Proposition 10 added a 50-cent tax to cigarettes and other tobacco products. The revenue generated from this tax was earmarked for programs that promote early childhood development for children from birth to age 5. Twenty percent of the tax dollars were allocated to the California state Proposition 10 Commission. The remaining 80 percent is distributed to individual county Proposition 10 Commissions based on the proportion of children born in each county. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors established the Los Angeles County Children and Families First-Proposition 10 Commission (now known as First 5 LA) in December 1998. The Commission's goal is to use the funds generated by the implementation of Proposition 10 to invest in the health and development of young children in Los Angeles County. For more information on First 5 LA, go to www.first5.org. The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit, independent, objective, and nonpartisan research institution, which helps to improve public policy through research and analysis. Additional information on RAND and RAND research can be found at www.rand.org. The First 5 LA-RAND Research Partnership was established to analyze the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey (L.A.FANS) data and disseminate research findings related to policy questions surrounding school readiness, child care choices, children's health, the contribution of neighborhood characteristics to young children's well-being, and children's health insurance coverage, access, and utilization. to facilitate access to L.A.FANS results and other data by developing and implementing a strategy for outreach to organizations, agencies, and community groups concerned with early childhood development in Los Angeles. to develop standardized measures of school readiness, child care choices, and children's health that can be used in other studies and evaluations. Under the Research Partnership, RAND Labor and Population, a unit of the RAND Corporation, and First 5 LA research staff collaborate on identifying key policy questions on which policymakers and the public need more information. Although First 5 LA also provides funding to RAND to conduct the analyses, RAND research staff carry out the analyses and are responsible for all of the findings and conclusions. Like all RAND publications, this report has been carefully reviewed for accuracy and objectivity as part of RAND's quality assurance program. 3 Contents Preface Table of Contents Figures Tables Summary CHAPTER ONE Introduction Public Policy Objective and Organization of This Report CHAPTER TWO Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey (L.A.FANS) Survey Design L.A.FANS Child Care Measures CHAPTER THREE Results Regular Use of Non-Parental Care Number of Arrangements Primary Type of Child Care Used Amount of Child Care Used Per Week Cost of Child Care Child-Adult Ratios CHAPTER FOUR