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BERKELEY -- By a wide margin, voters approved movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to spend $550 million a year on after-school programs. Updated Nov. 6, 1:38 am
Bolstered by Schwarzenegger's fame and $1 million of his money, the measure attracted the endorsements of police chiefs, district attorneys and business leaders around the state.
It held a steady lead throughout the vote count.
Citizens for Afterschool Programs, the coalition of endorsers headed by Schwarzenegger, celebrated at the Hollenbeck Youth Center in Los Angeles Tuesday night.
The League of Women Voters and the California Federation of Teachers led the opposition, arguing that Prop. 49 would take away the Legislature's flexibility to use taxpayer money for other needs, like health care and environmental programs.
"Of course we regret the fact that it looks like it's winning," said Trudy Schafer, Program Director for the League of Women Voters before the final results were tallied. "But we had a goal of educating the public to the kind of danger that Prop. 49 posed for funding of certain programs."
"There is going to be a real challenge to do the budget given this mandated spending," said Schafer.
Prop. 49 is the latest in a series of state propositions to call for allocating a percentage of the state's general fund -- the budget's largest pot of unrestricted money -- for a specific purpose.
But the fine print -- where the money will come from and what the future impact will be on the classroom -- had many parents, teachers and districts questioning its wisdom. The state's biggest teachers unions were split on the measure, with the California Teachers Association coming out in favor and the California Federation of Teachers opposed.
"Of course after-school programs are important. But I think in general people don't pay a lot of attention to the truth of how the budget actually works," said Mary Bergan, president of the California Federation of Teachers. "(Prop. 49) puts after-school programs in competition with children's health and higher education."
However, proponents said that locking in money for after-school programs is the only way to ensure their survival.
"Law enforcement studies show that the after-school hours between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. are the peak hours for kids to get into trouble," Schwarzenegger says in a statement on his Web site, joinarnold.com. "After school programs change that." He has echoed the idea in countless stump speeches around the state.
Schwarzenegger spent months making his way around the state and set a record for the most money raised for a single ballot measure. The "Terminator" star, who has promoted physical fitness for kids in the past, contributed $1 million of the more than $8 million raised for the campaign.
Political analyst Bruce Cain, director of the Institute for Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley, said Schwarzenegger's support for Prop. 49 may come back to haunt him.
"I think Arnold is going to benefit more than the state of California," Cain said. "But if (he) becomes governor, (he's) going to regret passing Prop. 49 because it will restrict his position to balance the budget."
Some districts see Prop. 49 as a way of ending their yearly dependence on the state for money. The Los Angeles Unified School District was among those that came out in favor of the measure.
In Alameda County, where 38 schools received state grant money for after-school programs last year, ambivalence toward the proposition was evident. The county superintendent gave Prop. 49 qualified support.
"It's critical that as a community we provide after-school care for our children and engage them in safe productive activities … even though there is some concern about how we are going to pay for it," said Superintendent Sheila Jordan.
Others remained neutral or silent because they worried about the toll on other programs, particularly during tough economic times.
"I have mixed feelings about Proposition 49," said Mel Thompson, a board member of the San Mateo-Foster City School District. "I see Proposition 49 as another thing that public education will be required to do, whether or not we can fund other critical parts of education properly."
Thompson's district faced deficits last year that would have forced it to cut programs ranging from music to tutoring to counseling programs, both during and after the school day. Like many districts in California, the San Mateo-Foster City district had to cut programs that were paid for from its general fund because of a cut in funding from the state. A fund-raising effort by parents and teachers saved classroom music and after-school sports.
Right now money for after-school programs is determined yearly by the state budget, and grants are awarded through the Before and After School Learning and Safe Neighborhoods Partnership to schools, non-profit organizations and groups interested in running programs on school campuses.
Last year, the state awarded $95 million in grants for before- and after-school programs, with priority given to low-income schools.
Prop. 49 would replace the current system and require that the state boost its current funding by more than five times. Proponents point out that this would only happen after the state recovers from its budget crisis.
The state would first have to erase its deficit and accumulate a surplus of $1.5 billion before funding for after-school programs would rise to $550 million. The legislative analyst's office projects that this will not happen until 2004, at the earliest.