A Boost for Families

Years ago, Orange County established a “one-stop shop” for developers to get permits for construction and cut through bureaucracy. Now the county has adapted that technique to families, trying to provide health care, counseling and recreation under one roof at several facilities. It’s a good use of resources that should benefit residents.

To their credit, county officials did not decide what would be best for communities and impose a top-down solution. They asked for advice and made use of existing institutions. That’s an important step in establishing credibility and allocating resources where they can best be used.

In Santa Ana, the county joined forces with the Corbin Community Center to provide counseling against child abuse, to offer tutoring and to provide emergency economic assistance.

In many cases, clients of Corbin and other centers may not know how to obtain access to such services. Even if they did, having to travel great distances to obtain financial help in one location and counseling in another can be a drain. A single parent facing great distances and a need for a baby sitter while she fills out forms and undergoes interviews may just decide the process is too difficult and give up. Centralizing services can overcome obstacles.

The county now has eight Family Resource Centers, including the one at Corbin. The Board of Supervisors has approved spending more than $10 million to build at least five more centers and, perhaps, three more later.

That’s a good expenditure of funds, especially when private groups are involved in the mix to provide money and expertise.

Each of the centers has outreach workers, with many paid by funds from Proposition 10, the voter-approved initiative to tax cigarettes an extra 50 cents a pack and spend it on child-development programs, from child care to parent education. The projects are administered by state and local commissions. In Orange County, the extra revenue this year is expected to be nearly $50 million.

The public health nurses and family advocates at the Family Resource Centers can visit clients at home and see what they require. The next step is having families visit the center to learn about the availability of emergency assistance, food and clothing. When the basics are taken care of, the centers offer instruction in coping with the slings and arrows of everyday life.

Such counseling may sound basic, but it can be a lifeline for someone stuck at home and unsure how to escape from a mountain of troubles. The more affluent are more likely to have built-in support networks; those without much money are in greater danger of isolation. And specialists in the field say the isolation increases the danger of domestic violence and child abuse.

Three of the centers are affiliated with hospitals, giving the residents access to professional care and the medical centers an increased presence in the community. In Huntington Beach, the center is affiliated with a school and has use of a temporary building on campus. That increases the chances of reaching the parents of students.

Most of the centers are in blue-collar areas, and many of the centers have experienced an influx of visitors seeking help, police and family-service workers have observed. At the Oak View Collaborative in Huntington Beach, police said the center has helped rally the neighborhood to fight drug and gang problems.

John Webb, coordinator of the centers, says getting help for families early can help prevent problems from turning into crises. That’s what Congress had in mind seven years ago when it passed legislation to try to keep families together and provided funding that became seed money for the Family Resource Centers.

The county has done a good job successfully seeking funds from other agencies and establishments and tapping sources like the Proposition 10 money. Keeping families together and in good health needs to be a top priority for government at all levels.