State ‘Kids ‘92’ Agenda Unveiled : Politics: A broad coalition calls for a platform of issues for children, including health insurance and an immediate end to welfare cuts.

In an attempt to do for children in the 1990s what the environmental movement did for the Earth in the 1970s, an unusually broad coalition of interest groups on Wednesday unveiled a “children’s platform” of political issues for California’s 7.8 million residents who are too young to vote.

The platform--which calls for health insurance for all youths by 1994, a revamping of the state’s child support system and an immediate end to welfare cuts--was presented at a City Hall news conference in Los Angeles.

The “Kids ‘92” campaign was drafted by Children Now, an advocacy group, and was endorsed by the California PTA, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the United Way of California, the Latino Issues Forum and the California Council of Urban Leagues.

“We’re issuing a call to action and asking every Californian to put elected officials on notice: Baby-kissing and campaign slogans about investing in our children are not enough,” said James Steyer, president of Children Now. “California’s children are in crisis, and voters need to hold candidates accountable for their promises to children.”

Although it may have been the first time such a broad range of interest groups in the state had launched a campaign centered on children, it certainly was not the first time children’s advocates have spoken out.

The number of such groups has grown dramatically in the last few years, and the messages they are sending to state and local politicians are becoming increasingly sophisticated and insistent.

Whereas the only major child advocacy group used to be the Children’s Defense Fund in Washington, “there are now 40 state-based child advocacy groups throughout the country,” said Eve Brooke, head of the Assn. of Child Advocates, an organization of advocacy organizations based outside Rochester, N.Y.

“They have emerged and grown in strength in the last few years because of budget cuts and changes in federal policies during the Reagan years,” Brooke said. “Those changes have meant that states now have far greater responsibility in setting policy and spending priorities for a variety of programs that affect children, including health insurance, welfare policy and child support enforcement.”

Children Now, a nonprofit organization supported by foundation and corporate grants, has been among the most aggressive and effective of the new state groups, Brooke said.

“We want to empower people as the civil rights and women’s movements empowered earlier generations,” Steyer said. “We want to do for children what the environmental movement has done. Not only did it make people conscious of issues they had never thought about before, it taught individuals that they could make a difference: They can recycle; they can use energy-efficient light bulbs. We want doctors and teachers and parents and everyone to understand what can be done to help children.

“If we leave it to politicians, very little is going to change,” Steyer added.

His organization has begun a slick radio, television, print and billboard advertising campaign designed to mobilize voters during the upcoming elections. Rather than what Steyer calls “warm and fuzzy” commercials, his TV spots present stark black and white images depicting the conditions of children in California.

Since its creation nearly four years ago, Children Now has issued annual “report cards,” showing county by county how well the state serves its children. Based on such factors as high school dropout rates, infant mortality, violent crime and the number of children living in extreme poverty, California has received a symbolic “D” for three years in a row. Los Angeles County has ranked in the bottom 10 of the state’s 58 counties.

Children Now’s efforts have inspired similar projects in other states. The Greater Kansas City Community Foundation has created and distributed a score card to rate the quality of children’s life in that city. The Annie E. Casey Foundation of Greenwich, Conn., has begun a Kids Count Project, which provides statistics-at-a-glance on children in numerous parts of the country.

One of the newest youth advocacy groups to enter the scene is Parent Action, a Baltimore-based membership organization modeled after the American Assn. for Retired Persons. The group was founded in 1989 by Dr. T. Berry Brazelton, a renowned Harvard pediatrician, and Bernice Weissbourd, founder of the Family Resource Coalition and contributing editor of Parents magazine.

Through its publication, Parent Post, and a computerized information database, it informs members of pending legislation, children’s services, recreational programs and volunteer opportunities in the community. Next spring, the organization plans to announce the formation of a book club and membership discounts for hotels, magazine subscriptions and toy purchases.

Other state and local advocacy groups have begun detailed analysis of city and state budgets, which have brought about changes in policies and spending priorities.

The Los Angeles Roundtable for Children, an 8-year-old privately supported group of community, corporate and academic leaders, has done a variety of scholarly analyses of government and private programs and issued a 200-page detailed study of public resources dedicated to children. These studies have given policy-makers and voters in Los Angeles County some of their first clear glimpses of spending on youth services.

In San Francisco, Coleman Advocates for Youth and Children, a small nonprofit operation, issues “kid’s” report cards on the performance of city departments and an annual wish list for children’s services. Although the city has experienced a sizable budget shortfall, the Coleman group managed to get $12 million in additional funds for children’s services.

Whether groups such as Coleman and Children Now will be as successful in years to come is hard to gauge, said Michael Wald, a Stanford law professor who is one of the country’s leading experts on children’s issues and a member of Children Now’s board of directors.

They have had a “hard time” setting priorities and clearly that is what needs to be done in a time of budget crisis, Wald said. By dealing at state and local levels, however, they are clearly working where the action has come to be, he said. The key, Steyer said, is to monitor politicians on very specific issues both before and after elections.

“Don’t ask politicians whether they are for or against children,” he said. “Everyone is for children. What we have to do is start talking about very specific policies.”

Children Now, for example, says it is very pleased with Gov. Pete Wilson for putting children as a top priority even in the midst of a budget crisis. But Steyer said his organization has been sharply critical of the governor’s proposed Taxpayer Protection Act on welfare reform. If enacted, the children’s advocate said, it would adversely affect 1.5 million children who receive Aid to Families With Dependent Children.

In giving its support to the Kids ’92 campaign, the American Academy of Pediatrics is pushing for legislation being considered by the California Legislature that would require health insurance policies to cover childhood immunizations. Under the previous Administration, similar legislation was vetoed twice, and the pediatrics academy estimates that more than half of the state’s 2-year-olds are not fully immunized against preventable diseases.

The coalition also has called for full health care coverage for all of the state’s children and pregnant women by 1994. One in four children (2.1 million) has no private health insurance and is not covered by public programs--an increase of 62% over the last six years, said Dr. Joan Hodgman of the pediatrics academy.

In addition to health and welfare, the coalition has said it also would push for reforms in the state’s system of child support. Because absent parents aren’t consistently forced to pay child support, there is an estimated $2.5 billion in uncollected payments that are due children.

“California’s child support system touches more children’s lives than any other system except the public schools. In fact, half of the children in California will live with a single parent by the time they are 18,” the coalition said.