Financing Child Care in the United States - Ewing Marion Kauffman ...

GENERATING PUBLIC REVENUE LOTTERIES AND GAMING
• The Office of School Readiness stresses that the
purpose of the Georgia prekindergarten is school
readiness (not child care) and that participation is
voluntary.
• Rapid growth of the prekindergarten program (from
750 children in 1992 to 62,500 in 2000) has resulted
in a number of administrative challenges. Additionally,
developing policies that work effectively with a wide
range of providers (nonprofit and proprietary, in the
public and private sectors) has not been easy.
• The governor moved the prekindergarten program out
of the state Department of Education into a separate
agency, the Office of School Readiness, created
specifically for this purpose. This reorganization was
designed to establish a stronger, more institutionalized
base of support for the prekindergarten program and
make it easier to coordinate early education and child
care funds from various sources. Unlike the state
Department of Education, which has an elected chief,
the director of the Office of School Readiness is
appointed by the governor. In addition to administering
the prekindergarten program, the office is currently
responsible for the child care food program and for
licensing and monitoring the private–sector child care
programs that participate in the prekindergarten
program. This also means that the funds are not
administered by local school districts.
• Regardless of the purpose for which the funds are
used, public lotteries are often controversial. Many
voters and policy–makers question the wisdom of
government urging people to gamble frequently,
especially when research shows that low–income
people are the heaviest purchasers of lottery tickets.
Critics point to the large advertising budgets of state
lotteries as well as the lack of regulation of the
advertising. Some opponents also feel that
government lottery advertising has helped to promote
community–wide acceptance of gambling and
contributed to the rapid spread of casino gambling.
CONTACT
Celeste Osborn, Director
Office of School Readiness
10 Park Place South, Room 200
Atlanta, GA 30303
Phone (404) 656 5957
Fax (404) 651 7430
E–mail once@mail.osr.state.ga.us
OTHER SITES WITH SIMILAR STRATEGIES
Thirty–six states, in addition to Georgia, operate lotteries.
Twelve others, in addition to Georgia, – California, Florida,
Idaho, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, New
Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio and West
Virginia — dedicate a portion of all lottery profits toward
K–12 or higher education. Concerns have been raised,
however, that in many states lottery profits do not
represent additional dollars for education, but simply
replace general fund dollars that would have been spent
on education.
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