5 ‘Preventive Government’ Bills Are Signed by Wilson

Gov. Pete Wilson on Thursday signed five bills in his “preventive government” program for children, including a $9.2-million proposal to restore and overhaul statewide testing of students.

The new testing program, among other things, will measure a student’s actual performance in specific skills such as writing, instead of developing evaluations from answers to multiple-choice exams.

In addition, the $89-million package is aimed at heading off health, learning, drug and other problems that afflict children before the difficulties bloom into bigger, more costly epidemics for taxpayers.

The signing left Wilson one step short of completing action on a package he requested last January, designed to use the education system to prevent problems so public agencies do not have to deal with them later.

A cornerstone of the package, a bill creating a new Cabinet-level state agency to administer a wide variety of programs affecting children, is snagged in the Assembly, a victim of the partisan reapportionment scuffle. No further action is scheduled before next year.

“We should not hold the children of this state hostage to any other purpose,” Wilson said of the stalled proposal.

The potentially far-reaching student testing bill, carried by Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), will spend five years overhauling the existing California Assessment Program with the aim of better evaluating the performance of students, teachers and schools.

In a fight with the Legislature over funding sources last year, then-Gov. George Deukmejian vetoed $9 million from the budget for statewide school testing and rejected a Hart bill to restore the funds. But in January, Wilson made it one of his “preventive government” priority issues.

Hart noted that in his substantially revised version, tests in grades four, five, eight and 10 will be added to the current multiple-choice format to measure a student’s ability to write, solve problems and communicate orally.

New standards will indicate levels at which a student should be able to perform. For the first time, Hart said, individual pupil scores will be reported to parents and compared against peer performance standards.

Wilson also signed these “preventive government” bills:

* Preschool--Approves $45 million to double to 42,000 the number of poor 4-year-olds enrolled in state preschool programs. The bill was carried by Assemblywoman Bev Hansen (R-Santa Rosa).

* Drugs--Earmarks $4 million to expand drug education programs in junior high schools, with an emphasis on the hazards of drug abuse during pregnancy. Assemblyman Jack O’Connell (D-Carpinteria) introduced the measure.

* Health--Appropriates $20 million for local educators to plan and provide more health services in the schools. Wilson said the bill, by Sen. Robert B. Presley (D-Riverside), will allow children to enter the classroom “healthy enough to learn and healthy enough to concentrate.”

* Mental--Creates an experimental early mental health counseling program chiefly for low-income children in kindergarten through the third grade who are experiencing “adjustment” problems. About $10 million in matching grants will be available to schools this year.

In other actions, the governor:

* Signed a bill by Assemblyman John Vasconcellos (D-Santa Clara) prohibiting insurance companies from denying health care coverage to people who participate in tests to develop an AIDS vaccine. Wilson said a subject may test positive for the human immunodeficiency virus, often a precursor to AIDS, but may not actually be infected. He said participants in vaccine testing “should not be denied basic health care coverage as a result of those tests.”

* Vetoed a proposal by Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) that would have required local water agencies, under certain circumstances, to purchase water from desalination plants, whether they wanted it or not. The governor sided with the Metropolitan Water District against the Southern California Edison Co.

* Vetoed a Vasconcellos measure creating a task force to study and make recommendations on the self-esteem of California senior citizens. The bill would have transferred $31,000 from the advisory California Senior Legislature to the state Commission on Aging for staff support for the task force. Wilson said he was sympathetic to the idea, but said the money in the bill “would provide 9,047 home-delivered meals to the frail elderly.”