to the Aquarium! . . .
Include me out! Freedom is freedom - you
don't have to teach me no freedom! 1
Young Horatio has grasped the most basic dilemma of out-of-
school life — its simple pleasures are too important to be left
in the hands of children. Since some very important lessons
are learned outside school, children need to be "given" the proper
"selection of life." Toward this end, over time many recreational
and cultural activities directed at children have become a social
responsibility .
Romantic notions of children's autonomy may be appealing, but
in contrast the creation, planning and budgeting of\recreational
and cultural activities is a complex business. Within the public
sector it is an activity done not only in the name of children,
but for society as a whole, and our commitment to providing these
opportunities" has been substantial . Yet, nearly a-century after
their inception, the providing institutions are in a precarious,
marginal postition. Today, the urban parks, recreation departments,
9
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1-2
libraries, museums and other facilities which serve children are
in a predicament with potentially devastating consequences. They
must contend with both a crisis of resources and a crisis of pur-
pose. This is a study of how they are managing and what is at
stake for children.
In this monograph, we are concerned with a whole range of
services and programs that have, over time, developed pro-educa-
tional agendas—agendas which either directly or indirectly
complement traditional school activities. The linkage may be
ambiguous but those who, provide these out-of-school services
are often quick to justify them as learning experiences, enrich-
ing or supplementing the school curriculum. One
salient difference, of course, is that children use these facil-
ities and services voluntarily and even those who participate
do not "learn" the same structured lessons that the schools are
expected to provide. ^
This informality makes it difficult to measure the precise
impact of these services on the educational achievement of young
people, but their relationship to issues of learning and develop-
ment has always been prominent. The vagaries of mandate and pur-
pose are reflected in the history of out-of-school, publicly pro-
vided services for children. At times they have been in the vanguard
of social change in the inner city, and at other times they have
been the most concrete symbol of the child-centered suburban
"good life." They have served as a safety valve for social control
of aliented, unemployed youth, and they have also been the emmis-
saries of "high culture" to the "masses."
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1-3
There have been periods when these institutions seemed to
lose their basic purpose, only to gain a new role as conditions
changed. They have periodically been financially strapped, only
: * to find new funding, sometimes from highly unlikely sources.
Crises are certainly nothing new. But what we see as unique
today is the convergence of a critical shortage of fiscal
resources with an unprecedented level of conflict about the
proper ways to provide these kinds of services for children. The two
issues are intertwined, of course. Sometimes issues of program
purpose and effectiveness are cited as a reason to reduce fund-
ing for children's services. $ In other cases revenue shortages
force programming reforms aside in a single-minded push for fiscal
survival. Both crises must be confronted however, for neither
will soon recede. The impetus for changes in programming comes
from shifts in socio-cultural values, family c structure ,
leisure, sex roles, and other basic life patterns. The resource
scarcity is a function of the broader fiscal crisis of the public
sector. This heavy agenda of structural problems, and the crisis-
management ambience which envelops many urban institutions, sug-
gest that there is something more than fun and games at stake.
The Search for Legitimacy
Throughout their history cultural and recreational services
have struggled to be taken seriously. That this battle has not
been won can be clearly seen in countless recent confrontations
over municipal budgets. The most frequently voiced sentiments
have been: that these "quality of life 1 ' programs do not compare
< 6
• 1-4
in importance to the "essential city functions" such as police
and fire protection; and that the non-essential services, if
they continue to exist at all, should make greater use of volun-
teers rather than trained professionals. These two arguments
threaten ±he core of legitimacy of cultural and recreational
institutions. The strength of their position largely depends
on two beliefs: that they perform valuable social, educational
and economic functions; and that they require skilled, profes-
sional, paid staff in order to operate properly.
The quest to overcome marginal status within local govern-
ment has been continual since the advent of municipal systems
for recreation and culture at the turn of the century. The
services had their origins in philanthropic efforts directed
toward urban immigrants and their children/ These sand gardens,
community centers and reading rooms were seen as vehicles that
could help children assimilate mainstream American culture,
including leisure behavior. Many of the services were intended
expressly to address the needs of children from broken homes,
or to offer refuge from the "squalor" of tenement life. However
effective the programs may or may not have been, they were gen-
erally recognized as necessary and essential. By 1920, social
reformers and budding professions had succeeded in turning largely
privately funded programs into local public responsibilities,
The assumption of public Control was the successful conclusion
of the first "marginality crisis."
1 7
1-5
The new cultural and recreational services carved out a
niche in the sphere of social reproduction, roughly between the
school and the family. Like the school, they were a form of col-
lective consumption. No working-class families in the early
twentieth century could have 7 individually provided their chil-
dren with the facilities and opportunities offered by the new
programs. Also like schools, they were thought to be merit
goods, whose benefits were -shared not- only by clients-but by
society in general.
On the other hand, the service providers fought hard to
distinguish themselves from the schools in many respects . One
prime difference was the absence of compulsory attendance at
cultural and recreational institutions. No child would be "forced"
into a library or community center. Related to this was the
notion that in these voluntary settings children could develop
their individual potentials, away from the homogenizing drudgery
of the classroom. At their best, librarians and recreation
leaders could enliven books, sports or crafts for students
who were turned off by their school's homework, physical educa-
tion or shop class (or who had dropped out of school altogether) .
The sometimes cordial, sometimes testy rivalry among services
for the attention of children has been a constant theme in -this
history and is today as relevant as ever.
The relationship of the new services to families entailed
much more than the above-mentioned aspect of collective facili-
ties. Most early recreation workers were essentially social
ERIC ^ 8
workers for whom helping families was a basic- mission. Sometimes
this meant removing the children from the hoi£e as much as pes-
sible, both to relieve the pressure of overcrowded tenements
and "to inculcate vaj-ues which were assumed to be lacking at home.
-There were also other therapeutic approaches, however, which
encouraged families to recreate together in the community center
or park. And of course, many of the new centers, especially the
settlement houses fostered the solidarity ©f neighbors.
There were several ideological strands within recreation, as
within all the helping professions, and some were more respect-
ful of the working-class family than others.
In the last several decades service providers have employed
some highly .resourceful strategies- to overcome successive margin-
ality crises. These strategies have included courting new con-
stituencies and client groups; developing a social service exper-
tise (by providing compensatory education or therapy) ; establish-
ing channels for financial assistance from higher levels of govern-
ment; and redefining the boundary between public recreation and
private amusements. At present all four of these strategies ^
can readily be observed. Throughout this monograph we will
examine these strategies in historical context and in the situa-
tions where they are currently being pursued.
Children as Clients
In most of the services considered in this .study children
are often the most numerous, but not the only clients. The
children's component of each recreational and cultural institution
operates -within two political frames of reference: that of the
" : 9
,v • . 1-7
service (e.g. libraries, museums) 5 and that 'conponent of the service
pertinent to children's status. It is worth noting briefly three
-aspects of the politics of children's services which bear directly
on the issues that will.be analysed in this study. ^
1. First, children have little or no voice in the creation
or administration of most programs: The concept of the "best
interests of the child" is generally predicated on the assumption
tha't adults will be determining and defining the scope of activ-
ities. This is self-evident or unavoidable in many contexts, of
course, and debate consequently revolves around which adults are
to exercise their judgment (parents, judges, psychologists, social
workers,, teachers, etc.). In the realm of recreation and culture,
however, children's rights are problematic in several respects. Sane
have argued that the very concept of play — the most visible form that ■
'some of these activities take, regardless of more subtle
developmental agendas-- should involve minimal • adult
interference. "The "right to be left alone" is thus important, and
its limits are continually tested in playground design, art instruc-
tion, library rules and any number of other situations.
Even so, in most cases children are planned for, argued over
and manipulated much more often than they are consult^ for their
opinion about the design or the management of programs. There ,
are youth councils of various kinds, and occasional surveys, but
they are not viewed as powerful or influential decision-making
centers. The most effective statements children can make about
programs and facilities are to "vote with their feet," either by
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10
participating or staying away , The essentially volu||ary. nature
of the domain makes this possible and distinguishes it from com-
pulsory services such as schools.
It has been argued that children's, services are comparatively
disadvantaged because, unlike many other services, the primary
clients cannot take part in the political process. The increas- ,
ing involvement (and manipulation) of children "and teenagers
in demonstrations to defend programs may be a sign that some
people are trying to overcome that weakness.
2 A second aspect of children's service politics is that,
in the broadest sense, children go in and out of fashion. The
readiness- with which taxpayers or legislators will vote for
increased spending or new programs in education, recreation,
j
health and other services fluctuates in accordance with demo-
graphic, economic and social factors. While this is difficult
to understand and explain, the phenomenon can be 'clearly seen
in indices ranging- from the fate of .school bond elections to the
proliferation of adults-only housing developments. The general
consensus seems to be that the later 1970 's represent a downward
stage of the cycle for children's interests, contrasted (often
in the false light of nostalgia) with the child-centered 1950's.
The generally unsympathetic climate for children
. is partly a function of their reduced numbers at
the present time.. This is due largely to a decline in the number
of children born' to each woman, a-nd an increase in mothers
ages at the birth of their first child. The "shortage" of
1-9
children is not. permanent, and the next upswing is expected
around 1985-1990.
The demographic shift has led to the closing of schools
in many communities and a decline in the demand for certain
other children's services. Concurrently there is increasing
resistance by non-parents to supporting these services through
taxes, and' a growing age-segregation -in many housing markets.
In some cities it has been documented that more than half the
rental housing is barred to families with children even as home _
0 " 2
ownership becomes unfeasible for more -young families. The
result is a metropolitan landscape dotted with emergent "life-^
^ cycle ghettos.," much more strongly delimited than in the past.
The concept of a society unsympathetic to children also
touches deep-seated cultural frustrations. The inadequat|
performance of schools and other services, the persistence of
stagflation, and a-, general economic and social" malaise all seem
to be telling parents that hard work will no longer ensure a
better future for their offspring. We are treading on tricky, .
very subjective terrain here, and only wish to suggest that
what popular sociology has dubbed "the end of the American Dream-
is a force to be reckoned with.
3. A third general quality of children's services is that
they frequently' endow those who work in them with second-class
professional status. .Children's librarians, recreation supervisors,
museum personnel and others all consistently report that many
financial and promotional rewards of their professions and agencies
0
Ac - 12
1-10
are denied them, at least partly because they work with children
rather than adults. - ^
The majority of people- who serve young children are women,
including 99 percent of children's librarians and 82 percent
of elementary school teachers. Yet the proportions of women in
management and administrative positions \are very low, and in some
cases (including school superintendences) actually declining.
While many of the sex role , stereotypes within the human services
3
professions are being broken, progress has been slow. Many
professionals feel that there is an additional increment of
discrimination which is specifically directed at those who work
with young people.
Inequality
The services we are concerned with here have never been pro-
vided equally to all American children, nor have they often
achieved the standards of equity laid down by the professions or
the courts. The issues surrounding the equitable provision of
cultural and recreational services have their own peculiar history
.and logic. While in some respects the situation is analogous to
•that of public schools, there are crucial legal and empirical
differences. The issue of who gets what, and at what cost, is
central to our inquiry. Though the services as a whole may be
in crisis, the effects will be felt very differently in the cities
and suburbs, and in rich and poor neighborhoods within cities.
Race, sex, income, family structure and other characteristics
of a child's "life circumstance" play an important role in deter-
mining .his or her opportunities.
r i
1-11
Attempts to measure the quality of municipal recreational
and library services have usually focused on their inputs — the
resources which are allocated. The most important input is,
of course, money, and measures of operating expenditures per
capita (or per child) are commonly employed. Unequal expendi-
tures have often been challenged in the courts when a class of
discriminated persons can be identified. As a consequence of
many court decisions, on constitutional grounds it has been
easier to show discrimination against racial groups than economic
classes, age groups, or other categories of possibly underserved
. 4
people .
Other things commonly measured to determine service qual-
ity are facilities and capital stock — library books and films,,
park acreage, number' of tennis courts, and so on. Professional
associations and planning agencies are continually revising their
r
standards of per capita "requirements" for capital equipment and
land, but the levels in most inner cities and many suburbs have
always been consistently well below these targets. This, of
course, raises the question of how useful standards of this sort
really are.
In recent years an increasing number of performance criteria
and output, or "outcome" measures have been developed for
municipal services. Program budgeting, survey research and a
variety of other management tools have been brought to bear on
recreation and cultural services, as a way of finding out who
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1-12
actually uses the services, whether they are ccst-ef f ective ,
and whether they seem to be having an impact on the clients.
These findings sometimes conflict with the results of studies of
inputs. 5 A broad disparity in per capita operating budgets
between two library systems may not be matched by broad disparities
in attendance or circulation. Conversely, different districts
can spend identical amounts on a service and achieve vastly dif-
ferent results. Inequality of service outcomes does not currently
have the legal standing that inequality of inputs has achieved--
only the latter convincingly qualifies as unequal treatment under
the law. However, with each passing year there is a greater social
pressure for the recognition of outcomes. The Children's Time
Study, from which some of the data reported in this study is
taken, is a prototype for a certain way of measuring the impact
of children's recreational and cultural services. Time Study
data is especially relevant to the study of out-of -school publicly
provided services because it contains extensive information about
family time structures. One consequence of sustained budget cut-
backs is greater dependence on parents, especially mothers, to
facilitate their children's participation in out-of-school programs
Parents are differentially equipped with time, money, transporta-
tion, -and other resources to handle these tasks. "Privatization"
of this sort is already a source of increased inequality in
post-Proposition 13 California.
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15
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1-13
Aside from the question of resources, we, are concerned
with the types of programs offered to children. Recreation has
a long history of ethnic and sexual stereotyping and segrega-
tion. For decades, libraries and museums offered only the
cultural artifacts of mainstream white, middle class America.
The pluralistic explosion in all of these institutions in the
1960's and 70' s is one of the truly significant changes in their
'history. The changes encompassed not only content but also the
forms of service delivery and the composition of the w©rk force.
Even as these innovations were beginning to make a measurable
impact, they were starting to fall in the wake of budget cutbacks.
In this monograph we will discuss service disparities in a
wide variety of contexts, using a number of different indicators.
We will compare neighborhoods within the same city, and different
cities within the sane county or state. We will compare the
experiences of blacks and whites, boys and girls, affluent and
poor children. As we shall see, for the more poorly served
communities and individuals the "era of limits" began years
•before the current tax revolt and recession.
In this chapter we have provided synopses of four general
themes which dominate this account of recreational and cultural
services for children. These include:
- the convergence of prolonged fiscal crisis and a crisis
of basic purposes and principles.
- the continuing efforts of the services to overcome
marginality and gain legitimacy as professions and
government functions.
- the special circumstances and vulnerability of programs
for children.
- the changing but persistent inequalities in the distribu-
te . tion of program costs and benefits.
16
1-14
We will elaborate each of these themes in this study, focus-
ing in particular detail on the fiscal dilemma that has so dras-
tically altered the circumstances and conditions under which
California municipalities provide children's out-of -school recrea-
tional and cultural services.
DEFINITIONS AND BOUNDARIES
The primary focus of this analysis is publicly sponsored
recreational and cultural services for children . However , to cover
the subject adequately we must explore some related topics.
Following are five kinds of distinctions that will affect our
inquiry .
1. Public and Private Services
The problems of private youth-serving agencies are closely
related to the fate of local government. In many respects the
two sectors complement each other, but in certain situations they
directly compete for resources and clients. As already mentioned,
the initial impetus for many programs came from private, non-
profit organizations started during the Progressive Era. In
some circumstances foundations today still provide "seed money"
to underwrite innovative programs. More common these days,
however, is the private agency whose dependence on government
subsidies and job training funds eclipses its philanthropic
support. When this happens, the sharp line between private
and public services is blurred. This takes on special importance
in light of massive public service cutbacks. Some private agencies
17
1-15
have been overwhelmed by a rush of too many new clients, while
others have aggressively recruited new program participants from
the diminished public sector. Furthermore, from our own research
it was clear that most preadolescent children did not know whether
the sponsors of programs they used were public or private.
Consequently, at various points we shall mention quasi-public
and- private service agencies, including YM-YWCA, Scouts and others.
Commercial leisure activities are also of some interest, especially
in terms of their relationship to the public sector.
2. Local, State and Federal Funding for Childre n's Services
Our primary interest is locally administered and funded
institutions. It is important, however, to note the small but
growing role of the state and federal government in the field of
urban recreation and culture. This support has taken the form of
grants to localities for development of facilities (e.g. acquisi-
tion of parkland, construction of libraries), and support of the
arts, of which a sizeable component is directed toward children.
A second kind of higher level governmental involvment in the •>
provision of children's services may result from the "tax revolt."
The replacement of local property taxes with state level funding
may lead, some say inevitably, to greater state control of munici-
pal institutions.
In California, there has been no such administrative
shift in the first two years since the passage of Proposition 13,
even though the state's financial contributions have greatly
increased. This lack of change may be only because few long-range
plans have been implemented as yet.
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1-16
3. Distinctions Among Types of Services
There are important differences in the structures, tradi-
tions, political bases and basic missions of recreational and
cultural service institutions. We do not intend to underplay x
■ these differences, and in fact they are a key element of the
analysis . _ .. .
Longstanding rifts such as between public and school librarians ;
between parks and recreation administrators; or between physical educators and
Little League coaches reflect different priorities within the com-
munity of children's service providers. These differences range
from ideological disputes about the most effective environment
for informal education, to comparisons N of the cost/benefit ratios
of various modes of service delivery.
However significant the characteristics of individual
services may be, their cumulative impact on children, and their
collective future, are the more basic issues. We hope, in fact,
that one result of our work will be greater mutual awareness of
common problems among the people working in these services.
\ >
4. Services for Children in the ConteXt of Services for the
General Population ~ \
To understand the status of services to children within
an institution which serves clients of all ages, it is necessary
x to study that institution's overall structure. Libraries, museums,
and recreation. departments provide services for several specific
age groups, in addition to their general offerings. Sometimes
age-specific services grow and decline according to the latest
pedagogical fad, or the latest budget cuts. (Library programs
for "young adults," for instance, seem to be a recent casualty.)
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1-11
In this report we will examine the ways in which the bureaucracies'
overall budget and operations affect their programs for children. *
The other side of the story, whereby children serve to attract
resources and legitimacy that enhance an agency's overall standing,.
will also be explored.
A clarification is in order concerning our flexible use
"of~the wo"rd ""children. " "in some cases we are referring to
All minors served by an agency. But where specific life cycle
references are intended, we will endeavor to be clear. Adoles-
cents, toddlers and pre-adolescent school-age children are dis- - —
tinct groups, of course, with some very different needs. The
last group, pre-adolescents , receive the most attention in this
' monograph, because they were the subjects of our field research On the
other hand, many of the service providers _who were interviewed for this study
addressed issues faced by young people at all stages of development.
5 . California versus the Nation —
Most of the contemporary* evidence in this report comes
from municipalities in California. Almost all of the primary
source material (interviews and surveys) were collected in the '
San Francisco Bay Area. However, the basic issues and the
results obtained are not only relevant in California. As we shall note,
with regard to children's services, the conditions described are basically similar in state
throughout the country. The services and their corresponding
professions have many common practices and operating styles.
The structure of local government varies among cities, of course,
but much of that variation is found within
„ . . j- 6 Many cities
California. J
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20
.X . .
1-18
elsewhere have seen their budgets strained to the same point as
Oakland or San Francisco circa 1979, for other reasons but to
much the same effect. It is clearly a national phenomena.
Where unique circumstances appear to be a pre-
vailing influence on children's services, we will so note and
explain. However, rt is our hope that the information and
analysis in this report will be useful to people throughout the
country who are concerned with the future of cultural and recrea-
tional services.
THE DATA
This monograph is based largely on four types of data
'about children's services. These will be introduced briefly here,
with the technical details reserved for appendices.
interviews with Service Providers
During the past three years interviews have been conducted
with scores of professionals who work in parks and recreation
departments, libraries and museums. Our subjects ranged from
entry level children's librarians to the chief city librarians,
and from play leaders to . directors of parks and recreation
departments. There is a cross section of age and ethnicity among
\he men and women to whom we talked, and they represent a broad
rangKof experiences in child-serving agencies. . Most of the
respondents were employed in the cities of Oakland and San
Francisco, or in the suburban communities of Alameda and Contra
X.
Costa Counties.
21
1-19
Also interviewed were the ' members of city managers' or
mayors' offices who' had responsibility for preparing the budgets
for cultural and recreational service agencies. In addition, we
spoke with leaders and rank-and-file activists within the unions
representing workers in the various municipal and county agencies.
Several interviews were also conducted with faculty members
of Bay Area universities who taught training programs in librarian-
ship and recreation.
Interviews covered a wide range of topics. The
questionnaires were varied to suit the role of the particular
subject, but most respondents in each round of interviews commented
on a comparable set of issues. The earlier, round, in 1977 and
1978, focused on the subjects' perception of their work; their
relationships as service providers with children and parents, with their profession,
and with the organizational environment. Respondents
were also encouraged to describe their motivations for entering
the field, their sense of how children's services have changed during the course
of their prof essional -'lives and what the future holds.
The second round of interviews, conducted in the Spring
of 1979, was directed at exploring the fiscal crisis precipitated-
by California's Proposition 13. The interviews offered a detailed
look at. the budgeting and decisionmaking process of urban public
bureaucracies. The consequences for children of California's
tax rebellion emerged clearly as those people close to the
decisions described the outcomes.
ERIC 22
1-20
o
In almost every instance we were given excellent coopera-
tion by our subjects. The' general tone of their responses was
satisfaction that "outsiders" were interested in their work.
The fact that we did not pose as advocates of their existing pro-
grams did little to diminish most subjects' belief that more
public dialogue could only help their situation.
2. The Children's Time Study
The Children's Time Study research project, of which this
monograph is one product, undertook various studies exploring
7 • /
children's use of discretionary time. Time spent outside of
school represents a large and important component of children's
lives about which relatively little is known. The Children's Time
Study developed a new approach to measuring and analysing five
"domains" of discretionary time use—television viewing, partici-
pation in organized activities; chores and jobs;- free play and
parent-child time use together; and school achievem-nt.
The principal instruments of the Time Study was a survey
conducted in 1976 i Children from the sixth grade of Oakland's
public schools were interviewed in their homes by a trained sur-
vey researcher and, at the same time, a parent completed a self-
administered questionnaire in a separate room,. The Study involved
764 families and featured a cross-section of the city's public
school enrollment. Appendix B describes the survey sample charac- .
teristics. *
ERIC
23
0
1-21
The survey has 'extensive information about children's use of
publicly provided services: parks, recreation centers, schoolyards,
libraries and other neighborhood-based facilities. It contains
accoifhts of each -child respondents' visits to community-wide cultural
facilities, museums and regional parks. The data on the social
and economic background of the -children are also extensive, permit-
ting detailed analysis of the use of facilities by various types
of children. There is also data on parents' attitudes about the
"~ ~~ — ______ it
quality of services and their importance to- children. Finally,
information from other studies of Oakland's public services has
been brought to bear on the Time Study data, to see if the avail-
ability of programs, facilities and services is a major determinant
of children's time use patterns,.
Publications on the Tax Revolt
While local taxes and what they pay for have -long been a sub-
ject of general concern, the last two years in California have been
a quantum leap in research in the field. Even a partial listing
of the sponsors of research on "the effects of Proposition 13" shows
the broad range of constituents which include, among others, the
National Association of Social Workers (California Chapter) , the
Urban League, the California State Library, the Children's Rights
Group, 4 the California State Department of Finance, the Institute
for Governmental Studies and the California Commission on Govern-
ment Reform. There are. even several new publications, such as the
Tax Revolt Digest, aimed at keeping up with the escalating information
ERIC
24
f
v 1-22
flow. In preparing this report we have reviewed this great range
of studies and evaluations. In addition, we have analyzed* many
hundreds of 'newspaper accounts describing the fate of children's
services in cities across California.
Professional Literatures
Each of the services examined here has been the subject of
extensive research about its history, principles and practices. ^
The histories range frhm uncritical "in 7 house" chronicles to
skeptical revisionist analyses of the social role of these urban
institutions. For our somewhat eclectic mission, the entire range
of material has been useful to us. Similarly, although textbooks
and evaluations of the state of the art in recreation or librarian-
ship tend to quickly become dated, they too proved to be useful
indicators of the conventional wisdom within these professions on
matters of planning for children. There is also a con-,
siderable recent literature on innovative approaches to the delivery
of children's services. The new writing, especially in recreation,
reflects the influences of sophisticated quantitative management
techniques,on the one hand, and humanistic psychology and philosophy
on the other.
Worthy of special mention here is the long tradition of empiri-
cal research on the use of neighborhood facilities. Since the
community studies of the 1920' s, sociological methods have been
applied to the questions of who uses recreation, libraries and
other leisure services. The marriage of urban social analysis to
public policy is not always fruitful, but there have been some
9
valuable contributions through the years.
o
ERJC , 2
rr
1-23
. •,/ O RGANIZATION OF THIS ANALYST'S
L
We focus here on the fiscal condition of publicly provided
cultural and recreational services for children. To begin with,
however, it is necessary to locate the place, of these activities
iir children's daily lives. In other words, before trying to under-
stand how contemporary trends in local government finance are
affecting children's out-of-schocl services, it is important to
' ' ' know about the constituency for these services and the range of need
needs that they appear to fulfill.
With this as background, sections IIP and IV examine the cur-
rent fiscal environment of local government and the particular
service's in question. After describing some of the factors affect- "j
ing the provision of human services by local government generally,
we will focus directly on children's services — exploring the process
of decisionmaking within children's programs, between competing
agenices, and among different levels of government. Here we shall
confront California's Proposition 13 and examine its particular
impact on services for young people.
Section V reflects on our findings and considers the ways
in which Porposition 13 is changing the provision of children's serv-
ices in Caiifornia. The changes seem to be taking place at three
levels: immediate, often unplanned response to budget "shortfalls ;
structural reorganization of the service delivery systems; tna a ^
reformulation of the fundamental boundary , between public and private
spheres of childrear ing . In other words, the current debate,
' which this report can hopeuflly inform, is not only about what the
services can do for children in the future, but what they should do.
1-24
In Appendix A we present an account of the impressive growth
and abrupt decline of summer school in California. Significant
differences in financial and administrative contexts required us
to separate summer school from the other services being reviewed.
Nonetheless, as the most prominent early victim of Proposition 13,
summer school is a prime example of the tenuous position of
programs intended to enhance children's educational experience.
ERIC ■ 27
Chapter One
Notes
Paul Goodman, The Empire City (New York: Bobbs-Merrill ,
, - 1942) p. 122.
Dora J. Ashford and Per la Eston, The Ex tent and Effects
of Discrimination against Children in Rental Housing
A Study of Ffve California Cities (Santa Monica:
The Fair Housing Project, 1979).
Accounts of recent efforts to combat sexism in library
work can be found in publications of Women Library
Workers (Berkeley, Ca.): WLW Journal and SHARE
A Directory of Feminist Library Workers (Second
Edition, 197b).
The most noteworthy "service equalization" case is
Hawkins v. Town of Shaw : 437 F.2d 1286 (5th Cir.
1971). For a good review of the issues see
Robert Lineberry, "Mandating Urban Equality: The
Distribution of Municipal Public Services," Texas
Law Review , 53=26, 1974).
Frank Levy, Arnold J. Meltsner, Aaron Wildavsky,
Urban Outcomes : Schools , Libraries and Streets
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974 ) .
Library and recreation services are provided by cities,
counties, special districts and school districts.
Cities vary in their charters and forms of govern-
ment, some' with professional city managers and others
with strong mayor systems.
See Appendix B for a description of the Time Study
Survey. For an extended analysis, see Elliott
Medrich, Judith Roizen, Victor Rubin and Stuart-
■Buckley, The Serious Business of" Growing Up:
A Study of Children's Lives Outside of School
(Berkeley: University of California Press,
forthcoming, 198l)'.
See, for a broad range of -modern techniques, James F.
"Murphy and Dennis R.' Howard, Delivery of Community
Leisure Services: An Holistic Approach , (Philadelphia :
Lea and Febiger, 1977)-
28
1-26
Robert S. and Helen M. Lynd, Mlddletown (New York:
Harcourt Brace, 1929); R. Havighurst, Growing;
Up in River City (New York: John Wiley, 1962);
and Celia» B. Stendler, Children of Brasstown
(Urbana, University of Illinois, 19*19) are
useful in this respect.
ERIC
29
II
rpHF. CLIENTS : WHO ARE THE USEP S OF OUT-OF-SCHOOL SERVICES
This monograph focuses on a variety of out-of -school activi-
ties and programs for children, many of which have "educational"
or (in the traditional sense) "pro-educational" agendas. It is
not possible to know with certainty the degree to which these
activities affect in-school achievement. However, there is
little doubt that they contribute to children's development and
well being and that they are part of the important link between
out-of-school life, in-school learning and school performance.
To understand the argument we will develop in this monograph it is first
important to know how these various out-of ^school activities fit
into the lives of children. Using data from our Oakland survey
of children v/e begin by locating these activities within children's
activity patterns. This provides a backdrop for the assessment of
how. the eroding fiscal condition of the providing agencies
may be affecting children.
' In this report we shall focus on services and facilities
provided by public agencies and intended for use by pre-adolescents ,
(tholugh not "necessarily exclusively by them) . We must distinguish between
!
types] of activities and be aware of the locus of program provision. "Facilities"
and "programs" represent two distinct categories of children's out-of-school serv-
ices! f ° rme ^ settings ( e * g# a school Y ard or a P ark ) * th ^
latter are activities , ' organized and structured in varying degrees
(e.g. sports, music, dance), - These categories are not necessarily mutually
exclusive. All programs, for instance, are provided at facilities.
But fo|r our purposes we characterize a park as a facility (for it
tends to be a place children go to play on their own) , and a recreation
center i as^ a program (for children who go tend to make use of the organ-
II-2
ized activities it provides).. The two loci of services considered
here are "neighborhood" and "city/region." The former represent
decentralized opportunities, close to home, often intended to
maximize access for children. Schoolyards and branch libraries
are prominent examples. The latter demand larger "catchment areas"
to generate a user population, hence they are typically limited to
relatively few citywide or regional locations. A zoo or an aquarium
fall into this category. Here we shall distinguish neigh-
borhood level facilities uch as schoolyard, parks, and branch
libraries ;from citywide or regional level facilities such as museums,
zoos, aquariums and "special interest activity centers" (e.g. the
San Francisco Exploratorium ,and Marine World, a commercial theme
park) .
CHILDREN'S USE OF SERVICES: THE NEIGHBORHOOD LEVEL
The following sections draw data from the Oakland Time Study
Survey and report use levels across a range of facilities and serv-
*
ices available to children in that community. We begin with
neighborhood-based activities and, in the later sections , examine
use of citywide and regional services. s
i
* Appendix B provides backgron information on the Survey and the
• characteristics of the sample. A scan of that material before read-
ing further may help interpret the data presented here. ■
0
ERIC
31
II- 3
Schoolyards
In many communities the most readily available out^of -school
neighborhood facilities for children are playgrounds, often located
adjacent to public elementary schools. In California, for instance,
there are specific State Department of Education guidelines requir-
ing the provision of open space for recess and organized play.
Schoolyards sometimes include recreation centers administered by
municipalities, thereby providing a comprehensive after-school
leisure activities complex. Even in the majority of cases, where
there is no adjacent recreation center, every primary school provides,
minimally, some kind of open space. These may be small ,, fenced-in,
asphalt surfaces or they may be large „ unfenced grassy areas. In
either case, they are familiar turf to children, who mostly attend
school close to home and find these facilities within easy walking
distance.
Having a schoolyard close to home significantly affects use
levels. As Tables 1 and 2 indicate, 62% of the children interviewed
in Oakland play at the schoolyard , and 53% play there at least once a
week. Aspects of the distributions are of interest. Boys are
more likely than girls to play there, and they are more likely to
play there often. Chidlren from lower income families are more
likely to use the schoolyard than children from higher income
families. (This may in part reflect differences in children's,
access to alternative kinds of play space, particularly yards at
home and rooms to themselves.) Blacks tend to use the schoolyards
more than whites or Asians. This is especially true of black
males, who are by far the heaviest users. The pattern of occasional
ERIC
32
II-4
TABLE 1
CHILD USES, SELECTED SERVICES, FACILITIES AND
PROGRAMS: BY CHILD'S BACKGROUND
Recreation
Schoolyards- Parks Centers/Programs Library
Total Sample * 63% 69% 31% 43%
All Boys 71 74 37 46
All Girls
55 64 25 41
Income Per Family
Member >
^$175 66%
$175 * $499 66
>$500 38
Parent Education
High School Degree 64%
High School Graduate 60
Some College '65
College Graduate 57
or more
Sex/Race "Typology
Black 68%
Boy 76
Girl 61
White 51 %
Boy 60
Girl 42
Asian 47%
Boy 52
Girl 45
74% 35% 41%
65 28 * 48
60 22 41
72% 32% 41%
66 1 31 43
70 30 43
68 29 51
71% 33% 41%
76 39 41
66 29 42
63% ' 29% 51%
75 35 56
53 25 47
54% 14% 61%
5 3 21 6 5
55 6 57
Family Structure/
Mother's LF Status
Single Parent 63%
Working 62
■* Not Working 64
T f wo Parent ' 64%
Working (bo th) 63
Working (one) 65
71%. 36% 40%
69 37 > . 42
73 34« 38
67% ■ 25% 46%
68 24 46
66 27 48
ERIC
33
II-5
TABLE 2
HEAVY USERS OF SELECTED SERVICES, FACILITIES AND PROGRAMS
BY CHILD'S BACKGROUND
Total Sample
All
All
Boys
Girls
Schoolyards
(at least
1 day/week)
53%
Parks
(at least 1
time/week)
41%
47
36
Recreation
Center s/Progr am s Libr ar Y
(two or more (few times/
programs) mo. or more)
14%
20
10
38%
41
36
Income Per Family
Member
$175
$175 $499
$500
59%
54
41
38%
39
29
16%
12
8
41%
40
32
Parent Education
High School Degree
High School Graduate
Some College
College Graduate
v or more
60%
50
54
42
45%
45
37
38
17%
16
11
10
38%
37
38
39
Sex/Race Typology
Black
Boy
Girl
White
Boy
Girl
61%
37%
44%
4 9%
40
31%
42
19
17%
23%
12
10%
15
7
38%
39
38
39%
45
33
Asian
Boy
Girl
19%
37%
39%
35
3%
5%
51%
58%
48
Family Structure/
Mother's, LF Status
Single Parent
Working
Not Working
Two Parent
Working (bo th )
Wor king (o ne )
57%
54%
60
51%
48%
54
45%
45%
44
38%
41%
34
15%
. 11%
19
12%
10%
15
36%
36%
36
3 9%.
38%
40
er|c
34
II-6
and frequent use is also quite different for white and black
children. Fifty-one percent of white children report that
they play in the schoolyard some 'time, but only 37% play there
at least once a week. For black children there is a much smaller
difference between occasional and frequent users — 68% as against 61%.
This suggests that for these children schoolyards are a basic part
of their regular recreational patterns. In contrast, Asian
children are far less likely than children of other ethnic groups
to use the schoolyard or to use it on a regular basis.
Children who are regular users of schoolyard recreational
facilities seem to have relatively few alternatives. According
to a recent study by the Oakland Planning Department, low income
neighborhoods had on average significantly lower capital invest-
ment in other parks and recreational facilities. In effect,
schoolyards help to meet the play space needs of children in low
income neighborhoods where there are few other off-street places
to play. An apparent demand for these play opportunities is
indicated by the higher level of use in these lower income areas.
Frequent schoolyard users are also more independent and are less
likely to depend on parents for assistance in their after-school hours. Only a third
of the parents whose children go to the schoolyard five days a week
or more say that their children depend on them to take them places
they want to go. This contrasts with the situation of the infre-
quent schoolyard users, 61% of whom depend on their parents to
regularly transport them to their leisure activities. We may
conclude, then, that children who are on their own a good deal
ERIC - 35
II-7
of the time (and therefore need facilities close to home) , who have
fewer material resources, and who live in areas poorly serviced
in other ways make up the largest share of the "regular" school-
yard users. And the predominance of black children in most of
the sampled neighborhoods having these characteristics accounts
for much of the ethnic disparity in schoolyard use. Schoolyards,
whether supervised by adult leaders or not, represent relatively
accessible recreation areas for young people. Particularly in
inner cities, where open space is often at a premium, these facil-
ities provide both an important play opportunity and a place to
socialize and be with peers.
Parks
Like schoolyards, many urban communities have systems of
neighborhood parks--often quite small— distributed throughout
residential areas. Today, in most large cities, this open
space is largely a highly valued legacy of the past. Typically
parks were situated on the outskirts of towns and as the towns
grew into cities- the parks were surrounded and sometimes engulfed
by housing and commercial development. There is little possibil-
ity of expanding these existing systems of facilities without extraordinary
expenditures of money and (often) major dislocation of business and, residences .
Parks are by no, means as ubiquitous as schoolyards. Where ,
there is a schoolyard located in most elementary, school attendance
areas, the expected service area for a park is usually larger.
Hence, when we speak of the parks system of a community and child- .,
ren' s use of these facilities their access is, by definition, ^
more limited.
ERJC 36
II-8
Referring agai,n to Tables 1 and 2, let us consider the
situation as reflected in the Oakland purvey data. Overall,
use of parks parallels use of schoolyards. In our sample, 69%
of the children said that they played in a local park at least
once a month. Forty-one' percent report playing there at least
once a week. Compared with schoolyards, a. smaller proportion
of park users say that they are heavy users. Furthermore,
a much smaller percentage of children play in parks
frequently than play in schoolyards frequently.
As we have said, not all children have easy access to parks,
and the data suggests that proximity does impact use levels.
Sixty-nine percent of those who say they go to the park at least
once a month walk there, and children from families without cars
are somewhat overrepresented among both occasional and frequent
park users. Similarly, parents of park users are more likely
to say that parks are "easy for their children to get to" than
parents of non-users (Table 3) .
TABLE 3
Access to Parks and Use of Parks
Child Goes To Park
Parent: Once Per Month
or More Less Often
Is Access Easy
Xes
i
No
65% 58%
30 36
Don 1 t Know 4 7
(N=51.8) (N=232)
9
ERIC
37
II-9
There are sex differences in parks use, at a level parallel
to differences in schoolyard use. Overall 74% of boys , compared
with 64% of girls, say that they go to a park at least once a
month. Only 47% of boys and 36% of girls say that they go to
the park at least once each week. Fully 92% of all girls who
frequently use the park are black, and the attendance pattern
of black girls' is more similar to black boys than that of white
girls is to that of white boys.
There are .significant differences in use patterns across
income groups. Children from lower income families are much
more likely to use parks and to use them regularly than children
from upper-income families. This tends to support the thesis
already proposed that children from lower-income families have
fewer open-space alternatives and that parks, like schoolyards,
represent important play area opportunities. We shall return
to this point in a subsequent section.
So the pattern of parks use is somewhat) similar to that of
schoolyards. In particular, those who are economically disadvan-
taged and those who live with relatively less yard space around
their homes tend to be the heaviest users.
ERIC
38
11-10
Recreation Centers and Organized Recreation
Programs
Participation in recreation center programs is considerably
lower than use of the facilities already examined. Referring to
Tables 1 and 2 the pattern is as follows. Overall, 31% of the
sampled children had taken a lesson or participated in a group
at a recreation center'. Only 14% had participated in two or
more programs .
Like parks, the distribution of recreation centers across
the city is such that many children live at some distance from
the nearest facility. But in 7 of the 22 sampled neighborhods
the recreation center was located in the schoolyard, meaning
that children living in these areas had the easiest access. As
the data show, use of the programs is quite significantly related
to proximity (G=.72). Furthermore, 92% of children who took
at least one lesson lived in close proximity to these facilities,
(Table 4) .
TABLE 4
P roximity of Schoolyards to Recreation Centers and
Levels of Use
Schoolyard Has Adjacent Recreation Cente r
Number, of Lessons
.or Groups Child Has Yes
Taken at Recreation
Center •
0
ERIC
43%
84%
1
24
12
2
32
S
P < . 001
(N=266)
(11=4 98)
39 .
11-11
Differences in use levels between^ the sexes are noteworthy,
no doubt related to the content of the programs offered. To
begin with, boys form the larger constituency. Thirty-seven. *
. { -/
percent of boys as compared with 25% of girls had participated
in at least one activity at a recreation center. Twenty percent
of boys but only 10% of girls had participated in two or more.
If we, consider different types of activities the pattern
becomes more distinct. For example, sports is an important
component of the programs offered at recreation centers, and
twice as many boys as girls participated in sports groups and
les.sons. While girls were more likely 'to take fine arts lessons,
this likelihood was not correspondingly . as great as boys')
participation in sports. This suggests an inadvertent imbal-
ance in programming or, perhaps, some deliberate bias in the
provision of activities Some activities are "intended" for
boys, others for girls, and for various reasons there are gen-
erally more programs fgr boys than for girls.
This kind of data does not provide a definitive description
of the institutional mechanisms'* through which^ unequal opportun-
ities for girls and boys are maintained. In other, more exten-
sive analyses of sex differences in'organized sports activities,
we have found that girls.tended to participate in their smaller number
of programs at rates roughly equal to" boys', and that elementary
school athletic programs offered girls more opportunities than
2
did municipal or private recreation agencies. We also
recognize that some. . significant changes are taking place in all
40
I
-ERIC
11-12
these agencies in the four years since our survey, due to compliance
with federal Title IX guidelines an3 other social pressures. It is
also apparent that fiscal constraints on children's services are
jeopardizing these innovations at a time when they would other-
wise be gaining acceptance.
Differences across sex and ethnicity in levels of partici-
pation are also striking and may be associated both with the
nature of the programs available and their appeal among children
of different backgrounds. There are significant differences in
use and heavy use levels across ethnic groups and by sex within
ethnic groups. In Tables 1 and 2 the extraordinary decline in
participation from black to white to Asian children and the impor-
tant differences between the sexes within each ethnic group is
evident. Unravelling the sources of the differences is more than
we can do here, other than to assert that they no doubt reflect, arrmg other things,
cultural differences across ethnic groups and parents' perceptions
of the safety of public spaces. They may even seem to confirm
some traditional stereotypes of "who likes to do what." This
should be read not just as a matching of personal choices and
opportunities, but as evidence of constraints in program offer-
ings that limit a child's sense of what he or she can do.
Recreation center programs sponsored by municipal govern-
ment agencies fall into two categories, those that are free
and those that charge a fee. From our data it is clear that
when lessons and groups are identified by their fee structure,
children who are black, from low income families, from low educa-
4i
0
ERIC
11-13
tion families and from single-parent families participated in
free programs more often than white children and those from
groups with higher income, higher education and two parents
(Table 5). In other words,. the fee structure clearly influences
TABLE 5
Activity Fee Structure and Participation in Recreation
Center Programs
Fee Structure
Child has Participated Fee Charged Free Activity
in at least one activity
and has following
characteristics
Black 10% 28%
White 23 17
Low Income ^ ^ 14 34
High Income 12 13
Low Education 1° 27
High Education 12 20
Single Parent * 1° 3 ^
Two Parent 12 12
the nature of the user group. (Elsewhere in this monograph we
will discuss in some detail the consequences of changing the
fee structure in response] to municipal budget cutbacks
With recreation center programs family structure and mother 1 s
labor-force status does not seem to significantly influence parti-
cipation 'rates , except that children of non-working single parents
are the heaviest users, and that children of single parents are
more likely to be users of free activities. Child care or
babysitting is implicitly provided by these services although
it is difficult to know how many parents— regardless of family
structure— encourage their children to participate for this reason
42
11-14
Recreation center programs, then, are different in several
ways from the activities we have already discussed. First,
recreation centers are not just places to go and play, but are
the scene of organized programs and activities. Children's
propensity to participate is likely to be linked to their own
interests and, perhaps to their parents' desires. Second, the
programs are historically tied to the developmental objectives
that communities and professions have for the young. Thus, the
programs available are not free of larger social purpose and,
therefore, they are also susceptible to social and/or sexual
biases and stereotypes. Third, these programs function in a
two-tiered structure^ "fee" and "free," which apparently
attract rather different constituencies, determined largely by
family resources. Fourth, because they are supervised, these
activities have the possibility of meeting a special need of
parents today-child care outside of school hours /.while parents
are working or otherwise engaged.
Branch Libraries
Libraries are prototypical "pro-educational" out-of-school "
services.' Branch libraries have traditionally been located in
•small facilities distributed across neighborhoods and intended
to serve a different clientele than downtown main libraries.
Children have always been an important client group of the
ERIC
43
11-15
branches and are therefore the recipients of a variety
of special professional services. While we may think of the library
as a place to go for books, our data suggests that, like other pub-
lic .facilities/it also serves as a gathering place where child-
ren can meet and be together without necessarily utilizing the
service in the conventional way. We deduce this by comparing
children's responses to' two questions, "Do you have a library
^card?" and "How often do you go to the library?" (Table 6) .
TABLE 6
Library Cards a nd Libr ary Use
Go to Library,
Once/Month Less
Have Card °r More Often
- Yes 75% 38%
No 25 62
P <.001
In our sample 54% of the children had library cards while 41%
report that they go to the library at least once each month (Table 2)
Relationship between the two measures is strong (G-.65) indicat-
ing a general link between the two items, although the pattern of
responses across social groups reflects the varying needs that
libraries fill.
Sixty-eight percent of children from high income families
in the Oakland sample have library cards, as : against 40% of
Children; from low-income families. Seventy-nine percent of
children whose mothers have graduated from college (or more) have
cards as against 48% of children whose mothers did not finish high
school.
^ 44 ;
- . 11-16
Differences are considerably smaller in response to the
other question: "How often do you go toThe library?" In
this case 41% of high income children and 37% of low-income
children report that ..they go once a month, or more. Among middle-
income children fully 50% say that they go once each month or
more. The smaller differences in children's behavior across
income groups may be a reflection of alternatives available among
wealthier families. In these Eomes there may be more reading matter on
hand or readily obtainable, so that going to the library, espe-
cially if it is not conveniently located, is simply not done.
Also, the range of responses to the "How often do you go" item
is narrow across groups stratified by mother's education. Only
10% difference was reported, with 41% of the lowest education
group going to the library at least once each month compared
with 51% of children whose mothers are in the highest education
group (Table 7) .
TABLE 7
• . Library Use and Mother's Educati on
Mother's Education
Less than High School Some College Graduate
Child Goes to Library High School Graduate , College or More
Once a month or more 41% 43% 44% 51%
ex. 5Q 57 56 49
Less often - jy 3/
(N=206) (N=222) (N=228) (N=90)
Libraries are not as common as schoolyards (Oakland has four
school sites for each library branch) and for many children they
are not within easy walking distance. Proximity apparently is
45
/
11-17
an asset in attracting young people, for fully 73% of the chil-
dren say that they walk to the library when they go there. A
recent trend of closing down the smallest branches and replac-
ing them with fewer, larger regional centers has been lauded for
its economic efficiency but criticized by many senior citizens
,md parents of young children— the population for whom distance
poses the largest barrier.
We developed a composite measure of the extent of library
service in each sample neighborhood as a way of probing the
nature of services across areas within the city. The lower
the neighborhood index score the less likely a chiM was to
use the library on a regular basis (Table 8) . -
•' " TABLE 8
Children's Library Service and Library Use
I , Non-Users and 2
Library Index Summary Score Infrequent Users-
1 4 (Highest Quality Service) 14 %
• 3 24
2 30
1 (Lowest Quality Serviee) 32
! P < .01
1 The "Library services summary" index consisted of the following
items: availability of a specially trained children's librarian,
closeness of the library branch to the neighborhood, and the size
of the branch's circulation of books (which is a reasonable proxy
for size of collection) . Each item was rated on a three point
scale.
2
Visits library less than once per month.
11-18
Going to the library is a different social experience across groups.
Girls are a bit less "likely to go to the library alone than boys.
Eighty-five percent of girls as compared with 80% of boys report
that they usually go with friends and siblings. Parents also
have a clear impact on their children's library behavior. They serve
role models and as facilitators of transportation and card reg-
istration. Children are more likely to go (G=..37) and are
more likely to have a library card (G=.56) if their parents use
the library themselves*. And going to the library with a parent
is basically associated with high income, high education level,
coming from a two-parent family and being white or Asian. This
kind of modelling behavior, under any circumstances, represents
an important dimension of library use (Table 9) .
With regard to differences between boys and girls the fol-
lowing picture emerges. Overall, boys are just slightly more
likely to go to the library than girls, while girls are much
more likely than boys to have a library card (61% against 47%).
In general, girls and boys look more alike in their library beha-
vior than they do on any of the other types of activities we have
examined here (see Tables 1 and 2).
Finally it should be noted that parents are more satisfied
with the library if their child used it or had a library card.
The correlation of satisfaction and direct contact with the
service is one that holds for many of the other children's serv-
ices where participation is not compulsory. In Chapter Four
we will discuss the relationship of indicators of citizens'
satisfaction with local services to the "taxpayers' revolt."
TABLE 9
Parent and Child Library Use
11-19
Child's Library Use
Once per month or more
Less often
Parent's Library Use
Not Hardly Sometimes
at all ever or often N
45%
51
25%
31
30%
18
(328)
(421)
Child's Library Use
Once per month or more
Less often
P^. 001
Parent's Library Use
Not
at all
41%
59
Hardly
ever
39%
61
(N=364) (N=214)
Sometimes
or often
57-%
43
(N-171)
Parent Library Use and Whether Child Has
Library Card
Child has card
Yes
No
Not
at all
41%
58
Parent's Library Use
Hardly Sometimes
Ever or often N
30%
27
29%
16
(403)
(346)
Child has card
Yes
NO
Parent's Library Use
Not Hardly ' Sometimes
at all ever or often
45%
55
57%
43
68%
32
P<. 001
(N=364)
(N=213)
(N=173)
ER?C
48
11-20
CHILDREN'S USE OF SERVICES—
"COMMUNITY WIDE" AND "REGION WIDE"
The facilities discussed above are principally neighborhood
based. They are characteristically provided in decentralized net-
works relatively accessible to children near their homes. We now
turn to a range of facilities that are thoroughly "non-neighborhood"
in that they service a much larger area and typically require much
larger populations as a base of support.
We will focus on six facilities that have an educational dimen-
sion built into their programs. Three are museums— Oakland ' s city
museum, the University of California's Lawrence Hall of Science
and the San Francisco Exploratorium. The Oakland Museum is located
in the downtown area, near the main library, the largest city park
and main routes of both mass transit systems. It provides a full
range of art, history and science exhibits as well as programs
exploring local or regional" issues of culture., history and ethnic
tradition. It has a working agreement with the public schools
whereby large numbers of children come to the museum each year
to participate in activities led by specially trained instructors.
The Lawrence Hall of Science is located in the hills above the
University of California campus in Berkeley (adjacent to Oakland).
Its science programs and exhibits are principally designed for
children and teenagers. The Lawrence Hall sponsors a variety of
after-school and weekend classes for children with special science
interests. Its focus is "sub-.regional," that is, most of its
programs are attended by children from East Bay communities. The
San Francisco Exploratorium is also a science facility for young
9
ERIC
49
# - x
ERIC
I It 21
\
\
\
people. Supported by city funds and Federal and foundation grants, \
the Exploratorium utilizes high school students as "explainers"--
docents who work with children at science exhibits designed to
be touched and manipulated. The programs are relatively unstruc-
tured, although every effort is made to help children learn as
much as they can or will during each visit. The Exploratorium has
a region-wide clientele. Hence, the museums have somewhat different
agendas and intended audiences, but all three seek to interest and
attract young people with educational programs and exhibits.
The other three facilities discussed here also have educa-
tional and cultural concerns, but they are somewhat less intentional.
Also, they charge admission fees, meaning that access may be related
not just to the distance one must travel, but to the cost of the
activity itself.
The Oakland Zoo serves the city and the entire East Bay. It
is supported principally by city budget allocations. Only capital
improvement programs receive significant outside support, mostly
in the form of patron and corp/rate grants The San Francisco
Aquarium and Marine World are /both located quite far from Oakland.
The Aquarium functions much like a museum, while Marine World is
more of an amusement park. Of the six activities, fees at Marine
World are highest, while depending under whose auspices a child
visits, entry to the other activities may cost several dollars
or they may be free of charge. —
In this sectior^then^e-^^^ 6 examining children's use of
several different kinds of facilities-some located in close proximity
to our sample population, others at some distance, and some charging
fees while others are free or nearly free
--. 50
The Museums
Even cursory examination of Table 10 'indicates important
differences among museums in terms of their relative drawing
power. Oakland's city museum had been visited by 48% of the
sample during the survey year, while only 19% had been to the
Lawrence Hall of Science. This kind of difference is not explained
entirely by proximity. For instance, the Lawrence Hall of Science
is much closer to Oakland then is the San Francisco Exploratorium,
but the latter was visited by many more children during the year
(28% of the sample) .
Most children go to these museums as a school activity rather than outside
of school hours. Sixty-seven percent of those who had been to the Oakland
Museum went with a school class,- as did 70% of those who had
"been to the Lawrence Hall and 77% of those who had been to the
Exploratorium. Respectively only 16%, 14% and 12% of those who
had visited each facility during the year had gone with their
parents. The differences across the sample in terms of "who they
go with" will be explored below.
The Oakland Museum can claim some success in reaching many
different kinds of children. Roughly the same proportions of
the sample, across all family income and education groups have
been there during the year. This is not the case for either
of the other museums, where the likelihood of attendance rose
steadily with increasing income and mothers' education.
The proportions of blacks and whites who had been to the
Oakland Museum are comparable. However, only half as many
51
) *
TABLE 10
SELECTED "COMMUNITY WIDE" AND "REGION WIDE" FACILITIES
(Children who have been to each facility during the school year of
11-23
the Survey.)
Total Sample
All boys
All girls
Income per family
member <
Less than $175
$175-499
$500 or more
Mother 1 s Education
High school graduate
Some college
College graduate or more
Sex/Race Typology
Black
Boy
Girl
White
Boy
Girl
0
Asian
Boy
Girl
Family Structure/Mother's
Labor Force Status
Single Parent
Working
Not Working
Two Parent
Working (both)
Working (one)
Who Child Went with (This Year )
School Class
Parents
Child Has M Ever Been"
to Facility
Oakland
Museum
Lawrence
Hall
of Science
Exploratorium
^Oakland
Zoo
Aquarium
Marine
woria
A Q Q.
4o%
£, O X
57%
30%
v 13 %
50
23
26
59
30
25
46
16
30
54
31
21
54%
10%
27%
59%
34%
26%
44
22
28
57
31
23
51
34
✓
35
D
53
n a
Z 4
ee 52%
15% X
27%
57%
36%
27%
46
17
22
54
ZD
9 7
Z J
> 45
21
32
64
29
20
52
32
36
50
34
22
5£%
16%
29%
66%
33%
Z /%
53
19
27
70
33
z y
47
1^
*5 9
9
32
26
49%
31%
26%
42%
21%
15%
49
35
27
44
21
1 /
49
28
25
41
21
14
26%
— 32%
16%
13%
21%
£%
27
J Z
J. D
9
24
15
25
32
17
18
17
3
50%
16%
28%
63%
34%
29%
49
18
25
64
29
29
ji
31
' 61
41
27
^ 47%
23%
29%
54%
28%
19%
A C
4 D
Z D
30
57
27
24
49
20
28
51
30
13
ar)
67%
70%
77%
15%
67%
40%
18
14
12
39
23
43
85%
38%
47%
94%
60%
73%
9
ERIC
52
Asian children (25%) reported that they had been there in the
Survey year. The relative distributions for the Exploratorium
are somewhat similar, although the proportions of each group are
much diminished. On the^ other hand, the Lawrence Hall mainly
draws white and Asian children (in equal proportions), and .less
than half as large a proportion of blacks.
Tables ll' and 12 reveal important differences between two
groups of children— those who went with their school c\ass
during'the year and those who .went with their parents. For
the Oakland Museum, as family income and education levels increase*,
the child is le-ss likely to have gone with the school class and
more likely to have visited with his or her family. A far larger
proportion of whites and Asians have been with parents rather than
with school and a diminished proportion of blacks have been with
parents. .
The children who had visited the Oakland Museum with a school
class were evenly divided between those with single parents and
those with two.* Visits that children made with their own parents
were not equally common, however. Just 29% of those who went
with their parents were from one-parent households .
For the' Lawrence Hall of Science,- the use patterns are
drawn very sharply, suggesting more exclusivity in the clientele
Whereas 33% of those from low income households who had been to
* The total sample includes 42% single parent families and 58% two
parent families,
\
53
11-25
TABLE 11 . r
Characteristics of Children Who ""Went with School Class" tp Facilities
Oakland
Museum
Went with School Class
Income per family member
Less than $175
$175-499
$500 or more
Mother's Education
Less than high school degree
High school graduate
Some college
College graduate or more
Ethnicity
Blfck
White 0
Asian *
Family Structure/Mother's
Labor Force Status
Single parent
Working
Not Working
Two Parent
Working (both)
Working (one)
48%
39
13
Lawrence .
Hall
of Science
Exploratorium
Oakland
Zoo
Aquarium
33%
45
22
42%
40
19
41%
44
15
48%
43
9
Marine
World
66%
30
4
35% ,
24%
32%
24-
40%
39%
35%
31
30
19
26
33
24
34
35
32
, 26
23
10
12
10
8
• 9 *
9
79%
11
2
71%
15
7
j
83%
• 7
2
79%
12
1
V
83%
92%
50i%
42%
»-•»
45%
55%
60%
28
22
22
19
23
22
31
27 ,
24
32
33
27
50%
i&%
55%
41%
4"5%
40%
28
22-
36
22
30
25
19 ,
23
' 22
23
28
12
o
ERIC
54
11-26
TABLE 12
Characteristics of Children Who "Went with Parents" to Facilities
Oakland
Lawrence
Hall
Oakland
Marine
- Went with Parents
Income per family member
Less than $175
$175-499
$500 or more
Mother's Education
B Less than high school degree
High school graduate
Some college
College graduate or more
Ethnicity
Black
White
Asian
Family Structure/Mother 1 s
Labor Force Status
Single Parent
\
\
Working^
Not Working
Two Parent
Working (both)
Working (one)
Museum
of Science
Exploratorium
x —
Zoo
Aquarium
World
25%
3%
\
17%
40%
35%
28%
33
55
55
46
39
49
39
26
23
20%
31%
21%
27%
16
14
28
23
19
26
35
37
35
33
36
32
29
49
34
13
25
16
r An
0U%
VJ T)
73%
53%
70%
43
83
64
16
28
24
6
10
8
3
14
4
29%
18%
31%
38%
25%
41%
12
18
13
25
12 '
25
17
18
14
13
16
71%
83%
70%
62%
25%
60%
32
38
48
38
43
41
39
44
22
24
32
18
ERIC
55
11-27
the Hall had gone with a school class, only 3% had gone with a
parent. At the other extreme, 22% of school visits to the
Exploratorium were by children from high income families, while
they accounted for 42% of trips with parents.. The differences
based on stratification by mother's education are most dramatic.
Children whose mothers had not graduated from high school accounted
for a quarter of school class visits to the Hall, but none of them
went with their parents. Only 12% of children who had gone to the
Hall with a school class had mothers who were college graduates,
while 49% of visits with parents were by children with mothers
who .were college graduates.
The overwhelming proportion of black children who went to
the Lawrence Hall of Science went with a school class. Blacks
accounted for only a small proportion of trips with parents
while the converse is the case for whites. Finally, as with
the Oakland Museum, children of two-parent families made up a
much larger proportion of trips with a parent than did children
from siVigle-parent families.
The Exploratorium in San Francisco drew Oakland sixth graders
. in a distribution falling between those of the two museums des-
cribed above. Black' children and children from low income or
single-parent families were substantially more likely to have
gone with their parents to the Exploratorium than to the Lawrence
Hall of Science. For school visits there was a smaller difference
between the two institutions. Since the Exploratorium is somewhat
further from Oakland than the Hall of Science, the difference in,
/
ERIC *G
11-28
attendance with parents cannot be explained simply by distance.
The: difference reflects parents' and children's preferences based
on prior visits, word-of -mouth , and publicity, as well
as other factors influencing the choices of a family outing.
Regardless of these specific qualities of family travel decisions,
it is clear that visits with- school classes greatly increase
disadvantaged students' chances of seeing these museums.
Zoo, Aquarium, Marine World
This diverse set of activities reflects classic "distance
decay" travel decisions. The Zoo is in the Oakland hills and 57%
of the children had been there during the year. Overall 94% of
the children in our sample say that they have been to the Zoo at
some time in their life the highest proportion of any activity
studied) . The Aquarium is in San Francisco, about 20 miles
from Oakland, and 30% of the children had been there during the
Survey year. Marine World, a popular Bay Area amusement park,
is the farthest from Oakland, almost 4 0 miles away, and only
2 3% of the sample say that they had been there during the year.
In the case of all three facilities a somewhat smaller pro-
portion of high income children had gone during the year. This
is interesting given that these are mostly fee charging activities
and private transportation costs are considerable. As we will
see below, school sponsorship (and subsidizing) of trips accounts
for some of these differences.
57
11-29
Ethnic differences in use are large and significant.
Whereas 66% of blacks had been to the Zoo during the year,
only 42% of whites and 13% of Asians had been there. Similar
ethnic differences are found for Marine World and in slightly
attenuated form for the Aquarium.
Perhaps most notable for our purposes, a much larger propor-
tion of children had been to the Zoo with parents than with
their school class (39% against 15%), while about equal propor-
tions had been to Marine World with parent and school class
(43% against 40%). Only in the case of the Aquarium is "school
dominance" in evidence (67% against 23%) .
For the Aquar i vim- -the school dominated activi cy--the pattern
is much like that which we have seen above for the museums.
Lower income children and children from families in which mothers
have less education made up the largest proportions of Aquarium
visitors who had gone with a school class. Children from upper
income families and those with more education were more likely
to have gone with their parents. Blacks comprise most of those
who have gone with, school classes. Finally, children from single-
parent families represent over half of the school class visits
to the Aquarium but only a quarter of the parent-child trips.
The Zoo and Marine World are our two examples of activities
that children did more often with parents than with school classes,
As noted earlier, 39% of children who had been to the Zoo during
the year went with their own parents, only 15% with a school class
(The rest went with siblings, friends, friend's parents or other
m£ , 58
11-30
organized groups.) The. comparable figures for Marine World are
43% and 40%.
The Zoo is the city's most popular facility for children.
Virtually all of the respondents had been there at some time and
more than half had been there during the year of our study. By
income gro%p, among those who went to the Zoo, about the same
proportions had been there with school and parent. \
By ethnicity, blacks accounted for a larger proportion of
school trips to the Zoo and a somewhat lesser amount of family
trips. White children accounted for about three times as many
trips with parents as with school. Fifty-eight percent of
school trips were by children from single-parent families, 38%
of the family" trt^s-were^hTidren from single-parent families.
While Oakland's Zoo resembles the city Museum in terms of
the patterns of attendance, Marine World has a pattern all its
own. Here family resources are extremely important. With
increasing family income a larger proportion of trips are with
parents rather than school. Similarly, families with higher
parental education levels make up a larger proportion of family
trips. An extraordinary finding is that fully 92% of school
trips to Marine World were by blacks, while none were by whites
or Asians. In contrast blacks accounted for just 28% of the trips
59
with parents. Finally, as in the case of most of these activi-
ties, children of single parents made up the majority of . those
who had been to Marine World with a school class while children
of two-parent families made up the majority of those who had
been with parents.
We can complete this analysis by looking more closely at
the role of the school and family as a source of exposure to
these citywide and regional facilities. The evidence is reported
in Table 13. If a child attends a school which received federal
Title I compensatory education funds, and he or she has gone to
any of the activities described, the trip was more likely (except
in the case of the Zoo) .to have been a school trip. If a child
does not attend a Title I school, with respect to places where
there is an admissions charge — Zoo, Aquarium and Marine World —
the trip was, more likely made with parents. In every case
children from Title I schools were more likely to have gone
with the school than were children from non-Title I schools.
On the other hand, inoevery case but one, children who did not
attend Title I schools were more likely than their Title I counter-
parts to have gone to a particular facility with their parents.
The extensive use of Title I funds to subsidize these
outings is evidence of their widely recognized educational value,
or at least of the ease with which they can be integrated into
an elementary school program. Resource allocations for trips
are made by principals and teachers at each school. Although
Title I funds are awarded to schools in Oakland if they have a
TABLE 13
Sources of Exposure to "Community Wide" and "Region Wide" Facilities
Child Attends Title-I- School
and
Went with School Went with Parent
Child Does Not Attend Title I School
and • "
Went with School Went with Parent
Facility
Oakland Museum
Lawrence Hall of Science
Lxploratdrium
Zoo
Aquarium
Marine World
75%
85
86
17
77
49
11%
3
6
39
17
34
45%
55
57
9
32
7
36%
25
26
38
48
77
61
62
I
u>
11-33
certain level of low-income or under-achieving students, the
characteristics of an individual child are not a factor in- deter-
mining whether he or she goes on any particular trip. In other
words, the subsidy goes to the school rather than "following the
child," a policy adopted in some school districts .
No doubt the findings presented here about proportions of trips
taken with parents and with classes are influenced by the fact
that Oakland's Title I schools are 'predominantly black and have,
c-inrrio r.*T-pn-i-c; lower family incomes and lower average
on average, more single parents, iuwei j-auu.-i-j
years of parental education than non-Title I schools. Other
papers based on Time Study data explore in more detail this
relationship between school and family resources in the
. . 3
exposure to cultural opportunities.
We have now described children's use of six non-
neighborhood facilities. We have seen significant differences
in levels of use and sources of exposure across social groups
and across type -of facility. These differences sometimes reflect
constraints on access (proximity, material resources, educational
background reflecting cultural resources) and sometimes differences
in interests and preferences. Overall, Oakland's citywiae facil-
ities drew surprisingly well among all social groups, suggest-
ing an interest on the part of the Zoo and Museum leadership in
reaching a broad spectrum of the community. The most dramatic
• differences across groups occur at the regional level where cost,
distance and facility specialization significantly affect use
patterns, thereby increasing the importance of public subsidies
as a mechanism for equalizing children's cultural opportunities.
ERJC -,i 63
11-34
Neighborhood, Citywide and Regional Services
As an Analytical Context
This description of children's use of various out-of -school
facilities and services provides background for the discussion that
follows. To begin with, it is clear that these kinds of oppor-
tunities are valued by children. Neighborhood facilities attract
large numbers of child users and are clearly important on a day-to-
day basis. Citywide and regionwide facilities are, for a variety
of reasons, less frequently utilized but nonetheless encountered by
the majority of preadolescent children in the course of a year.
Only a small literature has focused on children's use of
neighborhood and community facilities. As a result, it is easy
to lose sight of the special role they play in the lives of
- children. Since children do not lobby politically on their own
(and do not constitute an interest group in traditional terms) , their
facility use patterns are the only data with which we can evaluate
the significance of various publicly provided services directed
at them. *
This cluster of services is hardly a "frill" from the perspec-
tive of young people. They use the facilities and services to
meet various needs, although not always in the conventional fashion'.
The services, as we shall see, often have developmental and "pro-
educational" agendas that. complement activities and. programs^at
school. For that reason we must view them as far more central to
the well-being of children than adults often presume. Understand-
ing their role in children's daily lives provides a context within
which we shall explore the impact of the contemporary urban fiscal
crisis ,
ERIC 64
11-35
Chapter Two
Footnotes
1\ Oakland City Planning Department, Open Spac e T Conservation
and Recreation Element of the Comprehensive Plan
(1976), Chapter 3-
2 Elliott A. Medrich, Judith Roizen, Victor Rubin and
Stuart Buckley , The Serious Business of Growing Up :
A Study of Children's Lives Outside of School
(Berkeley; University of California Press, forth-
coming , 1981 ) .
3. Charles S. Benson, "Time and How it is Spent." In
Charles' S. Benson and Michael Kirst (eds.),
Educational Finance and Organization: Future
Re search Directions (Washington: GPO, 1980);
Charles S. Benson, "Household Production of Human-
Capital: Time Uses of Parents and Children as
Inputs." In Walter W. McMahon and Terry Ge,ske (eds.),
Toward Efficiency .and Equity in Educational
Financ e (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1980); and
•Charles S. Benson, Stuart Buckley and Elliott A.
Medrich, "Families as Educators: Time Use Contrib-
utions to School Achievement." In James Guthrie (ed.),
School Finance Policy in the 19b0's: A Decade of
Conflict (Cambridge: Ballinger, 1980) .
ERIC
6"
rr
Ill
URBAN FISCAL STRAINS AND CHILDREN'S SERVICES
Close examination of the history of children's recreational
and cultural services should disabuse us of any notions that
they have existed "outside" of major political, ideological
and economic processes. Rather, linkages between the serv-
ices and the larger social system provide the substance for
assessment of their current predicament.
Perhaps the most important set of linkages is. that compris-
ing the urban fiscal crisis. Revenues and budgets delimit the
boundaries of change in urban services. When fiscal conditions
are relatively stable, these boundaries are well-known and
incentives .and risks are reasonably predictable. When they
i
are not, as at present, the situation, even in the relatively
short run, is fraught with uncertainty. In this section and the
following one we intend to describe this period of uncertainty
and transition. First, we will provide a context of •political
and economic developments in which to place the services. Then,
in the next section, we willsexamine the responses of service
providers, clients and politicians to .the tax revolt and fis-
cal strains associated with California's Proposition 13. That
response encompasses both immediate crisis management and the
beginnings of fundamental re-organization of the services. And
while the situation as a whole is unique, there are, in these
9
ERIC
66
5 I II- 2
/ ' . ■ ' *
NresponseS, important elements of continuity with the resolution
of past difficulties. ■
\ Growing up with Local government
Three broad characteristics of the role of children's serv-
ices in local government provide a basic framework for under-
standing the recent fiscal history. First, the services have
evolved into substantial municipal bureaucracies , complete with
a largely unionized f or professional workforce; routinized, often ,
" cumbersome administration and frequent managerial turbulence.
Second, the services have remained primarily local in funding -
and control, in increasingly sharp contrast to other services
which have seen .massive growth in state and federal involvement.
Third, the services 'remain in, a fundamentally ambiguous position
concerning their main objectives. They have sought legitimacy
* both as an instrument of social reform and as a conventional,
non-controversial collective good, and have not garnered enough
support in either role to ensure a stable niche as an "essential
service." These three characteristics of children's services
emerge from their history, which we can briefly summarize here.
• Children of urban working-class immigrant families were the first
recipients, in the 1890 's, of playgrounds and programs designed
Specifically for recreation. While the ideological root^of \
these services went back to the 1830' s, it took the pressure
of industrialization. and urbanization during the Progressive Era
to establish recreation as a social movement. Led by upper-class
philanthropists and educators-, the recreation movement sought to
67
III-3
create a' niche between schools, public health and social welfare
agencies, where they could address certain special, largely unmet,
needs of children. 'Their program was intended not just to amuse
young peopte or keep them out" of trouble, but to socialize them
to the values of the dominant American culture.
By 1920 the recreation movement had succeeded in making the
basic program universal in large cities, and the focus shifted
to the leisure needs of adults. Public libraries, which had
followed a parallel route from privately sponsored children's y
rooms to substantial municipal edifices also shifted their empha-
sis somewhat. The two services flourished in the twenties in the
cities, but found that with the Depression their source of local
public support dis'si.pated quickly.
The funding crisis brought on by the Depression held a source
of salvation, however, since the Federal government stepped into ..
the field for the first time. Recreation leadership and the con-
struction of parks, libraries/ and other cultural facilities became
a major component of every federal youth employment program. The
New Deal also created 6,000 new recreation councils in small towns,
'which became the basis- for permanent oonmissions.
In the two decides after World War II, recreational and cul-
tural services regained their primary orientation toward young
children, particularly during the period of great suburban devel-
opment. The number of new facilities and programs grew tremen-
dously, part of the child^-centered life style sought by so many
yoiing families. Concurrently, families remaining in central cit.ies
ERIC ^ 68
watched as their older facilities became obsolete and ever more
inadequate. By the mid-sixties, the failures of urban recreation
(and to a lesser extent, libraries) were repeatedly cited as con-
tributing causes of poor school achievement, juvenile crime and
civil disorders.
With the War on Poverty, a second important period of major
federal involvement in recreation and cultural services provision
began. Recreation was seen as an immediate form of "social\contrc
of youth, and a way of dissipating tension and stress in urban
ghettos. But many of the leaders hired under these new programs
\
saw themselves as ocmmunity organizers rather than "soft cops."
The tension between the dual purposes of these youth programs in
time contributed to the withdrawal of federal support, once again
leaving local governments with a new stratum of bureaucracy.
Through the 1970' s both city and suburban agencies alike have
sought to diversify and modernize their service to attract a
relatively shrinking youth population, one which has access to
many more commercial alternatives when compared to the old. play-
grounds and lending libraries of the past generations.
So within this historical context, it is clear that in many
ways recreational and cultural services "grew up" with local
government. They were established as municipal responsibilities
at a time when many other reform-oriented institutions' were like-
wise becoming public. From experimental "sand gardens" and read-
ing rooms the services developed into extensive networks of
neighborhood-level and centralized facilities with programs for
people of all ages. In the early decades of this growth most
politica'l issues concerned the expansion of facilities and pro-
grams: whom to serve, where to locate. The internal workings
of the programs were relatively simple and usually not contro-
versial. As local recreation and culture agencies became univer-
sal and the levels of service rose, so did the degree of bureau-
cratic complexity and the number of active interest groups.
Increasingly, the administrative procedures of municipal agencies
became the focus of political disputes, and were often targeted
as obstacles to innovation and equity.
In terms of local! fiscal commitments /for these services and
the size" of the supporting bureaucracies, these programs have
been well entrenched i|n the local government services "package."
Municipal park and recreation expenditures, .for example, have
accounted for a remarkably steady proportio n (roughly two percent)
of local government expenditures throughout this century (Table la) .
\
During that^period the per capita and absolute expenditures for
parks and recreation have\ grown substantially (Table lb) but not
disproportionately to othe\: government fuctions.
The' political and administrative processes by which recrea-
tion and |culture agencies have operated have been similarly con-
sistent With other domains of local government. Parks construction
and maintenance yeilded its flair share of clubhouse patronage
and "honest graft" in the heydays of urban political machines,
Year
III-5a
TABLE 1
State and Local Government Expenditure on
Parks and Recreation: 1902 tc 1976-77
Percent Local Government
Spent on
Parks a mPKe creation
B
Per Capita State and
Local Expenditures on
Pa rks and Recreation -
n
197 6-//
9 "3%
$22. 72
1975-76
9 A
Z • 4
18 . 00
1974-75
9 A
Z . 4
16. 24
1973-74
1 A
z • 4
13.96
1972-73
1 0
z • z
12. 20
1971-72
z • z
11.13
196 9-7 0
9
Z • J
9.29
1966-67
9 9
Z • Z
6 52
1962
9 9
z . z
4.77
1952
2 . 0
3 57
1948
1.8
2.06
1944
2.0
0.89
1938
2.1
0.81 (1936)
1934
2.4
1.18 (1932)
1927
2.6
1.29
1922
2.0
0.77
1913
3.2
0.59
.1902
3.3
0.37
Source: US Census of Governments, (1977) Historical Statistics
9
ERIC
71
TABLE 2
U.S. Municipal Expenditures on
Recreation and Libraries: 1976^72
Total Expenditure
(thousands)
Library
Parks
and
Recreation
Direct Municipal Expenditures $ 656,089
$ 2,503,571
Current Operation
Total
Salaries and Wages
Other
581,975
369,634
212,341
1, 857,588
1,170,092
687,496
Capital Outlay
Total
Construction
Other
74,114
49,497
24,617
645, 983
478,817
167,166
Source: U.S. Census of Governments, (1977) Municipalities
9
ERIC
72
III-6
Administrative reforms from civil service to program budgeting were
implemented in libraries and youth centers as extensively as in
sanitation or police. The clash between machine and reform
management philosophies, so common in American urban history,
has been prominent in parks and recreation as much as any aspect
of government.
Just as many of the issues in recreation and culture paralleled
those of other urban services, so do many of the active interest groups
Organizations such as the American Library Association and the
National Recreation and Parks Association developed standards by
which to measure local services, and have helped foster proges-
sional identity and public acceptance. The associations trace
their origins to the social reform movements of the Progressive
Era, but in recent decades have often been more "establishment"
than reformer. In the 1960 's and 70 's challenges from caucuses
'of ethnic -minorities and women, and from advocates of non-tradi-
tional forms of service have jolted the associations in a manner
comparable to other professions. For now it is sufficient to
recognize that^ these groups developed within the general contours
of American service professions, and are themselves potentially
powerful voices in fiscal crisis politics.
Public employee unions have also become important actors
in the policy-making process for recreation and culture, though
their growth has been relatively recent. Many full-time, perma-
nent workers in these services are covered by collective bargain-
ing agreements, in proportions generally following the level of
73
III-7
unionization as a whole in an area. Because of their relatively
small numbers, the staffs of museums, libraries and recreation
departments are generally in "grab-bag locals" including workers
from a variety of services. As we shall see shortly, this can
have important consequences for the type of political action
these groups undertake. Staff who work with children are rarely
in their own bargaining units. Thus, unlike school teachers,
the mere presence of labor activism does not automatically create
high public visibility for issues concerning children. Also
the high proportions of temporary and part-txme workers and the
extensive use of volunteers combine to give these services a
more diversified labor force than most public services. Yet
other services are increasingly employing these kinds of flexible
staffing arrangements, so some once distinctive features of cul-
tural and recreational programs are becoming more common.
While most of the above description emphasizes the things
that children's services share in common, with other local govern-
ment services, there are still important dissimilarities. One
such difference is that these programs are highly dependent on
locally generated revenue. Though there are noteworthy exceptions
ft
(some of which we will discuss), recreation and culture have seen
^pnly limited state and federal assistance compared to other
functions, especially education, welfare and health. Funds for
capital improvements have always been a key element of federal aid
for these services. When only operating expenses are considered
the proportion of local funding is even higher. A corollary of
low state and federal spending is a lack of mandates from those
74
III-8
ERIC
entities determining how local governments should organize these
services. Local decisionmaking is more firmly established in
libraries, parks and recreation than almost any other function
of municipal government.
The high degree of local financing means, in most cases,
that the property tax has been the dominant source of revenue
for these services. In the wake of Proposition 13, the property
tax has yielded California cities less revenue, and even in
states without fiscal containment legislation there has been
a trend toward reduction in the share of local expenditures
covered by property taxes.-/ And increased involvement
of states in the funding of culture and recreation raises for
the first time some ssues which are more familiar where public
schools are concerned. Does the state have the power, responsi-
bility or will to equalize expenditures among municipalities?
Will the state take an active hand in running the services,
and what consequences might that entail?
Answers to these questions would imply development of compre-
hensive policies vis a vis the services where none have existed.
This could mean more attention given by legislators and policy-
makers to the usually implicit tension among different objectives
of children's services. Our historical analysis, presented in
detail elsewhere, shows that attempts to establish these programs
have been founded on either their potential as activist social
services, or their value as basic non-controversial providers of
leisure activities. In the first mode, cultural and recreation
25.
Ill- 9
programs might gain legitimacy by being part of the "solution"
to critical problems such as crime and unemployment. The second
model is less ambitious, but consequently has usually offered
-more stability. While different historical periods have seen
either the social reform or the leisure orientation dominant,
the current situation seems to have brought out both approaches
as defenses against budget reductions. Conservatives such as
Howard Jarvis, co-author of Proposition 13, argued that parks
and recreation were "property-related" services and therefore
not the target of his tax-cutting initiative. On the other hand,
residents of low income inner-city areas have been arguing that
these services, and libraries as well, are needed as deterrents
to social problems like juvenile crime.
The rhetorical defenses -of children's services may be diverse
and with historical precedents, but they are not necessarily
effective. For cultural and recreational services are not in
control of their own destiny. Even' though they do not, necessarily,
constitute the "fat" in government which taxcutters have sought
to eliminate, they bear some of the heaviest budget reductions.
Even though they might mobilize considerable political support,
they must compete for scarce resources with other functions whose
claim on public funds is undeniably more urgent. Therefore,
in order to understand the possibilities for children's culture
and recreation services, we must see how they fit into the broader
urban fiscal crisis.
1-
ERIC . 7 6
JII-10
Budget Cutting vs. Fiscal Stress
Children's services may be immersed in long-term structural
fiscal stres but what they mainly experience from month to month
is a succession of immediate budget crises. The scenarios of
actual or threatened reduction of services have an internal logic
which is somewhat independent of the complex, diverse causes of
long-term fiscal stress. The closing of libraries evokes simi-
lar responses in a state with a large tax surplus and one with
a substantial debt. Proposed layoffs of recreation staff gener-
ates a particular kind of political reaction, regardless of
whether there is a "taxpayers' revolt" in progress. The best
guide to the impact of Oakland's Proposition 13-related service
"reductions, for example, was a 1976 budget cutting episode in
that city, rather than any factors related to the 1978 intia-
tlve itself. In short, there is a micro-politics of austerity
in each community which engages most of the regular interest
groups in reaction to a given set of fiscal circumstances. In
the following chapter we will describe how a variety of California
communities coped^ with the impact of Proposition 13 on services
for children. But while much of that process might be understood
in terms of a seemingly stable set of interest groups and bureau-
cratic processes, there is more at issue. We must ex-lore the
ways in which that political process around children's services
is itself changing. In this sense, nunicipal budget cutting _
episodes and taxpayer dissatisfaction need to be understood
in historical and political context.
Most of the research on urban fiscal stress has undertaken
the task of explaining the remarkable growth in public expen-
ditures, especially of state^and local government. The fact
of that qrowth is not so much at issue here, but its causes and
its relationship to the political process are our concern. Inso-
far as Proposition 13and related fiscal containment measures
signify a reversal 'o± . the expansionary trend or at least a slow-
ing of that growth, these prior theoretical perspectives may
seem somewhat dated. Yet even the fiscal containment controver-
sies should be seen as a response to the long-range trends in
the growth of state and local government.
Another broad task of a theory "of fiscal crisis is to exp-^in
the widening gaps between revenue and expenditures. The expansion
of government would not present the same kinds of problems if
the resources necessary to sustain that growth were, readily
available. Also, a useful theory of fiscal stress should account
for the dynamics df change in political structures which occurs
in response to a crisis situation.
These are three very different tasks, so it is not surpris-
ing that most analysis tends to focus on only one or two of
them and- thereby provide only a partial explanation of fiscal
crisis. In contrast, the few overarching structural analyses
which hav^ been developed seem to miss the variability and the
salience of particular local conditions. We suspect that our
purposes would be best served by some kind of middle-range perspec
78.
t
111-12
tive, and that one can eventually emerge from critiques of the
exceedingly general and excessively specialized analyses that
predominate today .
Children's interests have been especially poorly researched »
by those concerned with urban fiscal problems. Advocates and
scholars of the different services for young people seldom
address their common situation. Even rarer is an analysis which
cuts across agency lines and attempts to link immediate budget-
ing issues to the long-term prospects for public support for
these programs. In an attempt to do these two things, we must
examine both numerous partial explanations that have been advanced
to explain urban fiscal problems, and also consider the poten-
tial value of a more comprehensive theoretical framework. For
as we have shown so far, the future of children's out-of -school
services is inseparably bound up with the course of local govern-
ment as a whole.
Particularistic Explanations ' ^
In 1975, when New York City had less company in its advanced
state of fiscal distress than it does today, that city's unique
civic responsibilities and structure of governance were frequently
blamed for its deficits. New York did have somewhat more extensive
commitments than most municipalities, especially in hospitals
and higher education. New York bore a higher proportion of wel-
fare costs than most cities, included^ a proportionately larger
dependent population. Its ponderous/ highly centralized government
79
0
111-13
seemed to escalate the cost and minimize the effectiveness of
all kinds of services. Yet in the final analysis, New York's
special features only help to- explain why it was the first of
many major cities to approach default in recent times. For exam-
ple, Morris, in his recently published history of the city's bud-
get crises, shows that New York's salary levels and expenditures
for most city services were' not out of line with those of the
"2/
nation's ten largest cities. Since some of those cities have
recently experienced major budget problems, it is necessary to
recognize that while every city has unique characteristics,
virtually all of them will experience some kind of fundamental
difficulties. Also, fiscal stress is no longer only a feature
of large city governments. Chronic revenue shortfalls are now
\ being experienced in ail kinds of suburbs and rural communities,
tthis relatively recent phenomena needs to be analyzed systemati-
cally, with attention to the relationships between cities and
suburbs as well as the diversity among suburban communities.
\ Even when the factor s contributing to New York City's plight
can be identified as general urban phenomena they do not provide
an adequate explanation for crisis conditions. Certainly poor
management techniques and inadequate leadership are common enough,
but they do little to explain the origins Of the tremendous growth
4/
of expenditures/ (a tripling in New York between 1965 and 197 ; 5) .
Nor does it help much to single out the redistr ibutive function
that urban governments in the United States have taken on. Undoubt
edly some social spending has been intended to lessen income
inequality through transfer payments and public sector employment.
SO ;
iil-14
And without question many of these initiatives were ill conceived,
awkward, cynical and wasteful. But regardless of the verdict
concerning the ^distributive nature of recent urban spending,,
it cannot alone account for the fiscal crisis. For much, if
not most government spending was not of this type, but rather
served the interests of large capital, or of entrenched middle
class "producer interests" in the service bureaucracies. What
is needed is an approach that can account for the diversity of
demands made on urban government, rather than explanations
that target a particular group as the prime beneficiary, whether
it be the poor, ethnic minorities, civil servants, local businesses
national and muxtinational corporations, organized crime or cor-
rupt officials.
Another promising angle on urban fiscal crisis focuses on
the erosion or dispersal of local tax bases, contingent on the
locational shifts of capital and residential investment. The
migration of much industry and commerce to the suburbs, along with
a -large segment of the middle class, has of course for decades
been the dominant fact of Metropolitan spatial dynamics. The
increased service levels, higher costs and shrinking 'tax base
of New York and many other central cities have been contributing t
fiscal strains for many years. Furthermore, recent shifts in
private and public investment between regions of the country
(often oversimplified as a Sunbelt/Frostbelt competition) have
also contributed to the sense that locational factors are of
central importance, and that fiscal stress may just be a cor-
allary of a city's economic "obsolescence."
t
81
111-15 4
But no matter how serious these capital shifts may be, they
are never simply equivalent to the fiscal condition, of cities. ^
As /Friedland, Piven^nd Alford write:
American cities have experienced fiscal strains
at earlier historical junctures at periods when
capital was concentrating in the cities, not desert-
ing them. And not all cities, either in the United
States or in Western Europe, that are suffering fis- ' .
cal strains are the victims of territorial shifts *.
in capita! investment. ' In short, while some empiri-
cal verification 'can be found for all of these asser-
tions, they do not propose an explanation of fiscal
strains commensurate with their perennial and Wide-
spread occurrence. ^
There, are numerous partial explanations and it is neither .possible -
nor necessary to "choose" among them solely on the basis o.f empir-
ical evidence. A general theory of urban fiscal crisis that \
is eclectic but still rigorous would be very useful. Unfortunately,
such a theory is still in the embryonic is tages , as an examination .
of one major line of argument and the numerous critiques it, has
attracted will show. ^
A Structural Theory -of Fiscal Crisis ( (^f\
One starting point, for a general theory of fiscal stress demands
an enumeration of the functions of. the modern capitalist state,
rather than \n analysis of particular services or levels of govern-
ment .This is the approach taken t& the widely cite<§ framework
' 6/
developed by O'Connor." In this framework there is a dual nature
to public sector activities. On the one hand,, the government plays
a crucial and expanding role in the economy through direct enhance-
ment of productive capacity and the reproduction of a viable
labor force. On the other hand,' the maintenance and legitima-
tion of the social" order is also necessarily largely a' 'governmen-
ERIC • * ■ 82
j 111-16
tal function. In performing both of these broad functions the
state is absorbing many of the costs of economic development,
while appropriation of the profits from that development remains
basically private. That rule of socialization of costs and pri-
vatization of profits is, in neo-Marxi^n terms, the hallmark of
a capitalist state. In a modern capitalist state, such as the
United States, fiscal crisis is an inherent tendency resulting
from increased demands on the state and a structural incapacity
to cover the costs of meeting those demands.
What are the general categories of public spending, and how
can some particular services and programs be characterized? One
of the longstanding areas of public involvement in the economy has
been development or subsidy of physical infrastruc-
ture, including the transportation, utilities, and land improvements
so essential to industrial and agricultural enterprise. These
activities, along with government sponsored research and develop-
ment intended to create new industrial technologies, are known
as social investment . Social security and various aspects of
health and education which contribute to the reproduction of the
labor force are forms of social consumption , an indirect support of
capital accumulation. Police and welfare (and national defense)
are the most often cited examples of social expenses , tasks of
maintaining order and a minimal level of legitimacy for the system.
^ Most social expenses are directed at the "surplus population,"
those who bear the brunt of structural unemployment and who, when
they can work, are largely* segregated in the least stable and
least desirable jobs.
ERIC , ' 83
> \
\
\ 111-17
In practice, though, few services &re pure examples of any
\ \
one function, and the intermingling of purposes must be understood
as a basic feature of many public activities. This is especially
true of services for children. Education is clearly a social
expense in certain situations, a gloomy "warehousing" of ghetto
\
youngsters, but it is never without some connection to prepara-
tion for the labor market. Recreation and cultural services for
children are in a similarly split position. Various federal
initiatives during the Depression and the 1960's made urban
recreation a key element of employment policy and the social con-
trol o-f youth. The origins of the municipal agencies in the
Progressive Eita exhibit a duality of socializing "working class
immigrant children and providing healthy, basid leisure .or
all classes of people. The. dichotomy between a social service
and a leisure program, which we showed above to be intrinsic to
children's? programs, is akin to a dual role of social consump-
tion and social expense. Even these programs then, though
they represent only a small proportion of public spending, are
subject to the same general imperatives as larger services whose
goals are more frequently made explicit. ,
Perhaps the best developed and most helpful element of
O'Connor's theory, for our purposes, is the explanation of the
growth of public expenditures. The structural necessity of an
increasingly active, interventionist, non-neutral government is
convincingly argued, and its general functions are easily recog-
nizable, if not always discrete. By establishing a plausible logic
o I
ERIC 81
r
111-18
for the growth of government, the theory takes a burden off
particularistic assertions of the influence of individuals or
social groups.
But a general structural theory runs the risk of determinism,
which greatly lessens its value, in at least two important respects,
First, the long-term growth of public spending has not been
steady or automatic, nor is the growth of any particular service
simply determined by its functional utility. There are all kinds
of historical contingencies and counter-trends which also define
their current situations. In the following section on the recent
deceleration of the growth of government some of these counter-
trends are discussed. •
The second weakness of a deterministic theory is that it sug-
gests that crisis is ever present. This is not true in a practi-
cal sense, for crisis should also be seen as an inherently politi-
cal and variable condition. While there are always conflicting
structural tendencies toward fiscal str « n, an actual crisis,
if the term has any real meaning, is an episodic phenomenon. It
is a time when the conventional resolutions to contradictions do
not work, and the conditions for fundamental change are apparently
set. In the concluding section of this chapter some of the more
common political elements of urban fiscal crises will be outlined.
We shall argue that variability of government spending growth and
of political definitions of fiscal crisis represent a middle range,
of inquiry, between the particularistic, single-cause theories, ^
and the macroeconomic structural frameworks which miss so much
of the actual content of urban change. This middle range is
ERIC .85
9
ERIC
111-19
relatively undeveloped, but may be the most productive level
at which to understand fiscal containment issues as they affect
specific populations, such as children, and specific services,
such as out-of- school recreation, education and culture.
Counter-trends to the Growth of Government
Notwithstanding the long-term trend of government expansion,
the rate of expenditure growth in constant dollars now appears to
be decelerating, independent of the effect of recent fiscal con-
tainment legislation. As a 1979 RAND report concludes:
Over the last four years, the average rate of annual
increase for the three levels of government has been
half what it was between 19 49 and 1975. The rate
has shrunk the most for federal and local spending;
only state spending even approaches its historical
rates, and . . . it too may slow down further before
long. (Table 3 )' L
RAND also reports a similar leveling off of government spending as
a proportion of GNP and public sector employment. The 197 9 level-
ing off point represents roughly a tripling of per capita spending
since World War II at each level of government, measured in 1967
dollars.-^
The RAND indicators may well have pinpointed a major counter-
trend to the long term growth of public spending, but there are a
number of reasons why prevailing public perceptions are still domi-
nated by images of an expanding government. First, to reiterate,
the downturn in the growlh r.Tte is a relatively short-term phenom-
enon and still represents an overall absolute increase after adjust-
ing for inflation. The high inflation rate which has prevailed
over this period has caused the dollar amounts of government bud-
86
TABLE 3
III-' 19a
Year
1929
19 39
1949
1959
1969
1975
1979'
State , Local and Federal Spending:
1929-1979
$ billion 1967)
(In
. A. Expenditures
Local State
11
20
18
33
68
86
95
4
• 7
12
21
39
56
66
Federal
4
18
53
96
153
189
203
All
Levels
19
45
83
150
260
331
364
*Estimated
B. Average Annual Rate of Change (%)
1929-1975 4.6 5.9 8.7 6.4.
1949-1975 6.2 6.1 5.0 5.5
1975-1979 2.3 4.1 1.8 2.4
Source: Anthony H. Pascal and Mark David Menchik, Fiscal
Containment: Who Gains? Who Loses? Report R-2494/IFF/RC , RAND
Santa Monica, California, September 1979, p. 2.
87
111-20
gets to grow at an even faster rate than before.* This is not
necessarily true for the budgets of local parks, recreation and
cultural agencies, however. As we shall see in the next
chapter, their disproportionately large cutbacks sometimes
resulted in absolute_xe_ductions even before Proposition 13- type
measures took effect.
Another aspect of the size of government is the elusive but
important issue of productivity.' Over the last five years num-
erous examples of higher costs per unit of service have become
prominent. There are, in many metropolitan area school districts,-
fewer students but more educational personnel and much higher
per-pupil costs. The pattern of fewer direct services and greater
overhead expenses is a common perception, if not always precisely
defined or accurately measured. In a case study of
service productivity RAND found that in Los Angeles 86",
of the increase in government spending between 1973, and 1978.
was due to inflation, higher salary levels for the same employees,
and other factors not indicative of any increase in the level of
services provided. And Zevin used similar data to critique
9 /
the structural theory we alluded to above:- '
* It is not our intention here to discuss the fundamental relation-
ship between government spending and inflation, a highly contro-
versial topic. This point concerns only the literal increase
in the size of budgets which can be attributed to inflated currency.
9
ERIC
88
t IH-21
[O'Connor's argument] ... suffers by comparison
with the realities of New York's actual
dilemma. Although municipal employment has
doubled, it is dubious whether the actual level
of services provided by the city government
has increased very much. Although welfare
and otner transfer-payment burdens have
increased over the past ten years, the rates
of increase have been far less than the trip-
ling of the city's budget, and furthermore,
the modest increases which have occurred seem
to be more related to the faltering of the
growth of the Monopoly Capital sector, rather
than its progress.
As noted earlier, children's recreational and cultural
services were consistent with many of these trends in 'adminis-
trative practice. The phenomenon of increased costs is really
the product of several different factors which need to be seen
as part of an overall pattern. The obsolete physical plant
in older cities was being replaced at costs unavoidably much
higher then the original land and improvements. Public employee
salaries and benefits rose dramatically in a relatively short
period of time. New technologies were instituted with, high
start-up costs, but with savings due to efficiency accruing only
more gradually. New programs begun under special ' federal grants
were continued under local funding when that original source was
terminated. For these and other reasons more and more money was
spent for the same or deteriorating levels of recreation and
cultural programming in many cities.
Finally the incidence of state and local taxes did not in
its overall effect support the image of "leveling off" which the
aggregate expenditure data show. The yield from the more visible
89
111-22
taxes , especially on residential property rose extremely quickly
during .this period, due mostly to inflation-fed increases in %
assessed valuation and a gradual shift of the tax burden from
commercial to residential property. In some cases, most notably
California, the state increased its take to the point of bu: icing
a multi-billion dollar surplus. f| (Shortly after Proposition 13
passed in June, 1978, U.S. News and World Report showed 41 states
with some kind of surplus.—^)
We will return to the specific case of California in the
next chapter. Our point here is the diversity of coexisting fis-
cal conditions: some governments have large surpluses, others
face massive short-term debts. Cutbacks in services have been
accompanied by unprecedented rises in property taxes. A deceler-
ation of the overall growth rate has encompassed vastly different
rates for various levels of government, and for localities in
different economic circumstances. The more one searches for
the typical fiscal crisis, the more one finds a welter of contrast-
ing specific situc\tions.
C risis and "Normal" Fiscal Politics
Turning from economic indicators to political structures
and behavior concerning fiscal matters, we find that much more
has been written about "normalcy 11 than about "crisis." Not
surprisingly most analysts have tended to emphasize tire ways
<»
in which urban governments seek a to minimize turmoil and reduce
conflict oyer budget and revenue issues. In the broadest sense
we can speak of two schools of thought — one "radical," often
neo-Marxian, and the other liberal or, as has become- fashionable ,
ERJC 30
III-23
neo-conservative. (The labels are not fixed or particularly
important, of course, and are only rough 'indicators of ideolog-
ical positions.)
From the radical perspective urban political structures are
11/
seen as largely designed to diffuse class conflict. Sometimes
this means that public services expand in response to popular
unrest, but usually in a way that co-opts the most potent chal-
lengers. Many interpretations of the War on Poverty, including
12/
its youth recreation component, take this approach. But
more basic barriers to fundamental change are seen in the pat-
tern of governmental jurisdictions itself.. Many of the most
important activities which urban governments perform in the
interests of economic growth (urban renewal, inf rastructural
development, subsidies to business) are effectively shielded
from popular challenge, or so thoroughly fragmented in a myriad
of agencies that they can rarely become solid political targets.
What remains most susceptible to effective political organizing
are community services, including recreation, education, police
and welfare, with which people have almost daily contact.
These services therefore absorb most of the conflict, at the local
level, while most of the factors that determine both the overall
resources available and the opportunities for the population remain
relatively unaccessible . Friedland, Piven and Alford summarize
this line of argument this way:
91
(
111-24
...over time urban governments come to be
structured in ways which allow them both to
support economic growth on the one hand, and 1
to regulate'- and manage political partici-
pation on the "other. Urban governments are
organized in ways which allow them to absorb
political discontent through political parti-
cipation which is limited to agencies and 13 y
. issues which do not impinge upon economic growth.
Ironically perhaps s , most of the empirical research on urban
fiscal politics has not been done by people who share this per-
ception of structural constraints. Fortunately for us, given
our focus on California and Oakland in particular, some of the
most extensive analysis of these issues was undertaken by the
University of California's Oakland Project in the late 1960's
and early 19 70 's.—^ Meltsner, for example, asserted that in
Oakland ten years ago, local revenue was a political problem,
not an economic one". He detailed the ways in which, through
judicious manipulation of "tax publics" (the constituents
directly affected by and aware of a given revenue charge) offi-
cials could meet their basic revenue needs without drawing too
.15/
much political fire. Some oi these methods were already
employed, -he argued, but many others were not due presumably
to a lack of creativity or felt need on the part of of f icials .
Meltsner, Wildavsky , and others described the annual cycle of the
budgetary process in Oakland, which they saw as a routinized
procedure of bargaining, primarily between the city manager and
16/
department heads. - The typical result, notwithstanding public
posturing and even at tempts to mobilize .constituencies , was a
small annual incremental increase in each department's budget.
92
The more dramatic changes in Oakland's public., spending came from
the introduction or withdrawal of federal programs, which operated
by a rather different set of rules than the local budget.
Many of the Oakland Project's findings, if not their ideologi-
cal judgments, would appear to be consistent with the more radi-
cal perspectives outlined above. 'Oakland's low profile tax policy,
as Meltsner described it, suited Friedland, et al. , as "an example
of how key public decisions critically affecting accumulation
(the tax burden on large property owners) are bureaucratized ,
rather than politicized, through conscious political decision."
The extreme fragmentation of local government activities divided
between city, county, school district and numerous special districts)
often resulted. in similar de-politicization . The massive "imple-
mentation problems" with federal job development programs reaffirmed
that much governmental assistance for economic growth was imper- <
vious to popular control. In fact, as descriptions of "normal
politics," even in as turbulent a time as the late 1960 's and
early 1970 's, the two perspectives mesh to reveal a great deal
about Oakland and many other American cities.
Our problem is ascertaining the utility of these perspectives
for understanding the particular fiscal crisis precipitated by
Proposition 13. And here, both perspectives are less immediately
fruitful. -
The radical approach emphasizes that fiscal crisis is a per-
iodic, relatively rare situation. It develops when displaced
s8cial conflict, which has been' converted into demands on the
government, threatens to overwhelm the mechanisms designed to
93
- IH-26
diffuse and manage that conflict. Expenditures outstrip revenues.,
and "...At these junctures capital mobilizes within the framework
of these urban structures to declare a fiscal crisis and subdue '
popular' demands. " (emphasis added) 18
On its face «Proposition 13 seems to be a very different
scenario in many respects. It was a large surplus, rather than
a deficit, which triggered much of the popular uprising. That
uprising was couched in demands for less government, not more.
And it was the opponents of the initiative (hardly representative
of capital in /this context) who most vividly tried to "declare"
a crisis in order to protect services. To say that the theoreti-
cal argument fits New York City or Cleveland^ better than California
is only to buttress our .earlier point--that there .are important
differences among fiscal crises that are as yet not amenable to
an overall structural theory.
The "incrementalist" school of., budgeting and revenue is at
a similar loss to reconcile Proposition 13 with earlier frameworks .
It was initially a very large, highly politicized jolt to offi-
cials (at the state- level) who, by virtue of their extensive expe-
rience and resources, should have been able to manage "tax publics"
quietly for years to come. Instead, some of the very tactics
which formerly seemed so effective at reducing the visibility of
revenues became most problematic.
We should point out that some excellent accounts of Proposi-
tion 13' s origins have come from observers associated with these
perspectives. However, those accounts focus on the specific/
conditions in California and do not make extensive use of their
19/
earlier work. * -
f\ 111-27
"\ The next chapter focuses on the political issues "surrounding
Proposition 13, two years after its passage. Though, as- we said,
there are continual 'fiscal strains this situation, the first
immediate crisis" has passed. Many administrators of children's
services are claiming to be temporarily back in equilibrium and
at the same time warning of an impending cataclysm by 1981-82
(when the state ' s. budget surplus may "run out"). And, perhaps
not so surprisingly, the theoretical approaches - which we have
discussed 'here contribute more to an understanding of this r*ew,
precarious state of normalcy then they did to the unusual, vola-
tile happenings of 1978.
)
ft •
ERIC
95: ,
V
nr-28'
Chapter Three
Fo Dtnotes
0
'l 3
4.
5-.
\
'.These themes are developed in detail in Victor Rubin,
"The Historical Development of Childrens Services"
(Berkeley: Children's Time Study-, 1980 Working
'Paper) . \
By 1976-7 property taxes accounted for 33-6% of total
local government revenues (3155 for counties, 25-85?
for municipalities, 42% for school districts).
U.S. Census of Governments : Governmental Finances
1977 . '
Charles R. Morris, The Cost of Good Intentions: New York
• City and the Liberal Experiment (New York: W.W.-
Norton, 1980), pp. 172-75-
Robert^Zevin, "New York Cit$ Crisis: First Act in a
"New Age of Reaction, " r in R.E. Mealy and D. Mer-
melstein (eds.), The Fiscal Crisis of American
Cities (New York: Vintage, 1977), pp. 11-29. ' >
Roger Friedland, Frances F. Piven and Robert R. Alford,
"Political Conflict, Urban Structure and the
Fiscal" Crisis , " International Journal of Urban and
. Regional Research , L (Number 3) 5 1977, p. 44B.
James 0' Conner, The Fis'cal Crisis <qF the State (New York
St. - Martin's, 1973-)'. ~ :
Anthony H. Pascal a'nd Mark David Menchik, Fiscal Con -
tainment: Who Gains?. Who Loses.? (Santa Monica: ^
Rand Corporation, 1979 >, p. 2. '
8.
9'.
10
11
12
Ibid. , p . 8 ..
Zevin, Op.Cit . , pi£'20.
U.S. News and World Re port , "Taxpayer Revolt: Where It's
Sprg-ading-Now-r^Tlne 26, 1978, pp. l6-l8. 1
y • _ * : \
Friedland, Op .Cit . , provide many references on this point.
For example, Robert E. Myers, "Controlling the Poor:
The Undeclared Goal of Public Recreation . "Ph. D .
'} Dissertation, School of Criminology, University
of California, Berkeley, 1974.
ERIC
96
111-29
13. Friedland, Op.Clt . , p. ^53.
14. According to its Director, Aaron Wildavsky, the Oak-
land Project was "an attempt by scholars and
students' at Berkeley to develop a useful program
of policy research and action in cooperation with
Oakland city agencies. " Quoted in J.J. McCorry,
Ma rcus Foster and the Oakland Public Schools
(Berkeley: University of California Fress, 197«).
15. Arnold J. Meltsner, The Politics of City Revenue
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971).
16. Arnold J. Meltsner and Aaron Wildavsky, "Leave City
Budgetting Alone," in J.R. Crecine (ed.),
Financing the Metropolis: Public Po licy in Urban
Economics (Beverly Hills: Sage, 197") •
17. Friedland, Op.Clt . , p. 458.
18. Ibid . , p. 468.
19 For two "good descriptions of the tax issues leading
to' the initiative see Frank Levy, "On understanding
Proposition 13," The Public Interest , Number 56,
Summer 1979; and Arthur Blaustein, "Proposition
l3=Catch 22," Harper's , 257, November 1978.
ERIC , ' 37
IV
CHI LDREN'S SERVICES UNDER FIRE:
THE STRUGGLE FOR SURVIVAL AFTER PROPOSITION 13
On October 23, 1978, Howard Jarvis, co-author of Proposi-
tion 13 — the California initiative limiting property taxes — was
quest ioiTed about some of its impacts on public services:
Reporter./" Libraries are closing in Los Angeles.
How do you feel about that?
Jarvis: It doesn't bother me a damn bit.
R: Why not?
J: Well, because most of the children they're for
can't read. And I don't know what the hell good it
does to have the books there. Now I understand that
they're closing one day a week. Which doesn't bother
me at all . I have been familiar with libraries for
some time. Ninety percent of the time you could
shoot a cannon through and nobody ' s there . . . ^
Jarvis 1 extreme frankness, if not crudeness, had served his campaign
well, a&d in its aftermath he was free to escalate his assault
on elected officials, bureaucrats and many government programs.
His assessment of public libraries was, in laconic and colorful
terms, a statement of the "marginality crisis" to which we have
been referring. Here Jarvis questions not just the effectiveness
of the service, but whether even children—supposedly a primary
clientele — really care about libraries anyway. \
Strictivy speaking, Proposition 13 was only concerned with
property taxes — not libraries nor the fate of any particular
community service. Of course, in practice services themselves
were potentially affected, and California in mid-1978 was awash
with dire predictions of what would happen if the initiative
was adopted. Many estimates of its consequences for children's
er|c
IV-2
services implied that JarvdLs '. low opinion of their value would be
reflected in immediate, massive closures and cutback's. What
has actually taken place in the two years since is neither that
dramatic nor that simple. In this chapter we will examine
Prpoposition 13 and its particular impact, on children's out-of-
school services. This will require, first, a general examination
of the Proposition 13 phenomenon as a context within which to
explore the services of special interest to us here.
In the previous chapter we showed how issues of urban fiscal
9
stress have been described either very narrowly or very broadly
such .that they do not facilitate the' kind of impact analysis which
we are undertaking here. This is true of research around Propo-
sition 13 and related "tax rebellion" issues as well. At one
extreme, the initiative can be seen as the result of a sequence
of specific events and circumstances, not likely to be repeated. 4
At the other extreme it can be viewed as the culmination of
several years of growing taxpayer discontent, and an indicator
of a new "era of limits," not only in California but throughout
the country. There is some truth in both of these characteriza-
tions, for while Proposition 13 might not have prevailed had there
not been a certain set of fiscal and political conditions in
California, it did, touch some unappreciated, powerful and gen-
eralized antipathy of the electorate toward government practices.
And although the initial political momentum it generated has
faded, it has nonetheless effectively redefined the politics
99
IV- 3
of state and local fiscal affairs. In order to understand the
political climate in which decisions about children's services
were (and are) being made," we must- brief ly summarize the economic
conditions, campaign strategy and the climate of public opinion
in California at the time the initiative appeared on the ballot.
Proposition 13 and Tax Equity
Property tax burdens had by 1978 become a serious problem
for many California residents. There should be no mistaking
the political primacy of this fact. , As a result of reformed
assessment practices and unprecedented inflation of housing ,
values, California homeowners experienced enormous increases
in their property tax bills in the 1970' s even though tax rates
themselves' were mostly stable or declining. The assessment
reform had created a uniform tax rol'l, thereby preventing future
scandals, such as that which occurred in 1966 when several county
assessors had knowingly underassessed downtown office buildings.
New property valuation procedures, employing -computerized
multiple regression formulae, enabled assessors to update prop-
erty values, especially residential values, more quickly, based
on recent sales data. Since the first administrative reform
removed assessors' discretion and the second increased their
efficiency, they ^had- little choice than to pass on some skyrocket-
ing'' increases , reflecting the 20 percent annual rise in real
estate values that prevailed in many parts of California through-
, 2
out the middle of the decade.
3
IV-4
Of course, the sales tax and the income tax— both primarily
collected by the state— were also increasing their take rapidly
while their rates remained steady. By the early 1970's, the »
state treasury began to accumulate a sizable surplus,
although this fact went virtually unnoticed by the general public
until 1978. The legislative leadership preferred it this way,
mainly because they wanted to use the surplus to eventually imple-
ment the equalization of local school finance mandated by the
Serrano vs. Priest court decision. Had they actually adopted a
Serrano solution along with income-tax reform (such as indexing
to inf lation^both of which were stymied in the legislature
Proposition 13 would not have had such a visible target. However,
there was, until 1978, very little pressure on the legislature
or the governor to enact these changes. When the legislature
feve-ishly began to develop its own tax reform plan, in response
to the proposed tax initiative, the lawmakers' low credibility
was too much of a liability. The hitherto invisible surplus
became routinely described as •'obscene," and embarrassed state
officials continually revised estimates of its magnitude upwards,
finally above $5 billion. A Legislature sponsored tax proposal,
on the ballot simultaneously with Proposition 13, fared poorly
by comparison, had few supporters publicly (outside of the
Legislature) and was rendered moot by the overwhelming passage
of Proposition 13 itself. In effect, the Legislature had become
an issue, and lawmakers knew that distribution of the state sur-
ERJC loi
IV- 5
plus to supplant local property tax revenues— a necessary conse-
quence of Proposition 13— would be more closely monitored than
any previous fiscal matter.
There is, for those concerned with equity in children.' s
services,, a striking irony. Serrano , : whatever its imperfections,
seemed to require some equalization by means of greater state level
spending on schools. The' political- deadlocks which developed
around the various equalization plans lasted several years and
kept the Legislature from implementing any scheme and drawing
down the- surplus. This inaction contributed -to the overall tax
burden of Californians and to their perception of the Legislature
as unable" or unwilling to act decisively. This enhanced Proposi-
tion 13' s prospects, since it was the only lever at hand by
which people could both "send them a message" .and cut their own
taxes. The reults of post-Proposition 13 distribution, however,
shows that "in picking up the burden... the state has maintained
spending-per-student disparities that led to the Serrano decision.
.It remains to be seen whether the state Supreme Court will order
changes in state funding formulas." 3 ' Even if they do, the sur-
f
plus will be exhausted by then, and a new formula will more
likely require "leveling down" rather than up. Thus the surplus,
once seen as a key to equalizing school finance, became a politi-
cal liability, ultimately not even available to meet the initial
equalization objectives.
0
102
IV-6
There are other important tax equity issues that have been
"stood on their head" by Proposition 13, and an extensive account
would draw us away from our primary topic. But two issues should
be mentioned briefly, because they are rooted in the initiative
itself, rather than in the disruption of historic state tax policy.
First, residents receive less than half of the $7 billion
in tax relief allocated anually by the state. As Table 1 shows,
only 3 3.2% of the savings accrued to home owners, and 17% to
those owning rental property (most of which -was not rebated to
tenants). This data was used 'before and after the Proposition 13
campaign by tax reformers arguing- against the initiative, but to
no avail. As long as voters were receiving a tangible _benef it ,
they did not seem to begrudge business, landlords and agriculture
thei-r share.
The second issue raised by the administration of Proposition 13
may- become' more politically explosive in the years to come. The
initiative reduced the property tax rate to 1% of 1975 market value,
plus a levy to cover prior bond obligations. The average tax rate
across the state dropped from $10.68 in 1977-78 to $4.79 in
1978-79. Future assessment increases are limited to two percent
annually. However, new cons-feruction "and resales of existing
property was to be reassessed according to their current market
values. The median house price has risen from $70,000 at the
"time the initiative passed to $100,000 in June, 1980. Since
approximately 15% of the population move every year, there are
sizeable numbers of newly assessed properties. In fact, total
assessments have risen 9.4%, 13.8% and 17.8% in the years since
103
IV-7
o TABLE 1
Distr ibution, of Initial Tax Relief, By Type of Property,
— : Fiscal Year 1978-1979
Initial Tax Relief As a Percent- of
(Millions of Dollars) Total Relief
Owner-Occupied Residential
Rental-Occupied Residential
Commercial & Industrial
Agricultural
State
Total
Source: Legislative Analyst, An Analysis of Pro position 13,
The Jarvis-Gann Property Tax Initiative , May 1978, California
Legislature, Sacramento, California.
2/341
1 , 20 0
1,916
944
643
7,044
33.2%
17.0
27 . 2
13.4
9.1
100.0
02"
H><t
IV-8
1978. Given current economic trends and assuming no change in the
law, home buyers, within * few years, will be paying the same
v : . . . 5
amount of property tax tfhey .would have paid before the initiative.
Both of these points indicate that residents are paying an
ever-increasing 'rhare of the tax burden. This development, how-
ever, has not yet received widespread attention, but many obser-
vers suggest that in a few years it may become a central concern.
The non-partisan California Journal recently summarized the
. prospect neatly:
Barring the appearance of some revenue bonanza,
'the unavoidable issue f or' the 1980s will be whether
the Legislature will* raise taxes to maintain the.
governmental status quo. And if taxes are to
be raised, who will be hit hardest? Before that
can be done, however, lawmakers will be forced
to convince the public that there is no longer
any fat in statue and local government and that
the reserve tank is actually empty. Undoubtedly,
belt-tightening will take place before the
Legislature will take the politically dangerous
course of raising taxes.
The best bet is that an attempt will be made
to make a major alteration in Proposition 13.
The obvious target will be the business sector,
-which has been the prime beneficiary . of
Proposition 13. As years pass, the property ^
tax bill will continue to shift from industrial
and commercial parcels ot the single-family home.
At some point, a major effort will probably be
made to win voter approval for the long-discussed
split-roll concept, which taxes business property
at a higher rate than residential parcels. An
effort will probably be made to relieve buyers
of new homes because they are paying a dispropor-
tiona±e share of the tax burden. °
What we might add is that prospective home buyers are primarily
families with young children. The next round of the tax revolt
may reflect a somewhat different coalition—families anxious to
10
5
• • IV- 9'
> * ■
a home in communities with adequate services for children, along
with public sector service providers, their clients, and liberals
intent on increasing business' share of taxes. The defeat in 1980
of "Jarvis II.," the proposal to cut the state income tax in half,
featured the tentative emergence of that kind of voting bloc
(and a decidedly low profile by state officials) .
Even if this scenario is not entirely accurate, we can at
least be sure that Proposition 13 has begun an era of uncertainty
and greater militancy concerning tax issues. Both because of its
intended tax shifts and its loopholes, more questions have been
raised than answered. In the following section we will see that
with regard to the future of government provided services, there
is an increasing degree of uncertainty linked to some of these
fiscal considerations.
■■>( .
" * . - IV-10
Proposition 13: A Referendum on Services?
Early evidence during the Proposition ,13 campaign indicated that
the public scared undifferentiated anger at government inefficiency
and welfare largesse. Actually, however, the real "prize" and the
focus of most voter attention was the matter of property tax
relief. With regard to more general concerns — including the issue
of support, for public services — the mood of the electorate was
far from clear. The political and ideological currents were hardly
consistent, leaving extraordinary room for any number of perspec-
tives. To facilitate pur discussion of children's out-of-school
services, it is helpful to review these perspectives here,
1) Uncompromising conservative apposition to "big government"
was not necessarily shared by many. The initiative had its origins
in the landlord and anti-tax lobbies of California, and the ideolog-
ical tenets of those groups held sway in the campaign leadership.
9
But hard-core conservative support had not been enough to carry
several earlier similar tax limitation initiatives. The differences
which attracted voters of other persuasions to Proposition 13 were
the new economic circumstances described above and the oppor-
tunity to express the growing cynicis^n regarding normal political
channels for tax relief. \ t
2) Rather than eliminate services entirely, most supporters
of Proposition 13 were enthused about the opportunity to cut the
"fat" in government.. Fat in this context means several different
things. First there is extravagance , or ^ostentatious and unneces-
sary spending by public officials, generally to enhance their
JU7
IV-11-
\ • ,
own lifestyle? or egos. Second, there is waste , or funds lost
through bureaucratic inef f iciency . f Third', there are unnecessary
services , activities which should not be pru\ided by local govern-
ment (or perhaps/ any government). Finally, there is largesse
in the provision of -unreasonably high public employee pay and
benefits, and welfare payments. Proponents of the . initiative '
claimed that $7 billion in "fat" could be pared from budgets
without serious cuts in the essential functions of local govern-
ment. Public opinion* polls showed desire to cut the fat as a
popular reason to support Proposition 13. Some forced-choice
questions showed that this belief was strongly held, but not
very well focused. As a -University of California research group
put it:
...3.8 percent of ' Calif ornians polled by the Field
Institute in July, 1-978 felt that state arid local
governments 'could provide the same level of serv-
ices as previously even with a 40 percent reduction
in spending. And when forced to choose between
lower taxes and government services 60 percent
of C^lifornians interviewed by CBS News in June
197 8*opted for paying less evep if it meant
reduced services. 7
However, most of those who .would prefer reduced services in
the abstract sense could apparently not easily find many targets
appropriate for cutting" baafk . Table 2 'shows that' given a list
of 14 state and local functions and the inquiry "Should Spending
•for this Category Be Cut Back?" only Welfare was chosen by a major--
\ity°of respondents in the Field poll. The^ services which respondent
were least willing to reduce tended to be the ones most dependent
on 'the property tax. When after the initiative passed, those
IV-lla
TABLE 2
Should Spending for This Category be Cut Back?
Welfare and Public Assistance Programs 62%
Government-Backed Public Housing Projects 41
Environmental Protection Regulations 34
Medical Care Programs such as Medi-Cal 26
Courts and Judges 26
Higher Education such as University, \$tate
and Local Community Colleges 24
Public Transportation 23
Street and Highway Building and Repair 23
Public Schools, Kindergarten through
12th grade 22
Parks and Recreational Facilities 22
Jails, Prisons and other Correctional
Facilities
Mental Health Programs 9
Police Departments and Law Enformcement 8
Fire Departments ^
Source : Field Institute. Published in
San Francisco Chronicle, June 16, 1978, Page 8.
9
ERIC
109
VI-12
were the most directly endangered services, many people were only
further angered and frustrated that their message had not been
translated into the appropriate selective trimming.
3) The campaign against Proposition 13, featuring prominent
politicians predicting catastrophic cuts and fiscal chaos, was
ineffective and played into the hands of initiative proponents.
Since the leaders' credibility was already strained by their
belated, inadequate attempts at tax reduction, their stance seemed
vindictive and alarmist. As the reported size of the surplus kept
growing, the dire predictions were viewed increasingly as false
cries of wolf, and their credibility was further undermined.
It was a lesson well learned, and which paid anti-Jarvis II
dividends in 1980 , when a less alarmist campaign more tied to grass-
roots organizing was conducted successfully.
4) The inadequacies of existing public services provided
an effective argument in favor of Proposition 13. As noted in
the previous chapter, most of the recent increases in government
spending had gone for inflation and higher personnel costs,
without appreciable increases in service provision. Schools
were the largest and most troubled service, of course, and discon-
tent with declining test scores, violence, busing and a host of
other issues contributed to the allure of the initiative . Perhaps,
some people thought, more stringent budgets will induce concentra-
tion on "the basics" and greater administrative efficiency. Other
voters were simply resentful of the relative improvements in pay
9
ERLC
in.)
IV-13
which teachers and other civil servants had gained over the decade.
5) Even the most consistent opponents of big government
were selective in their targets. Jarvis, as noted earlier, devel-
oped a flexible category of "property-related services" which,
when efficiently administered, were the rightful recipients of
the remaining property tax revenue. Police and fire protection
and public works were always on this list, as were, at times,
parks and recreation and sanitation. Of course, it has been a very
long time since the general property tax was earmarked for certain
functions, but this version of minimal government had some
rhetorical appeal.
Police and fire officers gave much more support to Proposition 13
. than did any other group of civil servants. The debate rekindled
simmering animosities among employees in various services as to
whose work was the most essential. Police and fire services were
formally vindicated— protected from cuts in the state's first
bailout of local governments. Further security is being considered
in the form of a proposed initiative that would mandate that these
agencies be maintained at pre-Proposition 13 levels of service.
(Estimates in Oakland are that under current funding this would
8
leave less than 10 percent of the^budget for everything else. )
Public pre-school childcare programs, backed by a less powerful
constituency, also garnered some protection in the form of a
state requirement that they not be cut more deeply than the city
or school district-wide average reductions.
Ill
IV- 14
6) The performance of children's out-of -school services
of concern to us. here was not a major concern during the Proposi-
tion 13 campaign. In suburban and rural areas, where the Prop-
osition Won overwhelmingly, basic recreation and library prograps
were even seen as good examples of simple, locally controlled
non-controversial government activities. In many urban core
cities and in most minority neighborhoods with large cities, the
initiative did not receive majority support. These are areas
where out-of-school programs have more explicit social and thera-
peutic objectives, and also where the glaring inequities in
the quality of basic service and facilities are most serious.
People who voted against the Proposition were not expressing a
vore of satisfaction with their programs as much as a fear that
they would lose what they had.
Some corroboration of -this observation can be found in the.
survey of Oakland which we reported in Chapter 2. In that 1976
inquiry we asked parents for their evaluation of local out-of-
school services. On an index which combined opinions about five
children's programs and facilities, greater satisfaction was
associated with higher socioeconomic status (Table 3 ) . Parents
in high status neighborhoods were nearly three times as likely to
be completely satisfied as parents in low status neighborhoods.
At the other extreme, while 27.2% of parents in low status neigh-
borhoods scored 0 or 1 Cm the index, only 6.3% of those in high
I
status neighborhoods scored the same. .Those neighborhoods which
exhibited the lowest satisfaction were the most likely to oppose
1 2
r
TABLE 3
•
<
\
IV-14a
*
Parents
1 Satisfaction with Neighborhood Services
(Index
of five items)
Weighted
N
Least
Satisfied
0
1
V
2
3
Most
Satisfied
a- 5
Total Sample
(764)
5.5%
11.1%
18.7%
23.0%
20.7% 20.9%
Neighborhoods
Hi status
( 1 71)
2.4
3.9
19.7
19. 7
22.0 33.1
Medium status
( 1 8 2 )
3.8
8.8
17 . 6
23.1
2 3.6 20.9
Low status
( 474 )
9.5
17.7
18.6
21 . 5
16.5 12.0
Family Income
$5, 000
(165)
6. 3
21. 5
15.1
' 20 . 6
17.7 18.8
. $'S;000-$9,999
V x o *4 y
«• 8 . 8"
16. 8
24 . 5
20.8
12.2 16.9
$10,000-$14,999
(ion)
^ _l z u ;
8 . 0
9.4
21.5
25.7
28.2 7.1
$15,000-$19,999
^ y v }
5.3
8.2
21. 9- .
20 . 5
23.6 20.5
$2 0,000 or more
(139)
4.9
6.9
16. 5
26 . 2
19.3 26.2
Ethnicity
Black
'(530)
8.4
16.0
17.6
21.5
21. ~5 A 15.4
White
(134)
1.7
7.4
27.6
24.0
15,9 23.4
A sian
( 49)
4.4
1.3
13.8
27. 7
26.6 26.2
All other ;
( 51)
9.5
15.4
16.1
27.7
7.8 23.4
ERIC
U3
• *
"i IV-15
Proposition 13, while its greatest support came from areas where
service evaluations were more positive. Thus, in Oakland, which
we expect is typical of other large cities in this respect, Prop-
osition 13 could not be interpreted as primarily a plebiscite on
children 1 s services .
In this section we have elaborated the relationship between
voter dissatisfaction with government and support for Proposition 13/
The initiative was first and foremost concerned with tax relief.
To the extent that it recorded dissatisfaction with government,
this took the form of generalized frustration with unresponsive
politicians and ineffective bureaucracies. It was not a mandate
for the elimination, or even the substantial reduction of out-
of -school children's services. As we shall see, however, not '
being the object of voters' wrath has proven to be small comfort
for the advocates of these services, which have by all accounts
been among "the prime victims of Proposition 13."
0
ERIC
114
IV-16
The Impact of Proposition 13 on Children's Services
Much of the research about the impact of Proposition 13 was
conducted so soon after its implementation that attention invaria-
bly focused on measuring changes in program inputs. Given the
early uncertainty about the amounts and forms of state aid that
would be made available to replace lost property tax revenues,
its particular effect on local budgqts and services was very dif-
ficult to accurately measure. And even at this writing, the pre-
dominant mode of analysis continues to be assessment of resource
and budgetary constraints "caused" by Proposition 13, with much
less consideration of the consequence of change for community
residents and service users. In Appendix A we take the case
of summer school to illustrate this distinction. Summer school
was virtually eliminated, saving the state over $100 million
annually, yet there is no systematic empirical study of what
actually happened to the children who had been and would have
been served. With that caveat as to the limitations of impact
analysis, we can sketch very briefly what has transpired.
A worst-case scenario of 270,000 public employee layoffs
in 197 8 was offered by opponents of the Proposition 13 initiative,
based on an assumption of no state bailout of local governments.
Prior to the June vote, school districts throughout the .state —
required by law to notify employees by May 14 if their jobs
were to be eliminated the following fall — sent letters of dismis-
sal to thousands of employee s / and many cities, counties and specia
districts also drew up drastic contingency plans. After the elec-
tion and passage of the initiative the State Legislature, however,
0
ERIC
IV-17
passed a one-year bailout measure totalling roughly $4.4 billion in
aide to localities. This state action included various restrictions
on localities receiving the assistance, but most of these were
successfully challenged by communities in the courts. By January,
1979, 26,412 employees had actually been laid off, but 9,324 of them
,10
had been rehired.
Agencies made most of their staff reductions through attrition
o ■
and the elimination of already vacant positions. Employee turnover
rose considerably in skilled positions, such as computer programmers,
accountants and nurses, for which there were many openings in the
private sector. Employee morale at all levels suffered seriously,
because of specific changes in job conditions, reduced opportunities
for advancement and the general feeling of community antipathy.
Examples abounded of inefficient and inappropriate staffing arrange-
ments provoked by layoffs and budget reductions. While the effects
on clients were often intangible, they are still potentially very
important.
Still speaking in general terms, and across all affected
public agencies, preventive services tended to suffer especially.
From street repairs to burglary protection seminars to infant health
screening, these kinds of cuts were commonplace, regardless
of the future costs of such actions. The problems with
this short-run strategy were recognized by all, but avoided by few.
Other, more "urgent" 'services had prior call on revenues, either
because they were mandated by state law or by- practical political
considerations .
116
IV-18
A number of studies produced evidence, predictably, that ethnic
minorities, the poor and women were more vulnerable than others to
the Proposition's impact on services. Disproportionate layoffs
and setbacks to affirmative action erased much recent progress of
11
minorities and women in public employment. Social service cut-
backs which affected minorities, women and many children as well
included a year without a cost-of-living increase for^AFDC recip-
ients, and elimination of county level programs such as battered-
spouse shelters and rape crisis canters. A study by the National
Association of Social Workers carefully documented all of the
changes in human services, broadly defined, and concluded that
"the population groups most dependent upon state and community-
provided humar^ services. . .have been harmed'in multiple, overlapping
and mutually aggravating ways. Especially injured have been work-
ing women ana AFDC mothers, their children, youth, the aged, and
,,12
ethnic and racial minorities.
An assessment that encompassed all services to children of all
backgrounds would have to be somewhat more optimistic. After all,
it can be argued, the most expensive basic health and education
services reaching the largest number of children were generally able
to maintain their funding and levels of service. (Total funding of
schools^s, up 8.6 percent for 1979-80; Medi Cal was up $400 million
from the previous year; and the revised, long-term bailout bill
enacted in 1979 included new state funding for county-based children
health programs.)
\
I
IV- 2 0
As one of, the oldest major cities in California, Oakland
(population 333,000) has a long tradition of providing significant
levels of out-of-school services for children. Many landmarks
of past periods of urban expansion and population change are visi-
ble in the city— from the WPA-era Rose Garden to the Latin-American
library, begun in the early 1970' s. % The city has been justifiably
proud of its parks system;" the special collections of its library,
and its new museum, each of which are generally agreed to be
among the best, most extensive or most innovative in the country.
The substantial public recreation program began with a few privately
endowed playgrounds at the turn of the century, as was the case
in many cities. It developed through the years to embrace adult
recreation, on the one hand, and even therapeutic activities like
juvenile counselling, on the other.
-These services are provided by a governmental structure
administered by a professional city manager, and'presided over
by a Mayor and eight council members. The city has no authority
over schools, welfare, health, transportation 'or utilities, all
of which are governed by separate, independent local entities.
This means that generally housing and economic development issues
are the primary political concerns, while public saf ety^takes
up two-thirds of the general fund budget. Recreation and culture
has accounted for about fifteen percent of local spending, and
. consistently attracts controversy only at budgeting time.
The branch libraries, recreation centers and playgrounds, whose
attendance patterns we examined in. Chapter 2, are often the only
ERIC
118
IV- 21
institutions of city government with which people interact routinely
in their neighborhoods. ' (Oakland has no police precincts or city
council district offices; indeed, in 1981, district elections of
city and school officials will take place for the first time,)
There are still inequities among neighborhoods in the quality of
these services, though the gap between wealthy and poor areas
has- been diminished somewhat in the past decade.
Alameda County, in which Oakland is situated, contains a
> diverse collection of central cities, old and new {suburbs of
various levels of socioeconomic status, and a substantial rural
area. The large county government administers all health, welfare
' and judiciary functions, as well as general services for the unin-
corporated areas. It also xuns_ a library system serving not only
unincorporated communities but several of the smaller cities,
including Fremont .
Fremont, with a population of 130,000 and a vast land area,
^s in many respects a typical Western post-war suburb. This once
rural area, now highly suburbanized , is midway between Oakland
and Sati Jose— making for a virtually continuous strip of develop-
ment. The city is home to a large General Motors assembly plant,
numerous other industries, and a predominantly white middle-income
population, consisting mostly of families with children. It has
a fairly new and extensive public recreation and parks
system-
San Francisco, like Oakland, has a venerable set of municipal
services designed" to promote culture and provide recreation for
ERIC young people.. Several contextual -flftf ere/ices must be noted, however.
IV-22
San Francisco is a consolidated city-county government, performing
all the functions of both entities under one Mayor and Board of
Supervisors. Unlike Oakland's mayor, whose job is part-time and
whose powers are limited to appointments and persuasion, San
Francisco has a strong mayor form of government, with the requisite
salary and staff. At the time of our study, the city had recently
adopted district elections, which it has since abandoned. And
while both cities are mosaics of the same ethnic groups, the pro-
portions are different. Oakland has relatively more blacks, San
Francisco more Asians and Latinos. Both cities have been losing
total population for a number of years, and have been "losing
children" at an even faster rate.
Budget austerity measures were nothing new for Oakland and
San Francisco, and many of the initial responses to Proposition 13
were virtually a continuation of their recent history.
In 1976, Oakland was forced to develop drastic budget reduc-
tion contingencies pending the outcome of a re-evaluation of its
pension obligations to police and firefighters. The worst case,
based on the most stringent new actuarial figures, called for a
budget reduction of twenty percent in the fire department, five
percent in police and fifteen percent in most other departments,
for cuts totalling $8.9 million. The plan called for the layoff
of 265 permanent employess, with another 183 jobs continued
vacant or lost through attrition. In addition, 106 temporary
workers hired under the federal Comprehensive Employment Training
Act (CETA) would have to be let go. This "contingency plan"
became the center of the council's and the city's attention for
two months, as residents argued, in effect, over which limbs to
120
0
ERIC
IV-23
0
amputate— the necessity of an operation, having already been determined.
As numerous people complained to the council , "you cut costs to
the bone 'in previous years. Now you're cutting through the bone."
The service reductions were propsed by the city manager , based
.on suggestions' from department heads and their advisory -commissions.
The cuts were posed as equitable and rational solutions to a no-win
situation, and everyone was urged to unselfishly bite his or her
share of the bullet. Despite the calls to unity, most speakers
before the city council at the time argued vociferously that the
cutback plan was discriminatory and counter-productive. Over a
period of two months the council heard staff reports and public
comment on several hundred budget reduction items, and eventually
approved eighty-five percent of the cuts, $7.5 million , 'for the
official "contingency budget." Services to children and youth
were among the most hotly contested i terns. The conflicts over
the emergency budget illustrated the increasingly precarious posi-
tion of those services.
The budget reduction plan exacerbated at least four types of
conflict concerning cultural and leisure services, all of whichX„
had especially severe impacts' on the young. The four- areas of
conflict included:
- overall budget priorities, pitting public safety
expenditures against cultural and leisure activities' »
- a jurisdictional dispute between the City of Oakland
and the Oakland Unif ied^School District, with each
trying to shift the funding of recreation programs
to the other " ,
or
121
' • , IV-24
<»
A
' /' •
'/ - arguments over the consolidation, largely for -/post- v
reducing purposes , of several cultural and social
service facilities ,
>{ (a '
- competition, over the use .of * 'Community Development
Revenue Sharing, 1 especially^, concerning ' its 'use as
a supplement to operating budgets rather than fc/r
^ capital improvements. '
' >f /?
It is almost incidental to this analysis that the Cuts were mostly
rescinded after the pension pbligations "were mitigated by passage
of a city . referendum. . (Except , of course, for the fact that the
* »»
"crisis 1 ' was the means by which Voters were convinced to change the
city charter to lower employees 1 benefits!)* But for the dynamics
of budgeting in a "crisis" it was a dry run for 1978 from which-
the central administrators learned a great deal.
The initial Proposition 13 situation was comparable to 197 6
to the Extent that the city v could : treat its revenue total as both
exogenous and unknown at the time. Since balanced * budgets
(required by law) had to be adopted, and it happened that the
fiscal year began only a few weeks 'after the election, Oakland
and 'other cities found it necessary to approve drastic Propo-
sition 13 contingencies before the vote and without knowing
what relief the statb would offer. These plans became the focus
of arguments against the initiative by local politicians (if
they became a, reality many constituencies would suffer severe
diminution in service availability). Logically/ they kept under
wraps all plans for increasing fees and taxes if Proposition 13
pass'ed (the % initiative permitted local increases in fees and
taxes as long as they were enacted before July 1, 1978.1 In the
weeks between the election an<3 July 1, the Oakland City Council
did institute a wide array of new revenue measures, marking a
v IV-25
departure from its conservative and cautious past. The "tax
publics" most directly affected by the two largest new proposed
taxes were slow to react but eventually influential. An extremely
high increase in the business license tax was later lowered under
pressure from business groups. The "employee license fee," a pay-
roll tax disguised for legal reasons, was never implemented, due
to demands from both organized labor and business.
Plans to raise revenues locally notwithstanding, drastic
budget reduction contingencies had to proceed. A weighty tome
detailing hundreds of individual budget items in priority order
was made available to the council and widely publicized by the
v Budget Director via the City Manager. One level of cuts were
efficiency oriented and deemed acceptable even under a favorable
revenue situation, and were quickly approved. The second level
of cuts involved a broad range of highly visible services— some
.were admittedly consistent with long-range plans of the departments
in questions (e.g. closing obsolete or inefficient facilities).
The most serious proposed service reductions were those which
would directly and immediately affect the quality of life and safety
of Oakland residents. Many cutbacks in services to children ■
were in these second and third categories and were' approved by the
council contingent on actual revenues. However, the council,
somewhat chastened by their battle with the School Board over the
city's intent to close playgrounds two years earlier, protected'
those direct services to children. This made maintenance and
landscaping the most vulnerable element of the Parks and Recreation
ERIC . 123
IV-26
Budget. Citizen reactions to these proposed cutbacks were mild,
compared to 1976, as none were to be enacted unless the initiative
passed .
As it turned out, after Proposition 13 became law, the more
serious proposed cuts never were enacted, as the state bailout
funds, combined with new fees and higher than anticipated local
revenues enabled the city to suffer only a 4,5% cut. in overall
expenditures. The general services and public works departments
absorbed most of this reduction. The departments providing out-
of-school children's services received basically the same size
budgets as the previous year, and because of inflation, were
forced to reduce maintenance but not lay off program personnel.
The user charges instituted by Parks and Recreationmostly concerned'
adults, and the Museum had rescinded an admission charge after
attendance plummeted.
In the Alameda County government the administrative approach
to Proposition 13 created a much more highly politicized situation.
The County sent layoff notices to 1,100 employees and warnings
of termination to the many community-based social service contrac- ,
tors, .and ordered department heads to prepare skeleton contingency
budgets for their discretionary programs. Unlike almost all other
-jurisdictions, Alameda County acted as though there were no
assurances of any state aid if the tax initiative passed. Naturally,
employee unions representing most county workers did not appreciate
124
IV- 2 7
this strategy. The unions lobbied the Board of Supervisors strongly
for an alternative budget that would, given any reasonable bailout,
save most jobs, by drawing down various capital and equipment funds
as necessary. According to one study for the Urban Institute:
Much of the political uproar associated with the
county-! s initial reaction to Proposition 13 is seen
by both sides of the political spectrum as stemming
from the Administrator's personal decisions to use
Proposition 13 to implement program reductions and
efficiencies that he apparently had long thought
were desirable. J
The consequences of this approach for the County Library could not
have been more dramatic. It serves as a useful example here, since
the library service, has a significant child clientele. It is poorly
positioned to protect itself from the inordinate budget reductions.
The county library administration began preparing in February for
a severe cutback, and by May felt it necessary to inform the public
that due to an imminent closing, no more books could be loaned.
Some circulating materials were returned, but there was a great
deal of hostility from Proposition 13 supporters, who accused
them of political blackmail or vengeance. Most residents refused
to believe that the entire library system would be closed, yet
on June 24 that is precisely what happened. Only 16 of the 261
staff members remained on the payroll., to keep the basic mechanisms
. 14
in order and to plan for eventual reopening and reorganization.
Both the county librarian and the union activists realized
that the future of the library would rest on a successful political
organizing effort. Unfortunately, due to their different positions
in the service structure as well as differences of personal style
and values, .they disagreed over how to accomplish this.
0
ERIC
125
IV-28
ERIC
The union activists organized the Coalition for Quality
Library Service, involving patrons and staff, to fight the
cutbacks. They spoke to the Board of Supervisors, utilized the
mass media effectively, canvassed communities and sold "Jarvis-
Canned" T-shirts. «They reached out to library workers around the
the state and became the center of a network of advocates of
earmarked state funding for libraries. The Friends of the Library,
traditionally a rather tame citizen's auxiliary, was similarly
energized by the situation and staged media events of their own.
The County Librarian has applauded these efforts and credited
them for generating a public response that the Board could not
ignore.' The union leaders said in interviews, however, that the
head librarian had not kept the staff informed of developments,
had prevented the Children's Service Director from actively
protesting proposed cuts, and had favored administrative and
professional staff in the layoff and rehiring process.
The entire system was closed for about one month and then
reopened in stages, beginning with 31 percent of the previous
year's funding. Staff wanted to concentrate their resources in
a few branches and provide near normal service, but the Board
insisted that all branches be open, even with minimal service.
Increment^ of funding were gained after further politicking, in- .
August, September and November, when it reached ,80 percent.
Table' 4 is the schedule of which services were to be reestablished
at each funding level. In an article she authored, the head librar-
ian characterized her reorganization strategy as one where "some
126
\ ! :
IV-29
managerial positions have been eliminated, since the organization
has shrunk." 15 Union members, in contrast, stressed that mainly
clerical positions were lost, making working conditions more dif-
ficult for those who remained.
TABLE 4
ALAMECBTCOUNTY LIBRARY
SCHEDULE OF PROGRAMS AND SERVICES PROVIDED FOR EACH LEVEL OF FUNDING
Costs Include Salaries and Materials
funding
'Admin
Coifs
Control
Children's
Services
Young
Adull
Gmntral
Services
*
ILL
Amount
P
100%
(FY 1978)
1,700.000
538.000
442,416
185,452
967,215
242,000
SOS
Spanish
Services
Audio/
Visual
look mobile
$4.2
40,537
40,000
81,687
102,000
80%
1,370.000
425.000
340.000
164,000
710,000
150,000
NOT
OfFERED
NOT
OFf€RED
74,000
86,000
$3.3
70%
1,235.000
425,000
321,000
136,00b
600,000
120,000
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
62,000
NOT
OFFERED
$2 9
^
60% 1
1,100,000
425,000
220,000
136,000
560,000
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
52,000
NOT
OFFERED
$2.5
50%
975,000
425,000
220,000
NOT
OFFERED
550,000
NOT
OFFERED^
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
$2.1
4*
i
io%
/
850.000
425.000
122,000
NOT
OFFERED
3!5,orx>
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
' OFFERED
$1.7
—f
' 30%
725.000
450,000
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
150,000
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
OFFERED
NOT
j OFFERED
$1.3
•Adm.n CoiH >nttud*i •p^tot.ng
•O'Cufohe* Conliol—UoH. CIS' SjrUem •»»rrfu»s
4 f
*inter-library loan
Barbara Gray Boyd, "The Ides of ;78" News Notes of Calif ornia , Libraries
Volume 73, No. 1. ±yyo
r
9
ERIC
127
IV- 30
These differences are far from trivial but they are less
important than the overall fact of the system's demise and (only)
partial rejuvenation. The library was not automatically assured
of any future funds, and would have not regained as much support
as it has without the intense political impact its staff and
volunteers were able to generate. In November 19 80 the County
Librarian retired, saying that the system was adequately reconsti-
tuted. Whatever fiscal difficulties the library encounters in
the future, its advocates will have some valuable political
experience on which to draw.
In Fremont, where reductions in County Library funding were
most acutely felt, the municipal recreation and parks department
was also threatened with elimination of most of its programs.
However, the response of the administrators and residents to pro-
posed cuts in recreation activities took a very different turn from
the response to the library situation.
The director of Fremont's recreation and parks department
presided over a massive shift to a system of fees for virtually
every class. He reported that his department suffered a 6 0% reduc-
tion in city budget support. Remaining funds were so limited that
monies Were available only for "safety and informational services,"
maintenance of playgrounds' and parks, and central administration.
Classes would be offered only if they paid for themselves through
user fees. In 1978-79, fees increased from $330,000 to $560,000.
ERIC
IV- 31
The director's preliminary assessment was that children lost more
programs than adults under this new system- However, he pointed out
that because demand would determine the offerings, there was more
flexibility in what could be undertaken, "and parents theoretically
could pay for as many children's services as in the past.
Since there are few very low income families in Fremont,
recreation leadership is not expected to address serious social t issues,
as it is in large cities. The director felt that many of the families
could afford private recreation activities, and would actually seek
them out because many parents supported activities for children
which emphasize "competition, performance, and fancy uniforms."
Fremont is adjusting quickly, but not without difficulties,
to a new form of service provision. The director of the recreation
and parks agency is resigned to a curtailed program, but he will at
least try to ensure that there is a. -future for a specifically
public service. He hopes that parents will be willing to spend at
least some of their property tax savings on the programs which had
previously been funded entirely out of city revenue. As he pointed
out, support of Proposition 13 was a form of "voting with your pocket-
book," and so is choosing a provision strategy dependent on charging
fees.
The variqus cases we have described above typify the range of
responses to the first year of local government budgeting under
Proposition 13. By the Spring of 1979, communities had a year's
/"^ 123
IV- 32
experience with the new conditions, but still faced great uncer-
tainties. The state's bailout provisions were temporary, and nego-
tiations in Sacramento over a long-term plan promised to continue
beyond 1979' s local budget deadlines (July 1.) Revenue estimates
were also difficult to make accurately, due to the clouded future
of federal CETA grant categories, and the unpredictable effects of
inflation on tax receipts.
In Oakland and San Francisco, these circumstances accelerated
reorganization of the budgetary process. San Francisco began to
implement program budgeting, whereby dollar amounts are attached to
objectives rather than traditional line items. Recreation and Parks
was the first and only department to do this for 1979-80. In Oakland,
major administrative responsibilities were moved from the Budget
Director to the City Manager, and the mode of presenting the service
reduction proposals was altered. In both cities the stated rationales
for the charges were to' make programs more visibly responsive to
the needs of residents and more efficient. An important result, if
one not actually stated, was to centralize power in City Hall (meaning
the Mayor in San Francisco and the City Manager in Oakland.)'
In Oakland, as the first step in the budgeting process the City
Manager, his assistants and the Budget Director determined the relative
amounts of cuts to-be taken by each department. Then the department
managers were given the task of preparing their budgets in terms of ^
five possible levels of reduction (progressively more severe.)
Within these levels, individual items (e.g. a particular playground)
130
IV- 3 3
were prioritized.
The City Council was then presented with a volume listing all
the individual items, ranked both within their department (by the
department) and overall (by the Manager ) , and asked to consider
each item. For a part-time, unstaffed Council, this represented
their only chance to seriously influence the nature' of the budget,
and their only tools were the, shifting around of individual items •
and requesting additional information. According to one council-
member, the most significant aspect of Oakland's reorganized budget
process was the new mode of presentation, "computerized across
department lines, so that we could assess budget items by program,
rather than department." Asked if that made it "a program budget
she replied, "I don't know if it is technically, but it helped."
In San Francisco, programs within departments (e . g . playgrounds
within Recreation) were asked to prepare their budgets at four
different funding levels. Once these were submitted, budget analysts
weighted the requests of various programs within departments against
each other, as well as setting priorities among departments.
Program managers were assured that at each funding level, their
package of requests would remain intact. This eliminated what a San
Francisco budget analyst called "nickel-and-diming"-- precisely, the
kind of minute decisions which the Oakland Council prized.
San Francisco's incomplete ' introduction of program budgeting
made Recreation and Parks an uncomfortable pawn in the perennial
9
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131
IV-34
power struggle between the Mayor and the Board of Supervisors.. ,
The elaborate information system needed to make program budgeting
effective was not in place, so it was easy for Supervisors to ask Rec-
reation officials many seemingly simple but actually very complex
questions about program objectives. The Supervisors did not want
to lose their power over line items, because line items could more
easily be addressed politically. This was particularly true in terms of
the neighborhood level ramifications of decisions, as district elec-
tions had recently been ..introduced and Supervisors were seeking
to identify and fight for their district interests. Therefore,
they were less interested in the city's "tennis objectives" than 1 -?
in whether the courts at a particular site would be repaired. They
believed that since such individual decisions still had to be made,
the elected officials should help make them.
In both cities, the administrators were designing the rules
of the game while legislators and residents could only react.
TheOakland Council members, elected at large, were encouraged by their
manager to pore over thousands of individual items. San Francisco
Supervisors, looking out foX particular items more than in the past,
were hindered in that search for detail.
One thing that did not change in either city was the manner
in which residents sought to maintain children's services. Parents
and children trooped before their elected representatives in consid-
erable numbers, pleading (or demanding) that their particular branch
Ek£c „ 132
IV- 3 5
library, swimming pool or recreation center remain open.
Staff would dispassionately explain how the- facilities selected for
closing were the least efficient or most poorly attended. Residents
would . respond that easy access for children and senior citizens
should be a higher priority than economic efficiency. Council mem-
bers would regret having to cut anything and blame Howard Jarvis.
One important point was that Council and Supervisors alike preferred
to cut maintenance and supplies rather than programs whereever pos-
sible, repeatedly upsetting the balance which department heads had
tried to maintain. In Oakland, the liberal Council members were
proud to have been able to move across department lines to take some
money away from street repair and give it to recreation center staffing
More common was the tactic employed by the Oakland Mayor, of turning
the problems back on the residents who objected to particular re-
ductions. "What would you cut instead?" and "Would you volunteer _
your time to help the children if we kept this center open?" were
two of his favorite queries. Since voters in both cities had rejected
Proposition 13, politicians tended toward rhetorical images of "the
cities" versus "the suburbs", thereby minimizing the differences in
priorities within their communities.
Compared to years past, there was little evidence that either
city was deliberately discriminating against the poor or minorities
' in its program reduction proposals. Nor did many people argue
against the near complete exemption of police from serious budget
reductions, though investments in police "hardware" were criticized
9
ERIC
133
IV-36
and in some instances cut in favor of retaining foot patrols.
Even if service professionals are becoming less influential
in the initial formation of budget priorities, they are becoming
more sophisticated at organizing constituencies to protect their
programs. Each service has its own style of politics, determined
by its Relationship to the community. The museums rely on their
contacts among the city'^ influential elite , and on their volunteers
turning out for demonstrations. Recreation leaders have an "old boy
network" from whom they can elicit sympathy and occasional favors,
and there have always been "Friends of the Library." But, as with the
Alameda County Library, there is, after Proposition 1'3 , a heightened
militancy among many service workers. On balance the Bay Area lib- ^
rarians are currently much more aggressive than their counterparts
in recreation.
The women's movement is an integral part of much of the organizing
in libraries. The union representatives J.n San Francisco and Alameda
County, and the Director in Oakland are all associated with a Bay Area
group of women librarians which has been working to attain more .
access to executive pow§r and better services.
In San Francisco the women began organizing in 1968, and later
worked in .neighborhoods on the district^ elections campaigns. They have
cultivated close working relationships with several Supervisors.
In Oakland, the Director owes her job partly to pressure from women's
groups. She was described by the business mamger of the union (a black
134
. IV-37
male) as "someone who came up through the ranks and is good at
working with the community." She is well aware that she was hired
to improve the library's responsiveness to the community, and that
the City Council expects her to organize 'her constituents. Her
experience in and strong commitment to children's services was
also well known.
The recreation and parks departments are not without some
substantial political contacts of their own, of course, both in
/ city halls and in the neighborhoods. In San Francisco they are
well thought of by the Mayor's budget planners for their dedication
and capable administration. The manager in the San Francisco
Recreation and Parks Department with whom we talked was well
known in children's advocacy circles because he had helped organize
a protest against the closing of playgrounds. He says he attends
meetings of hundreds of community groups, a point corroborated by
the Mayor's budget analyst.
While, individual administrators , or supervisors may have extensive
contact with the community , * the departments as a whple -are not con-
.f
sistently involved in community politics. In Oakland, J:he admini-
strator said that the Recreation Department ' s relationship with the
Council would be damaged if the Department were to mobilize com-
munity opposition to the budget cuts before the Council had considered
them. In addition, he felt that the union representing Recreation
workers was concerned only with salary, and that the employees had
consequently become less dedicated and professional . " If other admini-
ERJC * ^0
' . ' IV- 38
' — *
strators share this perspective it is unlikely that they would
organize recreation employees- as a strategy to preserve the services.
For his part, the union business manager said that the ^library head
kept him much better informed about the effects of Proposition 13
than did. the Recreation administrator.
If the political effectiveness of advocates of recreational . .
and cultural services is erratic, at least the position of children ' s
needs as a central concern within these, services appears to be strong.
Most participants in the budgeting process invoked the values
we have seen to be historically important for children's out-pf-scho.ol
services. Social control, supervision, informal education and good
clean fun were all stressed repeatedly. In our ' interviewing we did
not encounter any official or employee who would subscribe to the idea
that children had been hurt disproportionate ly by the pattern of
cutbacks.. Said an Oakland City Councilmenber : "By now its so bad,
its hard to tell if children were hurt worse. The North Oakland
library has low circulation but is used after school by lots of
children. That was the rationale for keeping it open." This is in
sharpocontrast to a Council decision in 1976 to close a particular
branch because it was used primarly by school children. Similar
anecdq|$al 'evidence was offered by administrators in a variety of
positions within the services and in budget offices. Even allowing
for the expected def ensiveness , there is a definite trend toward more
explicit attention to children ' s heeds wit:,- these services .
136
r •
ERJC
IV- 3-9
All of this relative^oncern for children's interests has
taken place in agencies whose fiscal bases continue to deteriorate. •,
Each year the enacted cuts ate never as badawl/t had been predicted.
However,' several years of cumulative reduc£jdns of five to ten per-
cent,' continued losses to inf lation^rt^the termination of most
CETA jobs* has taken a severe toll;
In April of 1980 Oakland" was weighing another 19% cut in Parks
and Recreation and 10% in Libraries even if Proposition 9 (Jarvis'
income tax cut) were to fail .(as it did.) All strategies for cutting
budgets further Without closing facilities had apparently been exhausted.
Most of the practical potential^ for increasing user fees was already
tapped. Corporate donors and creative fundraisihg plans were running
thin. The terms of the bailout, relatively meager for cities, were
established and could onlu change for the worse. In fact, evidence
suggests that the state surplus will be exhausted in another year.
In short, municipal recreational and cultural services in Oakland
and all other large . Calif ornia cities face a grim future, though
children are officially a high priority. Whether circumstances
continueto erode provision, or even lead t-o the ultimate demise of
'the services are important questions. But more fundamental is that
the conditions which are bringing about this unprecedented deterioration
are clearly not being addressed. ■
Oakland, for example, expects' to lose 133 CETA workers between 1980
16
and 19 81 in Parks and Recreation, Library and Museum services.
IV- 40
NOTES
1. Information 13 Newslett er , (Sacramento, California State
Library) NO. 10, October' 31, y? 1978. ,
2. Tony Quinn, "Political Consequences of the California Tax
' Revolt 11 Tax Revolt Digest , Special Report, September, 1979
3. Maureen Fitzgerald, "California's Future Under Proposition 13 11
^T-ax Revolt Digest , Special Report", 'November, - 1980. p. 2.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid. p. 4. ^
<^ r
7 Susan Bain and Walter Park, "Resource Packet for the Workshop
on Proposition 13 — Impact on Ilinoroties" , Uniyersity of
California, Berkeley, Institute of Governmental Studies.
March 2., 1979.
8. Statement of Mayer Lionel J. Wilson, Oakland City Council
meeting, April 22, 1980.
9. Fitzgerald, op cit. p.2.^
10. Tax Revolt Digest , January, 1979,. p. 2.
11. Tax Revolt Digest ,- July, 1979, p.l.
12. Jack Stumpf and Paul Terrell, Proposition 13 and California
Human Services" (National Association of Social Workers,
California Chapter, February,, 1979.) p. 106.
13. Berkeley Planning Associates. "Effects of State and' Local
Expenditure Limitations on Human Service Financing: Case
Study: Public Finance in the City of Oakland and the
County of Alameda" (19 80, mimeo) p. 62.
14 Barbara Gray Boyd, "The l£es of '78", NewsNotes of California
Libraries volume 73, No. 1. 1978, p. 14 ;
15. Ibid. p.. 16.
i
16, Berkeley Planning Associates, op cit. p. 42
ERiC . 138
i V- 2
I
In Oakland, the city whose families we >surveyed in 1976 , this disadvan-
taged position is quite apparent. Between July 1978 (after Proposi-
tion 13 passed) and January, 1980 real dollar funding reductions by
the city for services * with extensive out-of-school pro-
grams for children were as follows:
Parks and Recreation 45%
Museum 38%
Library 25%
These figures are higher than the average city service reduction (22%)
2
and much higher than cutbacks in funding for police services (11%) .
Our research indicates that these proportions are reasonably repre-
sentative of program funding reductions in larger municipalities
throughout the state.
Many assessments of the impact of Proposition 13 have concluded
that in the aggregate, municipal government services in Calif or nia ,1,, ^^^
remain' surprisingly uncompromised . The state surplus, the. argument
goes, "bailed out" agencies sufficiently to avoid the
catastrophic dislocations which had been anticipated. This may
be true, but in terms of the services of concern to us here it misses
two very important points:
1. Children's out-of -school services have been in a state of
fiscal decline for a decade so trtat Proposition 13 was not a
unique intervention, merely another step in the historical slide;
and
2) To appreciate the real consequences of Proposition 13 one
must look below the aggregate level and consider how local
agency strategies to cope with budgetary reductions affected particular
out-of-school services and particular clients of. those services.
ERiC
139
V
CHILDREN 1 S OTTT-OF- SCHOOL SFRVICRS A^n ^HE FISCAL CRISIS;
PR^S^ NT CIRCUMSTANCE AND p^PSP^CTIV^S ON THF PUTHR^f !
In. the preceding sections of this report we have argued that
in spite of higrf levels of use of many children's services provided
by local government, -the fiscal integrity of these programs has
steadily eroded through the 1970' s. Proposition 13 in California
represented an acceleration of a trend, more than the commencement
of a new era of austerity.
We have focused on only one aspect of the public sector's involve-
ment with young people— out-of -school services. These services ful-
fill many of the same functions and purposes as other types of pro-
grams : enrichment, education remediation, socialization
and childcare. In this sense they are thoroughly part
of the historical mainstream of local government's commitment to the
youncK' Q
As we have seen, out-of-school services to children have become
especially vulnerable to the uncertainties of the local government
budgeting process, even before Proposition 13 type initiatives
became popular. We have argued that the vulnerability of out-of-
school services reflects their fiscal, political and ideological
ma
rginality, that although they are not severely critized, neither
do they have extensive political support. Hence, as Rubin 1 has
written :
In the dichotomy employed by many city managers
between "need to have" and "nice to have" services,
culture and recreation inevitably fall into the lat-
ter category. Nor are the services protected by
requirements for minimum service mandate by the
State Education code or other laws. In short, no
matter how efficiently or effectively the services
may operate, they are likely to be labelled as
non-essential luxuries which are no longer affordable.
ER£ , 140
V-3
We argue here that it is at this level that the impacts of Proposi-
tion 13 on children's services, children and families has been quite
severe.
This section begins with a discussion of post-Proposition 13
bureaucratic responses to increasing fiscal austerity. We shall
link this discussion to our earlier section on service utilization
in an effort to understand the implications of these responses for
service provision and idfferent user groups. Following this discus-
sion we shall consider some of the longer range plans by which
agencies and communities are addressing the problem of maintaining
children's services. Here we will look especially at some of the
new intergovernmental^ relations that will determine the fiscal
capacity and political control of the services. Further we shall
explore some of the opportunities which increased stringency may
afford to break with tradition and broadly reconceptualize service
mandates and provision strategies.
MANAGING THE NEW AUSTERITY
Over the course of the decade and at an accelerated pace
since the passage of Proposition 13, cities like Oakland have
adopted a variety of strategies to cope with reduced funding levels
for out-of-school children's services. Here we shall consider
those strategies that are not unique to Oakland but £airly representative
of actions taken throughout the state. Drawing on our early dis-
cussion of service use levels, we shall attempt to deduce the impacts
of each of these strategies on the inner-city client groups repre-
sented by our Oakland sample.
ERIC
141
V-4
Site Closing
One of the traditional aspects of children's out-of-school
programming has been a commitment to easy accessibility . In
i
neighborhoods throughout the country an extensive network of
parks? recreation centers and libraries emerged between 1920 and
1960. But through the 1960's and 1970 's and certainly into the
Proposition 13 era, the continued provision of highly decentralized
services has been questioned in many localities. The idea that
services should be located "close to home" has become a less effec-
tual justification in the eyes of city administrators and councils
than it was in„the past.
In a period of greater fiscal stringency many communities have
begun utilizing conventional cost-effectiveness criteria for evalu-
ating children's programs, thereby stripping away their "special
status." For the first time in memory the recreation facilities that
are used by fewer children and branch libraries with lower circu-
lations, are being summarily closed. As decentralized
services are curtailed to meet >budget objectives and to make those
responsible for children's services apply "rational" decisionmaking
techniques we must bear in mind two' things that were described in
Chapter II of this report:
A) most children who use neighborhood services get there on
their own, unassisted by their parents; and
B) while proximity does not entirely account for use levels
of particular facilities , (intervening factors such as child-
ren's interests a^id neighborhood safety also account for an amount
of variation) most regular users of children's services live
O nearby. < M ^
ERIC 142
V-5
Hence, we can argue that site closings in response to the, new
austerity will affect children in at least the following ways;
A) The clientele of many services will diminish because
fewer children will be able to get to facilities on their own.
B) Judgments concerning which facilities to maintain and
which to close will be made on the narrowest of criteria — e.g.
some measure of use levels — with minimal regard to the needs
of a neighborhood and its children and without recognizing that
lower use levels may be a function of past progranroa tic decisions
rather than client disinterest. For example, the fact that
a branch library has a collection poorly suited to the com-
. ' munity in which it is located may account for low circula-
tion rates. In Oakland , libirary branches in this circum-
stance have been closed even though the need for library
services is high, given that children in these areas have
relatively few alternative sources of reading material. The
apparent " inefficiency 11 of these branches may be a conse-
quence of actions 1 taken over a long period of time. But
the urgency of fiscal constraints leads not to consideration
of how to serve the areas 1 children but to a decision to
eliminate the service altogether.
C) Current policies seem to favor re-centralizing children's
services, in direct contrast with earlier prior ities* Such
decisions will mean that those children who are most mobile
on their own (or who are taken places they want to go by
adults) will" be the principal clientele for these child-
serving agencies. Issues of need will be relegated to
O secondary status and there will be increasing inequality in
ERIC
V-6
terms of children's access to and use of facilities and
programs. This is' ironic given that the intention of
many of these services is to address equity concerns.
Staff Reductions and Program Consolidation
Many communities have stopped short of site closings, instead
reallocating staff in mays which have significantly redefined the
nature of the service. Here, actions have been of four types:
1) discontinuing specialized programs directed specifically
at young clients;
2) reducing full-time professional , children '-s staff;
3) increasing the number of "non-specialized" part-time staff;
4) reducing the amount of adult supervision at facilities
(e.g. on playgrounds).
The logic of this approach to the new austerity is that children
can still have places to go, even if, once they get there, the
scope or intensiveness of programs are much more limited than
in the past.
There are a great many examples of successful, specialized
children's services that are now being phased out. Young adult
or teenage collections in public libraries are being combined
with general collections. Mobile vans used by museums, recreation
and library systems to reach young people "in the neighborhoods-
are being eliminated despite their documented success. And out-
reach projects generally, even when funded mainly through federal
or foundation grants, are in jeopardy when any amount of local fund-
ing is required (e.g. for insurance) .
ERIC
144
V-7
This diminution of programs designed specif ically- for young
people is reflected in staff-related changes as well. As a conse-
quence of continuing funding reductions, in many agencies there
are now fewer experienced professionals trained in children's
programming. For instance, many specialized sports programs have
been downgraded such that one leader now runs a whole range of
activities at the same time (e.g. baseball, basketball and soccer).
The quality of instruction invariably declines, for few leaders
are prepared to effectively run all of these programs. Similar
examples abound in fine arts programs where separate classes in ^
drawing, painting and sculpture give way to "art classes" which
cover the gamut— less well to be sure , it is argued, but better
than nothing. Children's library programs have suffered a somewhat
similar fate. There are in most communities fewer trained child-
ren's librarians on staff than before, while
those who remain have more general responsibilities and are less
accessible to children.
Virtually every one of the services discussed in this mono-
graph has suffered severe diminution of trained children's program
staff. The consequencies of this "de-professionalization" are many.
To begin with, the quality of children,',s public sector experience cannot
help but suffer. Even though we cannot say that programs in the past
were of uniformly high quality, it is clear that children are
receiving relatively less specialized assistance today. This
takes its toll particularly on children who use the public sector
as a place to learn new skills. Given the relative dependence
ERIC 145
\
of children from poor families on these free public sector serv-
ices/ the impact of staff reductions is likely to be profound.
While some may argue that even a reduced staff with less
motivation for and experience in working with children is better
than total elimination of programs, our data demonstrates that
these decisions have thoroughly inequitable consequences, princi-
pally affecting those with the fewest options.
Staff reductions have meant not only less specialized program-
ming but, generally reduced supervision as well. In the earlier
chapter on children's use of facilities and services the importance
of safety as a factor influencing children's play patterns was
briefly noted. Supervision, even just non- instructional watchfulness by adults,
makes for safer facilities or at least makes children (and their
parents) feel less threatened. Oakland provides a good example
of the tension here. For several years the city's Parks and
Recreation Department has, in its own budget messages pro-
posed discontinuing adult supervision at elementary schoolyards
after school hours. Each year the City Council has overruled the
Department and directed that supervision be continued. Our data
indicates the wisdom of this decision, even though that supervision
may not be- as highly skilled a professional activity as other endan-
gered staff functions. First, we have noted the popularity of
schoolyards as centers of after-school play and we note that safety
considerations influence how children feel about using the
schoolyard as a play area. Second, many parents simply will
not allow their children to play in areas that are not super-
vised. Equally important, as experience . in San Francisco has
146
r-n^" shown, when playground supervision was discontinued for budgetary
reasons the number of accidents dramatically increased. This „
\1
V-9
can, in part, be attributed to diminished supervision. Further-
more our data suggests that the impact of reduced supervision is
especially severe for girls, who •are. less likely than boys to use
unsupervised facilities whenever safety is in doubt.
So, while local elected officials and agency staff may try
not to close facilities, their approaches to trimming program
and staff have affected children's experiences at least as much,
albeit in more subtle ways.
User Fees
Of all the local government responses to the new austerity,
x^he imposition of user fees has been most widely adopted. The
loNjic here is to continue providing services and- let the user
bear\ some or all of the cost. Since services are not discon-
tinued, the illusion is created that "little has changed" despite
declining budget allocations.
The user fee issue is complicated by questions of equity.
In some communities the imposition of fees may have little effect
on families or children, while in other communities it might sig-
nificantly affect children's access. The free art class now '
charges $2.00 for materials; the recreation center soccer team
charges $5.00 for transportation to and from games; the library
charges an annual registration fee, and so forth. In a wealthy
community, such "pay your own way" policies may not be problematic
On the other hand, our Oakland data suggests that this is not the
case in a city with a large poverty population. Here we hit upon
one of the especially powerful impacts of Proposition 13 that can
be detected only by exploring program changes as they affect .par-
ticular populations within communities. In Oakland, the intro-
r
V-10
duction of user fees is sufficient to drive away a significant j
number of potential clients^ The data on use of recreation center
programs in Oakland (Chapter II, Table 5 ) makes the case clearly.
Children from lower income families constitute a very large pro-
portion of users of free services. When fees are charged, a dif-
ferent profile of the clientele emerges. In Oakland, while a
sufficient number of clients may be found to warrant providing a
fee charging recreation center program, the children who are most
dependent on free access may be excluded. Hence, one of
the more insidious consequences of the new austerity is the
de gree to which the traditional commitment to the less privileged
is being undermined. From our data it is quite clear that as
services with large Ipw income clientele introduce user fees
those children are, less likely to continue to participate. While
it may then be the case that there is "no change" in the number of
programs offered (i.e. that classes, activities and programs are
maintained) there "is likely to be real change in the composition
of the clientele.
User fees are not new to local government. Fees for such
things as business licenses, zoning permits and adult recreation have long been
standard practice, and have been increased in the wake of Prop-,
ositibn 13. This recent proliferation of fee charges is touching
many children's services, both in and outside of school for the
first time. The level of concern this has generated is illustra-
ted by the request by the California State Assemply for a
report from the Auditor General on the Extent of fee charges by >
148
V-ll
schools and local govfrnmerit agencies for programs involving
3
children. Implicit in this inquiry^was a larger problem raised
in a report by the League of Women Voters of California: "Are
government services gradually shifting' to programs only for middle
and upper, income residents?" 4 m The issue is less that uS^r fees
result in programs ecplicitly designed for wealthier residents, but rather
that the programs are really only accessible to them — thereby
creating implicit provision biases.
Private Sponsorship and Privatization
As cities have struggled to^aintain credible children's
programs they have at times made direct appeals to private enter-
prise to take some responsibility for actually funding ^services .
At best, this strategy has temporarily saved programs and at the.
same time given visibility to /'public spirited" corporations,
a .bu^ness and -philanthropies that fill the breach.
Several examples of these sponsorship effort^are as follows:
, The East Bay Regional, Parks District found several companies
(many fewer than hoped) to "edopt-a-parjc" b Y paying their maintenance
expenses (closures were otherwise threatened); concert impresario,
Bill Graham, organized a benefit rock concert to "save" the. San
Francisco Public Schools Iriterscholastic Sporfes program; and the
Bank of America contributed funds id the city- of San Francisco
.to keep playgrounds open and staffed during tha summer of 1978.
There are, of course, ma-ny other examples that could be recounted .
One problem, however, is that these sorts of contributions tend to
be on a one-time basis, so that the services themselves remain in a con-
tinuing state of limbo, not knowing hew or whether they will be maintained. There is
V-12
a great amount of effort required to solicit .donations, and public agen-
cies have nQj: had the staff capacity to utilize these possibilities
extensively. Also, greater reliance on corporate donations shifts
some decision over program priorities to the private sector. This
move, however unintended, could eventually have serious conse-
quences for the kinds of opportunities available to children and
the degree to which parents. and residents have any control over the nature of
° ffer;t Re S ductions in services and staffing, uncertainty about, future
funding and the imposition of user fees have resulted in a degree
of privatization in children's out-of-school time use, particu-
larly among wealthier families. The issue is in part one of options.
If a child" from a higher income family is taking a painting Class
into public recreation center and a- fee is introduced or the class
is discontinued, his or her parents can, if they want, either pay
t
the fee or find a comparable private sector offering. The key
is that these families have the resources with which to make choices.
Others do not. From the data presented in Chapter II, it is clear
that materially advantaged children are' less dependent, on the public sector
as a source of after-school programs and activities (regardless of their use levels;
In a sense, encouraging privatization solves certain problems
for local government agencies. If potential clients who can afford
'to pay fees turn to the private sector for programs, a drop in
demand 1 can reduce the cost-effectiveness of the public programs and
provide a reason for "no longer offering certain programs at all.
' The distinction between those who can pay for services and . those
who cannot, those who have choices and those wh*> do not, is likely
to be exacerbated in -the future. -While higher income suburban ccnrnunities , with
™k ■ ' '■ ' 150
V-13
more homogeneous populations, may find that the introduction of
user fees does not undermine the demand for services, our data
indicate the heterogeneous big cities are faced with a far more
complex provision problem, given the breadth of personal circum-
stances that characterizes their clientele. ff fees are intro-
Q
duced or program specialization reduced in the public sector,
numbers of potential clients may look elsewhere for services.
Rather than the historical relationship of complementarity betweeen
public and private cultural programming, competition, with the
public at a disadvantage, may become more common. Price parity
or near parity may, in the end, turn those who can afford to pay
for services to the private sector, leaving a leaner set of serv-
ices more costly than ever, to children from families that are
less able to afford them.
Short-term Responses to the ^ew Austerity Summarized
This brief survey of current strategies -co combat the new aus-
terity Suggests an uncertain future for children's services. Of
special concern is the equity consequences of these decisions for
children as a group and among children of different circumstances.
The public sector has had, as a fundamental mandate, provision of
services for those least able to find alternatives. Evidence indicates
that in the Short run, the adverse consequences of this reorgani-
zation of services have fallen most directly on children and fami-
lies with the greatest need and the fewest alternatives.
9
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151
r
ERJC
V-14
The Changing Political Environment of Children's Services
This period of fiscal stress is profoundly effecting the
politics of children's services. We can identify three broad aspects
of that environment and outline some of the possible impacts and
consequences of the ongoing austerity .
The politics of the budgetary process pose serious limitations
on activists committed to changing the nature of children's ser-
vices. Most parental political involvement with children's
out-of-school services today is defensive — intended to protect
or conserve existing programs, nothing more. In most cases the
objective of this activism is to conserve the integrity of a
single program or preserve a single facility. At times, as we
have seen, the issue can become very big indeed, as when
library workers and supporters in Alameda County were forced
to defend their entire service. This is not to say that many
parents and service professionals do not Worry about the quality
or the substance of the programs that they do provide. But in these
difficult times. -the issue of simple survival has necessarily
received most attention.
The new austerity has highlighted important differences
in types of political activism. Responses to the current crisis
in the communities that we have focussed on here tends to diffuse
conflict and reduce the possibility of fundamentally changing the
nature of a service. Large problems (are the available services
meeting the needs o^ child clients?) give way to small or narrow
ones (is the money there to continue providing what is now available?,) ,
1 52
V-15
public input and critical legislative examination focus on a
narrow range of "tradeoffs," and organizing around larger demands
or needs is virtually suspended.
As long as advocates for children's interests respond in
this way, they will be unable to alter— or successfully cope with—
this new political reality. As long as the principal issue
is conservation of existing services there will be no careful
consideration of the goals, objectives or actual impacts of
programs and agencies. Perhaps more problematic, to an extent
the fiscal crisis has persuadod some parents that it no longer
makes sense to look toward the public sector for meeting certain
everyday needs of children. Indeed, some fortunate few have "withdrawn"
to seek services exclusively on the private market. On the other
hand, there has been some healthy reorganization of political
coalitions. For example, we have seen how public employees and
parents in Alameda County worked together in a kind of issue
based effort that helped to overcome some of the traditional
structural barriers inherent in urban politics.
The Future of Local Government
We have emphasized the fact that out-of-school services
for children have long been provided principally by local government
agencies. Now that tradition is being tested— pulled in several
directions at once. On the one hand, the state and even the federal
government are assuming more financial responsibili tv for these
services. On the other hand, there is an increasing number of
9
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153
V-16
privatized alternatives, from commercial to not-for-profit programs.
And there is also pressure on parents, mainly mothers to become
more "self-reliant" and take responsibility for managing their
children's out-of-school time- Ironically this is occuring
just when more families with two working parents, or single
parents^, are demanding publicly provided care and publicly spon-
sored children's activities. These developments could lead in
any number of directions.
For one thing, we must ask whether there is anything
inherently sacred about the provision of children's services by
local government, especially if state bureaucracies or decentral-
ized private entrepreneurs could do much the same thing. For
instance, would state or federal funding for libraries (as has
been proposed) overcome the fiscal dilemma and promote service
equality and high quality service? Would a voucher system for
out-of -school culture and recreation services promote pluralism
and greater efficiency in service delivery.
These are, at the moment, more theoretical questions than
urgent issues demanding resolution. The State of California, for
instance , has expressed very little interest in managing out-of
school programs, even programs to which it now gives support.
The state fiscal bailout has been organized along the lines of
revenue sharing, with few mandates. However, there is every reason
to expect that as state funds become more scarce, these programs
will come under ever closer scrutiny as the competition for
er|c i5 4
\
V-17
monies grows. As we have noted, various children's services have
been lobbying for earmarked shares of state revenues, and out-ipf-
school services do not currently have the political base from
which to argue for these kinds of funding assurances. As for the
voucher concept, it will probably not emerge until the fate of current
school voucher plans are decided. Since the services are basically
voluntary to begin with this would be a much less dramatic, if
more practical voucher experiment. Also, the market for profit-
making out-of-school programs has not proven to be especially
vigorous as yet (although it may be too eariy to tell). Experiences
with day care and summer school (see Appendix A) show that private
sector ventures often overestimate the potential profitability
of children's programs.
At the very least leadership among children's services
professionals must learn from their school counterparts and become
more aggressive entrepreneurs themselves. For the fact is that
whether these kinds of activities remain serious endeavors of the
public sector at all will be one of the significant questions
facing local government officials in the next few years.
Finis
Out-of-school children's services have been a major casualty
of Proposition 13. After two years they are just now beginning
to respond to its challenges. We can only understand the
er|c
155
V-18
immediate impacts of fiscal constraints by looking at how part-
icular populations have^en ^fected; and also by recognizing
that some families and^chil&lfen are more reliant on the pub-
lic sector, hence more vulnerable to the consequences of
service reorganization or diminution. The long term challenge
for children's out-of-school services should not be merely to
survive the attrition that Proposition 13 has accelerated. There
should be renewed committment to the largely unfulfilled promise
of these programs: to improve the quality of children's lives;
to enhance children's individual life chances; and to meet the
increasingly complex and pressing service needs of families
today. At their best, these services can contribute toward these
ends. And indeed, this is what must be encouraged.
9
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156
IV-19
Despite rough maintenance of the status quo, Proposition 13
has nonetheless been called a mixed bag for children, in part because
out-of-school childrens programs have suffered severely. At the
state level, libraries, parks and recreation, cultural institu-
tions and summer school had few effective advocates. Even a small
legislative appropriation ($18 million) earmarked for public
libraries was vetoed by the governor , despite their having suffered two
years of serious cutbacks. While there is clearly a role for the
state in supporting these kinds of services, to date, with the
exception of summer school, almost all the relevant decisions
have been made at the city, school, special district and county
level. Consequently the rest of this chapter will describe actions
taken at these levels of government since the passage of Proposi-
tion 13 — focusing principally at developments in three localities.
Supported by an exhaustive review of reports and interviews
concerning children's out-of-school programs in scores of Califor-
nia communities (see Appendix C) we are persuaded that the analy-
sis presented below reflects most of the actions and responses
to Proposition 13 at the city, county and special district levels
of government.
1 57
\
V-19
Chapter Five
Footnotes
Victor Rubin, "Living yttth Less: Proposition 13 and Children's
Services," in Kathfyn Cirincione-Coles , editor, The Future
of Education: Policy Issues and Challenges (Beverly Hills,
Sage Publications, 1981), p. 134.
as
2. Oakland, California, Office of the City Manager, "1979-80
Budget Reduction Alternatives." Mimeo
3. California Legislature, Joint Legislative Audit Committee,
Office of the, Auditor General, Report 9 32, December 7,
19 79. In this report many of the issues concerned the
constitutionality of requiring public school students
to pay fees for participation in school programs and
activities (required or not). By way of example, various
related, publicly provided out-of-school activities
were also examined.
4. League of Women Voter/; of California, State-Local Government
Relationships: Study Guide II (San Francisco: LWV,
February, 1980) , p. 20.
J 58
ERIC
Appendix A
Summer School in the Wake of Proposition 13:
" Ancillary Educational Services under Fire
[While much of the post-Proposition 13 research has concluded
that its overall ^impact on the provision of human services has not . §
been as severe ^s anticipated, there is agreement that California's
public summer school program has suffered severe cutbacks — virtually
all state monies for the program were withdrawn in 1978. This appen-
dix explores the history of the California summer school program
before Proposition 13, comments on its current status and examines
who has been affected by the diminution of services.
Between 19^52 and 1977, in 4 twenty-five year s 1 time, the State of
California built a large, formidable summer school program serv-
ing well over one million elementary and secondary school age chil-
dren annually. .. In 19-78, in one trip to the polls California voters
passed a tax initiative which ,.. among other things, led to the
complete dismantling of the program.
How and why this happened, and what the impact has been on
children and families the subject of this appendix.
Summer School in Historical Perspective
Although summer school rests comfortably in the world of the
educator it has an uncertain tradition marked by imprecisely defined
objectives and poorly documented impacts..
*
The first summer school programs date to Boston ir. 1866 . These
"vacation schools" were originally viewed as a way to keep children
from the dangers and temptations of the streets. "Their chief function.,
was to keep the children who attended, pleasantly and perhaps
profitably occupied so that they would be removed f rom^undesirable
influences to which they would otherwise be exposed."
ERJC
'Through the middle part of the nineteenth century, principally for
economic reasons, the length of the school year declined from
225-250 days per year (in other words nearly year round) to 180-200
days.
159 •
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2
Early summer programs were not, for the most part, actually
provided by the schools. Rather, with a kind of welfare spirit,
urban social and charitable organizations promoted summertime
services, in large measure to provide clean, healthful environments
for children growing up in tenement housing and in unsafe areas of
cities. The vacation school movement spread quickly thtough the
Northeast and by 1899 twenty cities in the U.S. operated elemen-
tary level programs.— ^A major shift in locus of control and sponsor-
ship occurred during the 1890 ,% s. As the movement took root, pri-
vate and quasi-private agencies often found that space requirements
exceeded their facility capacities (churches, settlement houses,
etc.). Public school officials were called upon to assist. In
the space of a few years, this collaborative relationship became
commonplace. By the turn of the century many cities were not only
providing \ space, but they were also contributing \funds to help
4
suppor r t^ summer school programs.
As with the recreation movement at the turn of the century,
initially programs were sponsored by private sector agencies, but
were incorporated into the public sector as they grew and matured —
in this case they came under the control of the public schools.
By 1925 it is estimated that 20% of school districts in the more
3/
populated states had elementary level summer programs-.
In the early 1900 's the provision of summer programs was
justified on many grounds, not solely for the purpose of providing
children with a safe place to go during the day. The arguments in
favor of summer school were often based on assumptions about the
positive effects of increased exposure to schooling, although
160
\
3
there was little corroborating evidence. Many school districts
introduced summer school with this explicit educational agenda —
to help "backward 11 students catch up and to give "bright" students
a chance to get ahead-^. Refinements of this proposition underlie
most summer school efforts today. Many school officials speculated
that summer programs could diminish summer learning loss, which was
recognized as a problem even early in the century. But
even at athat time there was little or no data
available with which to demonstrate that summer school was support-
5/
ing the regular year program in this manner- . Even so, by the
1920 f s the intellectual underpinnings of summer school we^e well
in place and the objectives had shifted from amelioration of the
conditions of urban life and to enhancing or remediating children's
learning skills.
Growth in summer school programs continued through the 1920 ' s;
however, its popularity declined drastically during the Depression
years. Many cities eliminated programs to reduce spending indicating that the
relative marginality of summer school was already quite clear.
In addition concepts of educating the young were in transition and
the idea of summer school was no longer in vogue. In
fact, it was not until the post World War II baby boom that a sig-
nificant public demand for summer programs re-emerged, coupled
with renewed interest amonej professional educators.
Program Growth in California
As in other parts of the country, the early summer school
movement in California was dominated by urban interests when a significant
m
commitment emerged in the decade 1910-2 0.
From the beginning virtually every community adopting. a program did
so at public expense and exclusively in public settings (unlike °
the Eastern history) . Fresno has operated a program continuously
since 1921, longer than any other city in the state. It should
be noted , however , that because the summer school movement devel-
oped at a late date, it was linked philosophically
to prevailing educational objectives more than it was to any
social welfare agenda. Since there was no uniform reporting
system until the early 1950' s, it is difficult to. know how many
districts had programs although growth appears to have mirrored
the national experience for the three decade period '1920-50 .
In the context of California educational history, summer school
matured as the postwar baby boom triggered extraordinary growth
in the state's schooling programs. In political terms it was not
a controversial issue, viewed as a reasonable elaboration of
schooling services supported by the state education bureaucracy,
administrator and teachers' groups and legislators (bi-partisan)
alike. —
Ironically, however, it was not educational but fiscal factors
that stimulated widespread program growth. In 1953, as part of an
effort to encourage districts to sponsor educational summer programs
legislation was passed which permitted school districts to count
summer school a.d.a. (average daily attendance) in calculations of
total attendance , on which state revenue contributions were deter-
mined. In other words, school districts could run summer programs —
\
a reduced day schedule with comparably reduced co'sts — and count
eacha.d.a. as equal to a "regular" school a.d.a. for revenue purpose
The advantages here were rather clear and its impact immediate.
It was a fiscal bonanza. (An extensive literature search and discus-
sions with several legislators in office at that time did not shed
much light on the purppse of setting the formula in this way. With-
out doubt, however, the legislature did not expect districts to
utilize the program specifically for fiscal reward, although this
was obviously an inducement.)
In 1954 (the year after the State adopted' summer school
reporting and application procedures) 119 districts operated summer
school programs. This grew to 147 in 1956; 174 in 1957; and 237
in 1958. The number of schools with programs increased 119% dur-
ing this period. In one survey of 129 districts 69% that had pro-
grams in 1957 established them between 1952 and 1956. By 1970 an
extraordinary proportion (nearly 20%) of all enrolled K-8 public
school students attended a summer session in their community.
This rapid growth was attributed not^ just .to the availability
of state monies but also to post-war suburbanization (children's
summer recreation needs were not well met by many fast growing
cities) ; and to growing recognition among educators that many
children had learning problems and needs that could be attended to,
often in unconventional ways, outside the regular school year-.
There are few studies of California summer schools and their
relationship to the larger educational system. One of the more ,
comprehensive analyses, a survey of 147 districts was conducted
« ♦ **
' " '6
in the late 1950' s-^. Among other things this study documented
the reasons' why districts started programs; it explored the curricu-
lum of summer programs; and' it described how administrators felt
about the programs and their impacts (see Tables 1, 2 and 3). The
author concluded that the activities, services and curriculum were S ^
broad, tending to promote the social, 1 physical, emotional as well as
y
intellectual growth of children. Tphere also was some evidence that
district's used the time to develop curriculum and experiment with
innovative teaching methods.
There is little evidence "that either the nature or purpose of
summer programs have changed very much since the time of the survey. They
have, however, growi/TVeat deal. In -this regard ESEA Title I
offered many districts- • an/important opportunity to expand their sum-
mer school efforts, particularly around remediation and enrichment
opportunities forUihe disadvantaged- .
The more recent history of 'summer . school in California cannot
be 'understood without reference to the changing fiscal conditions
of the. public schools. Through the early 1970's,"as school enroll-
ments and tax rates peaked, summer school became a very important
revenue-producing, vehicle . --In California 660,000 children, K-8 grades,
attended .in 1972— rising to 860 , 000 in. 1977', or 30% of all K-8
public school students. In 1977, 33%" of K-8 public school students
were enrolled in summer programs.
The substantial expansion of summer school in the 1970' s is
clearly shown in Table 4. Not only did the proportion of K-8
children enrolled more than double, the "real a.d.a. increased by 31%
>
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164
TABLE 1
Reasons for Starting First Summer School in District
Number of
Reason for Summer Schools Districts Percent
Help children needing additional
basic educational experiences
Enrich - regular program
Remedial problems
Parental request
Give needed summer supervision
Help children with reading problems
Staff and community interest
Give emergency teachers and student
teachers experience
Eliminate much retardation
Help pupils behind in school work
due to illness or transfer
Needs of gifted children
Provide a continuing program
Started when district eliminated
mid-term promotions
Provide additional opportunities for
children who want to learn
28 21.7%
26 20.2
19 14.8
17 13.2
11 8.6
11 8.6
8 6.2
Provide additional use of buildings 5 3.9
4 3.1
3 2.4
3 2.4
3 2.4
2. 1.6
1 -8
Offer laboratory for summer conference 1 - 8
To provide for experimentation
1 .8
To meet the needs of children
Nutritional and recreational needs
Number of Districts 129
^Seventeen districts listed two reasons
1 .8
1 .8
1 .8
Source: Ronald E. Notley, "The St.- ".us of Summer School Programs for
Elementary School Children in California" (1959) .
ERIC 165
\
8
/
TABLE 2
Subject Offerings
in the
Summer School
•
Enrichment Program
Subjects
Niamber of
Districts
Percent
Physical Activities
Physical Education
Swimming
Folk Dancing
Rhythms
Interpretative Dancing
34
1)7
5
1
1
58
39.4%
Music Education
Instrumental
Music
Vocal
34
13
10
57
38.8
Art Education
Arts and Crafts
Art
Photography
29
6
1
1
36
24.5
Science Education
Science i
Nature Study
Science and Nature Study
Elementary Physics
11
3
1
1 ■ 1
I
-
16
10.9
Creative Arts
Dramatics
Stories and Poems
Library
\
\
\ 1
\ 3
\ 2
12
7.6
Education of Exceptional
Children
. Cerebral Palsy
Mentally Retarded
Deaf
j Physically Handicapped
\
\ 4
i
i
\
3 '\
3 \
1 \
1
8
5.4
Handicrafts and Home Arts
Shop 1
Foods and Homeimaking
Home Mechanics
Social Living
8
5.4
Foreign Language
Spanish
French
4
1
\
\
\
\
\
\
5
3.4
Typing ! , j
3
2.0
ERIC
Number of Districts
*Source: Notley (1959)
f
16
e\
\
147
-
\
\ TABLE 3
Chief Strengths of Summer School Program
Number of
Nature of Strengths Districts Percent
Improves general academic achievement 34 26,4%
Enrichment opportunities 29 22.5
Concentrated remedial program 23 17,9
Helps special or individual children 17 13,2
In-service training for teachers 13 11,0
Parents like and want it 10 7,8
Improves reading *
9 7,0
Worthwhile recreational activities 9 7,0
Relaxed atmosphere between pupil
and teacher
5 3.9
4 3.1
3 2.4
2 1.6
Provides for gifted
Change in pupil attitudes
More use of school plant
Aid to slow learners 2 !- 6
Children come because they want to 2 1.6
Provides worthwhile summer activities 1 -8
Helps solve adjustment problems
Provides teachers with opportunity
to earn more money
1 .8
1 -8
Assists in social adjustment 1 - 8
Number of Districts 129 1
*Thirty-seven districts listed two strengths
Source: Notley (1959)
9
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187
TABLE 4
Growth
in Summer School
Program Provision and
Attendance
in California
n nil
\ i y / 1
— 1 Q 7 7 \
— ±j II)
1971
1972
1973
1974
1975
1976
197"
NumDer or Lounuies
with Programs
52
50
52
50
52
54
54
Number of Districts
with Programs
380
411
436
462
511
503
535
*
a.d.a. (statewide)
(by grade level)
K
01 poo
12628
28823
17538
27457
29715
34723
1
1 I 1 QQQ ^
X X X O O O
99447
84478
97500
114887
119118
117842
2
Q 7 Q 9 1
96017
92730
102195
113594
119493
126780
3
Q 7 ^ 7 6
93434
93454
101679
109974
112957
124671
4
)7 OO JO
95884
95318
102146
119971
113594
118313
93471
95602
97708
105529
113349
112090
117205
6
58668
a O O C yl
bo j j4
7 o ^ n £
/z jUo
97586
1 09739
108393
106811
7
41185
46663
48341
54877
60449
63477
d A A A Q
u444o
8
19883
30611
32788
36904
43868
48503
48933
Total
654 , 760
662,366
679, 714
738 , 114
825 , 787
841, 818
Percent of K-8
a.d.a. enrolled
in summer school
20 . 7%
21.3%
22.2%
24 .6%
30.9%
31.7%
32.9%
*a.d.a.= average daily attendance
Source: California, State Department of Education, Calif ornia -Public Schools:
Selected Statistics (19 71-77).
163
ERIC
o
169
11
in this seven year span. During these years, well over half- the
total summer school enrollment was in the K-3 grades. We can attri-
bute these increases to at least the following factors;
1. Parents and school professionals generally were begin-
ing to support the idea of an extended year school program. The
reasons for their support were many and varied — sometimes educa-
tional , sometimes not. Furthermore , attachment to the ten-
month school year waned as fewer parents argued that children
"needed a rest," or ''that schooling during uhe summer -made family
vacation planning too difficult.
2. Increasing maternal employment made summer school oppor-
tunities for children attractive to many parents. It was a healthy,
safe place for children to go at little or no cost to families.
This may account for the high proportion of young children (K-3)
attending programs. These children, after all, are less likely to
be attending by choice and relatively few were enrolled by parents
specifically for remediation.
3. Although working with little hard data, school professionals
remained persuaded that summer school offered a supportive
climate in which to deal with problems of learning loss and reme-
diation. This becamV^near universally accepted premise underlying
the program. .
Despite these factors — each helped to increase the state tf s summer
school enrpllment— through the 1970 *s some legislators charged
that districts were principally interested in boosting attendance
only because of the generous a.d.a. policies.
9
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12
In June, 1978, Proposition 13 appeared on the ballot. The
election took place just days before summer programs were scheduled
to begin in school districts throughout the state. The legisla-
ture, preparing in advance for the possibility that Proposition 13
would pass, had amended the Budget Act of 1978-79 to read that,
if the initiative was approved, the broad guidelines under which
school districts organized summer programs were no longer operative,
and state supporte d summer classes vere to be limited only to
courses for high school seniors needing credit for graduation and
special programs for the .handicapped- 7 . Under Proposition 13,
districts were to be prohibited from counting 1978 summer school
a.d.a. for state revenue unless sessions were completed by June 30,1978.
As a consequence of this action, when Proposition 13 passed ,- almost
every school district in the state discontinued general summer
services. Attendance dropped to a miniscule .7, 380 a.d.a. statewide.
In effect, the state terminated its support of summer school and
services disappeared ' virtually overnight. This '
-raised some important questions:
1. Who was affected by the termination of summer school
services, and in what ways?
2. Have communities filled the breach with other services?
3. Why was there no effective lobby for summer school in
anticipation of Proposition 13? How deep was public support for
the summer school program?
4. Was summer school particularly vulnerable to Proposition 13,
or are there larger, more fundamental considerations at work that
might also affect other school/cultural/recreational services for
children in the future?
ERIC 17 'I
13
On the Question of Program Impacts
For all practical purposes there is no longer a summer school
program in the California public schools. In 1978, because classes
were cancelled just days before they were to have begun, parents
who had organized their children's vacations around it were confront-
ing especially troublesome dislocations. In contrast, in 1979 there
was no such upheaval. The public knew there would not be a program.
In the Post-Proposition 13 era, summer school
was no longer a free, community-provided service for children. But
to understand the responses in 197& and 1979 more detailed con-
sideration of impacts and community actions is necessary.
1978: Dislocation with Unexplored Implications
In 1978 summer school classes were cancelled because districts
could no longer be able to claim summer a.d.a. as a part of the
state aid calculation. Provision of programs would be a 100% cost
item, generating no revenue. Of all community services, summer
school had the dubious distinction of being hit first and hardest
by Proposition 13. Across the state classes were promptly cancelled.
Not surprisingly, at this very late date, many families had difficulty
finding summer activities or programs for their children. A major
question raised by school officials and parents throughout the
state had to do with alternatives— or lack of them— for children during the summer.
0
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i 72
14
In Los Angeles, 371,000 young people were affected, (and
9a/
7, 300 teachers were without jobs for the summer). — Some legislators
responded tnat these concerns demonstrated that summer school really was
a kind of "frill." Summer school, they argued, was little more
than organized babysitting at public expense, hardly central to
the educational enterpr ise . — ^ They viewed the dislocation—a
consequence of sudden cancellation — as a problem for parents only
in that they would be forced to find other care arrangements. The
instructional dimension of summer school, according to this logic,
was of secondary or tertiary import to most families. To these
legislators, the estimated savings ($107-180 million) was signifi-
cant and certainly in the "spirit" of Proposition 13.
In the Bay Area only 9 of 110 school districts proceeded with
summer school plans. Generally, where programs were held under pub-
lic school sponsorship, attendance was limited to graduating seniors
who needed one or two credits in order to complete required course
work. Some communities attempted to organized f ee-f or-service summer
schools, provided under the auspices of school districts using
public facilities. Wealthier suburban districts were somewhat
successful at organizing part-day programs for one month to six
weeks, at fees ranging as high as $75 per class. A pay-as-you-go
12/
program in Los Altos drew 1/100 children for example.
But f ee-f or-service plans fared poorly in the cities.
Organized at the last minute and at a high cost, many parents
simply could not afford it. In Oakland, for example, several
ERIC
J 73
15
church groups planned a summer session of five weeks at a fee of
$58 per child. One thousand children were needed for the program
to. break even. Only 26 children enrolled — parents would not or
could not pay the price and the program was cancelled before classes
began. A high school program sponsored by the University of
California attracted 250 seniors at $55 per'-class. This, however,
was far below the annual summer school attendance rate in Oakland
in past years— ^ The school district had , anticipated ana.d.a. of
17,000 for a regular, free summer session.
Little is known about the summertime impact of Proposition 13
on children and families, beyond the basic attendance count.
Clearly, many thousands of children were denied schooling oppor-
tunities, and it is not known what they did instead— or wh^t the _
impact on the loss of educational offerings may have been. The
Hayward, California newspaper interviewed children and families-
and found that at one point or another during their student
years almost every child in the. community had attended summer
school. Furthermore, most of those who had planned to go in 1978 •
were either behind in credits or had failed a ciass^ 7 . This was
consistent with other reports _and suggested at least that labelling
summer school. a frill was based on a less than objective assessment
of its role and import. *
174
16
The first year consequences of Proposition 13, then, can be
summarized as follows. (See Table 5 for additional details'.) Com-
munities that tried to provide school programs turned to fee-for-
service plans. They were, however, hastily organized and except in
some suburban areas failed to attract significant numbers of children
The impact of the loss of service was not studied, and no one
reallv knows what the million plus children who normally attend
summer school did instead. The state viewed the first year's
experience as "successful." Following an initial outcry (which
was attributed to the late date at which summer school cuts were
made rather than to the fact that summer school was discontinued)
there was little ongoing pressure to assure full state funding
for these programs in future years.
The 1979 situation seemed to provide further evidence that
summer school did not attract the kind of ' visible support that might
have been expected.
197 9: Where w ere the Children?
Nineteen seventy-nine saw an elaboration of the f ee-f or-service
model. With time to plan, more communities instituted these kinds
of programs.— / In addition, profitmaking institutions began offer-
ing summer school "packages" to communities, with"- an eye toward fill-
ing the void that emerged as public agencies other than schools
also began dropping summer programs for children.
Some communities promoted the f ee-f or-service plan and found
\
•ready constituencies. Others found that parents would simply not
bear the cost of enrolling children in summer activities, no matter
what the program might offer.
175
118 Districts and Counties
No Increased Decreased
Imprtc t Numbers Numbers
TABLE 5
Effects of Proposition 13 on a Selected Set of School Districts
Summer Programs
27 Districts with
54 Elementary Districts a.d.a. ^10,000-
No Increased Decreased
I mpact Numbers Numbers
No
Impac t
Increased Decreased
Number s_ Numbers
Teachers ;£mpi.C>ynent)
5
0
04
3
0
30
0
0
26
1
0
Instructional Aidia
Full time. (En#loyr.ent)
Part tune \ Employment)
12
12
0
0
29
47-
3
3
0
0
9
19
f
3
4
0
0
11
15
4
5
0
0
Volunteers
23
0
12
6
0
5
10
0
3
10
b
3 Programs (a.d.a.)
6
0
48
3
0
21
1
0
15
2
0
t
4-3 Program v a.d.a.)
4
0
53
2
0
22
0
0
18
1
c
a.d.a.- average dally attendance
Douxre: California, 'state Department of Finance, A Study of Local Government
; rr acr.5 of Proposition 13, Supplemental Re per t- -K- 1 2 School Districts
t March lj79)
35 Districts in Lover
Third Expenditure Per a.d.a.
No Increased Decreased
npact Numbers Numbers
2?
33 Districts in Upper
Third Expenditure Per a.d.*.
No Increased Decreaded
Impact Numbers Numbers
3 0 23
3
0
8
15
4
0
16
5
5
0 •
4
15
3
0
14
17
2
0
15
17 G
177
^ •' ' " ' * . " 18
' On the public sector side, -in 1979 most school districts
stuck to "the. letter of the law,' providing summer school classes
• • .only for the handicapped and for high .school seniors needing
' units in order to' graduate. ' In Los Angeles attendance was 13,000
total as against 341, 000 in 1977^/. Oakland put together federal,
• • state and local 'funds to support programs fpr 5, 000 youngsters
(compared with 18, 500 in 1977) . These included ESEA Title I •
reading clinics for 4,400 children at 17 schools; tutorial clusters
• for low achievers, utilizing,' CETA funds to pay for instruct
tional aides; and summer youth 'employment/education programs,
utilizing city funds to. provide jobs in tandem with career . devel-
opment program^ in h-igVschOol classrooms. Only the Title I read- ,
ing clinics drew any substantial a.d.a. \
On the matter of user fees, community experiences were quite
different from the previous year, but the reasons for the differences
were not always clear. For example, the Los Altos program mentioned
earlier drew only one- third as many children in 1979 as il had in
"l978. Another program,.,- in suburbaa Belmont, attracted 390 child-
ren in 1978 but only 38 in 1979 (and was cancelled). 'Cupertino ■ _
experienced a jump in summer program enrollment for its "voluntary ?
fee" programs- from 1, 000 in 1978 to 1,500 in 1979. -.But thi,s\ ^
■compared poorly with the 10 , 000 a.d.a:(of a possible 16 , 000) for/ the
regular public summer school session held in 1977 ^
There were some legal problems associated with these. programs, ^
that kept many districts from offering anything at all. It was not
S
clear that public schools could actually charge tuition for" classes/
.. hence some communities collected voluntary "donations," with
ERjfc i? 3
a-
19
"suggested level of contribution" for fear of otherwise running
afoul of the law. In fact, no legal actions materialized, but
public school officials expressed concejrn that citizens might go to
court to prohibit the schools from charging fees for service and
that, inthe worst case, districts would have to bear the entire
cost of the summer program (once completed) and forfeit the state
aid they had received. Partly as a result of these unresolved legal
issues, many communities simply chose not to offer programs.
Private enterprises were more in evidence in 1979 than the
previous year. The American Learning Corporation signed contracts
with 38 school districts to operate 25 programs throughout the
state .(Programs were not designed to serve individual school
districts but larger "markets" instead.) Charging substantial fees,
however, only 12 generated the necessary a.d.a.to warrant provision
of the program. Other enterprises proposed or ran programs with
fees as high as $144 for five week, one-half day sessions. While
rapid increase in the size and number of these fee-charging non-public
school offerings had been predicted,- in fact their growth was slow
and their attraction limited. At this point, summer school does
not appear to interest more than a small number of universities,
colleges and private corporations who are hoping to make a profit
providing f ee-f or-service programs to school districts and commun-
ities. By and large, their focus seems to be on remediation and
although there is ittle evidence that it will become a big business
as once envisioned (given the size of the summer school population)
some profitable small scale efforts may survive in the long run.
0
ERIC
179
\
\
20
T he First Two Years in Perspective
The post-Proposition 13 experience can be sulpmarized as follows:
1) Attendance levels at public summer schools have diminished
dramatically. Most districts have eliminated all except state
mandated programs. ( \
2) Wealthier suburbs have, to an extent, succeeded in intro-
ducing fee for service alternatives. Inner cities have not been
able to attract substantial enrollments for programs charging fees.
3) Private enterprise has failed to find a significant summer
market , as some had anticipated. This may both reflect higher
than acceptable fee structures and general disinterest in non-
public alternatives among parents and families.
4) To the extent that any documentation is available it appears
that summer school is used by students, particularly above grade 4,
for remediation, makeup of missed course work and advanced studies.
In this sense summer school can hardly be considered a frill, as some
have argued.
5) What happened to the children? Only a small proportion of
! the anticipated 1978-1979 public summer school enrollment can be
accounted for after examining attendance records of other (non-school)
summer programs. The vast majority of pre-Proposition 13 summer
school students remain unaccounted for. In most cities other
public agencies (e.g. recreation departments) were severely con-
strained themselves and had no way of expanding their own summer pro-
grams to absorb more participants.
' We must view the summer school experience in the context of
this larger study. While fully institutionalized, like many other
erJc ISO
21
children's services, summer school rested uncomfortably in the pub-
lic sector, never really enjoying fundamental support among adult
constituencies. The post-Proposition 13 years suggest that this
rather shallow support was coupled with uncertainty regarding the
mandate and programmatic objectives of summer school. Its history
is somewhat parallel to that of other cultural and recreational
services for children, hence it is not surprising that the confluence
of fiscal and political considerations shouldtso drastically under-
mine the statewide program.
The Current Debate
State officials and legislators are aware that the initial,
post-Proposition 13 response might have been unduly regressive.
Even thou-h a major summer school lobby has failed to emerge, impor-
tant issues linked to summer school can no longer be ignored. Some
legislators feel that the political response (or lack thereof) in
1978 and 1979 represents an adequate way of measuring, the import
of summer school to the populace. The ^tate education department,
on the other hand, argues that there ^ a need for summer program-
ming that can be justified in educational terms and that many con-
stituents, most in need of services, ;have few or no alternatives
to a free public program. Teachers support the education bureaucracy's
position and also fear a long-term deciine in summer job opportunities
for teachers. By this formulation one cannot simply examine the glo-
bal public reaction to the termination of summer programs and assume
that this is a true measure of their import. Rather, it may be
necessary to evaluate how uifferent user. groups have been affected
and, thereby, arrive at an appropriate strategy for future public
funding of summer school activities.
ERIC 181
22
To date (in 1980) the California Legislature has not addressed
the summer school problem, although several state senators intend
to introduce legislation that would re-establish summer school pro-
grams of particular groups of children (e.g. children who have failed
to pass to the next grade), albeit on a more limited basis. The
consensus, however, is that California's summer school program will
never again reach as many children a c it did in the past. This
has implications for parents, for with increasing numbers of mothers
employed , there is a serious need for more summer child care and
activity alternatives. There are also implications for children,
who have lost an opportunity to pursue interests and sharpen skills
somewhat less pressured environment that characterizes summer
school. If there is a new life for summer school, it will probably
be the result of minimum competency requirements being introduced
in California. ' If children must pass examina-
tions each year in order to advance to the next grade., summer pro-
grams will be necessary to provide remediation to a large proportion
of students who are performing far below grade level in both English
and math. Hence, one impact of annual competency testing may be a
revitalized summer school program.
The fate of California's summer school program in the wake of
Proposition 13 is consistent with a trend away from providing
specialized services for- young people. Whether this simply reflects
general taxpayer demands that agencies pare down their program commit-
ments; demographic factors lessening reducing the problems of the youn
a fundamental diminishing of public concern for child; or all of these
things at tandem, f it,is not possible to say. But the dramatic decline
© in fundinq for summer school affects a large proportion of children 1
ERIC
msmam and families who now must cope with the loss of yet another .we'll
23
r N otes
Charles W. O'dell, Summer Work in Public Schools (Urbana:
• University of Illinois, Bureau of Educational Research, 1930) ,
p . 1 0 .
Ronald E. Notley, "The Status of Summer School Programs for
Elementary School Children in California." Ph. a Dissertation,
'school of Education, University of California, Berkeley, 1953.
t Ibid . , p . 1 4 . t.
Ibid . , p . 14
Charles O'dell, op.cit., pJ-31.
Ronald Notley, op.cit., p. 18.
Ibid .
National Advisory Council on the Education of Disadvantaged
Children, Summer Edu c ation for Children of Poverty (Washington
GPO, 1966) . • '
State of California, Budget Act of 1978 (Sacramento: State of
California, 1978) , Section 316.1.
Los Angeles Times , June 30, 1978.
Oakland Tribune , July 12, 1978.
Palo Alto Times , July 5, 1979
Hayward Daily Record f June 2 4,- 1978 .
While it is difficult to estimate the number of proposed fee-
for-service plans, it was certainly in the hundreds
although far fewer were actually carried forward to programs.
Los Angeles Times , July 2, 1979.
Palo Alto Times, July 5, 1979.
Appendix B
Children's Time Study
Setting, Sample, Design
In the Spring of 1976, 764 pre-adolescents (11 and 12 years old)
from Oakland, California (population 333,000) and their parents were
interviewed as part of a study of children's use of time outside
of school.
The sample was drawn in the following manner. Elementary school
attendance areas were defined as principal sampling units. Children
in Oakland attend the school closest to their home, so school attend-
ance areas are geographic representations of the city's demography.
Of the 58 attendance areas, 20 were selected for study by stratified
probability sampling techniques to reflect all school attendance areas
in the city. Then the names of approximately forty children were
drawn randomly from the sixth grade rolls at each sample-school
yielding a cluster sample of twenty attendance areas, 764 cases
(number of cases per area proportional to population) . Character-
istics of the sample are described below.
Characteristics of the Time Study Sample
Oakland, California
Spring, 1976
(N = 764)
Ethnicity
Black
White
Asian
Hispanic
Other
59. 8%
24.2
9.2
4.6
2.2
Income
Less than $4, 999 ^.4%
$5,000-$9,999
$10,000-$14,999 ~~' u
$15,000-$19,999 ' ^J'*
$20,000+ 1 \
Not Available
Mother's Education
Some high school or less
High School graduate
Some College
College graduate and above
Not Available
22.8%
27.9
31.4
16.1
1.8
ISA
Interviews were conducted at the home of each child between
April and June 1976. The completion rate was 87.2%. There were
two protocols: a child's interview schedule and a Parents
questionnaire (which the parent filled out while the child was
being interviewed in another room) .
The interviews consisted of both closed and open-ended questions
about out-of-school life; things children do alone and with friends;
things children do with parents and siblings; chores and work
roles outside the home; involvement in organized activities outside
of school; and television viewing behavior. Parents questionnaires
focused on family demography and also probed socialization priorities
and child-rearing practices affecting out-of-school life.
185
APPENDIX C
Source Materials for the Analysis of Proposition 13 Impacts
Included in the formulation of the case studies in Chapter IV
*
were materials from the following newspapers:
Alameda Times Star
Bakersfield Californian
Colusa Sun Herald
Concord Transcript
Contra Cost (County ) Times
Davis Enterprise
Dublin Tri-Valley ^ News
Fair Oaks, North Highlander
Fremont Argus
Fresno Bee
Hayward Daily Record
Livermore Tri-Valley Herald
L os Angeles Times
Los Banos Enterpris e
Oakland, Montclarion
New York Times
Oakland Tribune
Palo Alto Times
Pittsburg Post-Dispatch
Redwood City, Woods ide Country Almanac
Richmond, Independent Gazette
Sacramento Bee
San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Examiner
Simi Valley, Enterprise Sun and News
Tracy Press
Woodland Democrat
* All newspapers listed are in California, except the New
York Times.
