[House Hearing, 110 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
RUNAWAY, HOMELESS, AND MISSING
CHILDREN: PERSPECTIVES ON HELPING
THE NATION'S VULNERABLE YOUTH
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HEALTHY
FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES
COMMITTEE ON
EDUCATION AND LABOR
U.S. House of Representatives
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, JULY 24, 2007
__________
Serial No. 110-57
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Education and Labor
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COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR
GEORGE MILLER, California, Chairman
Dale E. Kildee, Michigan, Vice Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon,
Chairman California,
Donald M. Payne, New Jersey Ranking Minority Member
Robert E. Andrews, New Jersey Thomas E. Petri, Wisconsin
Robert C. ``Bobby'' Scott, Virginia Peter Hoekstra, Michigan
Lynn C. Woolsey, California Michael N. Castle, Delaware
Ruben Hinojosa, Texas Mark E. Souder, Indiana
Carolyn McCarthy, New York Vernon J. Ehlers, Michigan
John F. Tierney, Massachusetts Judy Biggert, Illinois
Dennis J. Kucinich, Ohio Todd Russell Platts, Pennsylvania
David Wu, Oregon Ric Keller, Florida
Rush D. Holt, New Jersey Joe Wilson, South Carolina
Susan A. Davis, California John Kline, Minnesota
Danny K. Davis, Illinois Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Washington
Raul M. Grijalva, Arizona Kenny Marchant, Texas
Timothy H. Bishop, New York Tom Price, Georgia
Linda T. Sanchez, California Luis G. Fortuno, Puerto Rico
John P. Sarbanes, Maryland Charles W. Boustany, Jr.,
Joe Sestak, Pennsylvania Louisiana
David Loebsack, Iowa Virginia Foxx, North Carolina
Mazie Hirono, Hawaii John R. ``Randy'' Kuhl, Jr., New
Jason Altmire, Pennsylvania York
John A. Yarmuth, Kentucky Rob Bishop, Utah
Phil Hare, Illinois David Davis, Tennessee
Yvette D. Clarke, New York Timothy Walberg, Michigan
Joe Courtney, Connecticut Dean Heller, Nevada
Carol Shea-Porter, New Hampshire
Mark Zuckerman, Staff Director
Vic Klatt, Minority Staff Director
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HEALTHY FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES
CAROLYN McCARTHY, New York, Chairwoman
Yvette D. Clarke, New York Todd Russell Platts, Pennsylvania,
Carol Shea-Porter, New Hampshire Ranking Minority Member
Dennis J. Kucinich, Ohio Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon,
Raul M. Grijalva, Arizona California
John P. Sarbanes, Maryland Kenny Marchant, Texas
Jason Altmire, Pennsylvania Luis G. Fortuno, Puerto Rico
John A. Yarmuth, Kentucky David Davis, Tennessee
Dean Heller, Nevada
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on July 24, 2007.................................... 1
Statement of Members:
Altmire, Hon. Jason, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Pennsylvania, prepared statement of............... 71
McCarthy, Hon. Carolyn, Chairwoman, Subcommittee on Healthy
Families and Communities, Committee on Education and Labor. 1
Prepared statement of.................................... 3
Platts, Hon. Todd Russell, Senior Republican Member,
Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities, Committee
on Education and Labor..................................... 3
Prepared statement of.................................... 4
Statement of Witnesses:
Alberts, Beth, CEO, Texas Center for the Missing............. 41
Prepared statement of.................................... 42
Additional materials submitted........................... 47
Allen, Ernie, president and CEO, National Center for Missing
and Exploited Children..................................... 35
Prepared statement of.................................... 36
Berg, Steven R., vice president for programs and policy,
National Alliance to End Homelessness...................... 27
Prepared statement of.................................... 29
Booker, Rusty, formerly homeless youth....................... 23
Prepared statement of.................................... 25
Additional material submitted............................ 26
Krahe-Eggleston, Sue, executive director, Our Family......... 11
Prepared statement of.................................... 13
Rolle, Chris ``Kazi,'' creator, Art Start's Hip-Hop Project.. 7
Prepared statement of.................................... 9
Additional material submitted............................ 11
RUNAWAY, HOMELESS, AND MISSING
CHILDREN: PERSPECTIVES ON HELPING
THE NATION'S VULNERABLE YOUTH
----------
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
U.S. House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities
Committee on Education and Labor
Washington, DC
----------
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 3:05 p.m., in
Room 2175, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Carolyn McCarthy
[chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives McCarthy, Grijalva, Sarbanes,
Yarmuth, Lampson, Platts, and Biggert.
Staff present: Aaron Albright, Press Secretary; Tylease
Alli, Hearing Clerk; Jody Calemine, Labor Policy Deputy
Director; Carlos Fenwick, Policy Advisor, Subcommittee on
Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions; Michael Gaffin, Staff
Assistant, Labor; Lamont Ivey, Staff Assistant, Education;
Brian Kennedy, General Counsel; Deborah Koolbeck, Policy
Advisor, Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities;
Lisette Partelow, Staff Assistant, Education; James Bergeron,
Minority Deputy Director of Education and Human Services
Policy; Robert Borden, Minority General Counsel; Kathryn Bruns,
Minority Legislative Assistant; Cameron Coursen, Minority
Assistant Communications Director; Kirsten Duncan, Minority
Professional Staff Member; Taylor Hansen, Minority Legislative
Assistant; Susan Ross, Minority Director of Education and Human
Resources Policy; and Linda Stevens, Minority Chief Clerk/
Assistant to the General Counsel.
Chairwoman McCarthy [presiding]. A quorum is present. The
hearing of the subcommittee will come to order.
Pursuant to committee rule 12-A, any member may submit an
opening statement in writing, which will be made part of the
permanent record.
Before we begin, I would like everyone to take a moment to
ensure that your cell phones and BlackBerrys are on ``silent.''
I would now like unanimous consent to allow the
distinguished gentleman from Texas, Mr. Lampson, to be allowed
to join us on the dais today and participate in the hearing.
Without objection, so ordered.
I now recognize myself, followed by the Ranking Member, Mr.
Platts, from Pennsylvania, for an opening statement.
I am pleased to welcome you all to the Subcommittee on
Healthy Families and Communities hearing on runaway, homeless
and missing children.
I would like to thank the ranking member, Mr. Platts, for
his interest in this important subject.
I would also like to thank my two colleagues on the Healthy
Families Subcommittee, Mr. Grijalva and Mr. Yarmuth, for their
dedication to the issues of runaway and homeless children.
Mr. Grijalva has taken the lead and urged the appropriation
to increase funds for runaway and homeless youth programs, with
success, this year. Mr. Yarmuth recently held a town-hall to
illuminate the issues of runaway and homeless youth in his
district in Kentucky.
We are lucky to have such passionate members on this
subcommittee, and I look forward to hearing from the witnesses
from your districts today.
Later, we would also like to welcome a visitor to hearing
today, Mr. Lampson from Texas. We are glad that he will be able
to join us later. Mr. Lampson has been personally dedicated to
this issue for the last 10 years. He founded the Congressional
Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, which now has over 130
members. Mr. Lampson remains the champion of missing and
exploited children in Congress.
We are here today to learn about runaway, homeless and
missing children and gain perspectives on how we can help these
young people as we begin the reauthorization process.
Although there are no exact figures for the number of
runaway and homeless youth in our nation, in 2002 1.6 million
young people between the ages of 12 to 17 ran away from home
and slept in exposed or poorly sheltered locations.
Runaways may find shelter with a friend or member of the
community, but for the children who find themselves on the
street, food, shelter, health care, and personal safety needs
are not met. Studies of runaway and homeless youth show high
rates of emotional and mental health problems. According to the
Basic Center Program and Transitional Living Program in 2006,
29 percent were identified as having mental health issues upon
exiting care.
In addition, many of the young people who enter shelters
have a history with the juvenile justice system, on which we
had a hearing just a few weeks ago. These issues are all
related, as we have a juvenile correction system that fails to
protect youth from shelters and streets.
Runaway children may fall into the missing children
category. A study funded by the Department of Justice found
that nearly all of the 1.3 million children who went missing in
1999 were reunited with their caretakers.
We will learn of the grassroots activities on these issues,
which includes collaboration between those who assist runaway
and homeless youth and those who locate missing children.
However, not every child was reunited with caretakers, and
that is why we have AMBER alerts, the National Center for
Missing and Exploited Children, a Task Force on Internet Crimes
Against Children and Law Enforcement Training Center.
Today's topics are difficult. I am looking forward to
learning what we do for our runaway, homeless and missing
children and recommendations on what we can do through
reauthorization to better serve these young people.
I want to thank all of you for taking the time to be here
this afternoon.
And now I yield to Ranking Member Platts for his opening
statement.
[The statement of Mrs. McCarthy follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Carolyn McCarthy, Chairwoman, Subcommittee
on Healthy Families and Communities
I am pleased to welcome you to the Subcommittee on Healthy Families
and Communities hearing on runaway, homeless, and missing children.
I would like to thank the Ranking Member, Mr. Platts for his
interest in this important hearing.
I would also like to thank my two colleagues on the Healthy
Families Subcommittee, Mr. Grijalva and Mr. Yarmuth for the dedication
to issues of runaway and homeless children.
Mr. Grijalva has taken the lead and urged the appropriations to
increase funds for runaway and homeless youth programs, with success
this year.
Mr. Yarmuth recently held a town hall to illuminate the issues of
runaway and homeless youth in his district in Kentucky.
We are lucky to have such passionate members on this subcommittee,
and I look forward to hearing from the witnesses from your districts
today.
I would like to welcome a visitor to our hearing today, Mr. Lampson
from Texas. We are glad that you could join us today. Mr. Lampson has
been personally dedicated to this issue to for the last ten years. He
founded the Congressional Missing and Exploited Children Caucus, which
now has over 130 members. Mr. Lampson remains the champion of missing
and exploited children in Congress.
We are here today to learn about runaway, homeless, and missing
children, and gain perspectives on how we can help these young people
as we begin the reauthorization process.
Although there no exact figures for the number of runaway and
homeless youth in our nation, in 2002, 1.6 million young people between
the ages of 12 to 17 ran away from home and slept in exposed or poorly
sheltered locations.
Runaways may find shelter with a friend or member of the community,
but for the children who find themselves on the street, food, shelter,
healthcare, and personal safety needs are not met. Studies of runaway
and homeless youth show high rates of emotional and mental health
problems. According to the Basic Center Program and Transitional Living
Program in 2006, 29 per cent were identified as having mental health
issues upon exiting care.
In addition, many of the young people who enter shelters have a
history with the Juvenile Justice system, on which we had a hearing a
week and a half ago. These issues are all related, as we have a
juvenile correction system that fails to protect youth from shelters
and streets.
Runaway children may fall into the missing children category.
A study funded by the Department of Justice found that nearly all
of the 1.3 million children who went missing in 1999 were reunited with
their caretakers.
We will learn of the grassroots activity on these issues, which
includes collaboration between those who assist runaway and homeless
youth and those who locate missing children. However, not every child
was reunited with caretakers, and that is why we have AMBER alerts, the
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, a task force on
internet crimes against children, and law enforcement training center.
Today's topics are difficult. I am looking forward to learning what
we do for our runaway, homeless, and missing children, and
recommendations on what we can do through reauthorization, to better
serve these young people.
______
Mr. Platts. Thank you, Madam Chair.
I will submit a formal statement for the record, and first
just want to commend you for your continuing leadership on
issues of importance to our youth, throughout our nation and
here, especially dealing with runaway, homeless and missing
children. Your hosting this hearing is going to allow us as a
committee to be that much better informed and better prepared
as we go into the reauthorization process. So thank you for
your leadership.
I also want to reference Mrs. Biggert from Illinois, who is
also co-chair of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus
and has been a great leader on these issues for us on the
Republican side.
And, Judy, we are glad to have you here with us, as well.
To our witnesses, each of you bring what will be invaluable
knowledge to be shared with us. Through your written testimony
that you provided and your oral testimony here today, your life
experiences, your expertise in this area is so critical for us
being better informed.
I look at our job as Congress men and women as being kind
of general practitioner. We need to know a little bit about
everything and, as an issue is moving forward, become experts
on a few things. And, on this committee, dealing with the needs
of our nation's children is one of those areas where we are
charged with being more experts. The way we become more expert
on these issues is through information shared with us, such as
you are going to do today.
So I sincerely thank each of you for being here and for
making time in your schedules to participate to help us have
the knowledge we need to do right by our nation's children and
look forward to your testimony.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
[The statement of Mr. Platts follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Todd Russell Platts, Senior Republican
Member, Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities
Good afternoon. I'd like to welcome each one of you to this hearing
entitled ``Runaway, Homeless, and Missing Children: Perspectives on
Helping the Nation's Vulnerable Youth.'' This is the third hearing in a
series which we have held that examine the programs authorized by the
Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA). The Runaway
and Homeless Youth Act and the Missing Children's Assistance Act are
Titles III and IV respectively of JJDPA.
The Runaway and Homeless Youth Act authorizes three grant programs
to meet the needs of homeless youth. The first, the Basic Center
Program, provides emergency short-term shelter for youth, as well as
food, clothing, counseling, and referrals for health care. The second
program, the Transitional Living Program, assists older homeless youth
in developing skills to promote their independence and prevent future
dependency on social services. The final program authorizes funding for
Maternal Group Homes, which provide a range of services for young
mothers such as childcare, education, job training, and advice on
parenting to promote their well-being and success as a parent.
The Missing Children's Assistance Act coordinates the various
federal missing children's programs though the Department of Justice's
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. In addition, it
authorizes the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children,
which provides assistance to families and law enforcement officials to
help reunite families.
Today, I look forward to hearing from our panel of expert witnesses
and learning what their assessments are of the current programs. In
Pennsylvania, 40 percent of individuals who become homeless during any
given year are youths. It is vital that we provide support early to
homeless youth to get them on a path of responsible independence and
decrease their risk of entering the juvenile justice system.
Finally, I would like to thank all of the panelists were joining us
today. With that, I yield back to Chairwoman McCarthy.
______
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you, Mr. Platts.
And, again, welcome Ms. Biggert. We appreciate you being
here.
And, also, Mr. Lampson is here.
Without objection, all members will have 14 days to submit
additional materials or questions for the hearing record.
Today we will hear from a panel of witnesses.
Your testimonies will proceed in the order of your
introduction.
Our first witness, Mr. Chris--I am going to pronounce this
wrong--``Kazi'' Rolle, comes to us as one of two voices of
experience on our panel about homelessness. However, he will
also have a message of hope and growth to share through his
work on Art Start's Hip-Hop Project, an after-school program
for teens which teaches them to turn their life experiences
into art through hip-hop. He also has worked on the Hip-Hop
Project, which can be seen in the documentary by the same name,
with all profits going to support organizations working with
young people.
Now I wish to recognize the distinguished gentleman from
Arizona, Mr. Grijalva, to introduce the next witness, Ms. Sue
Krahe-Eggleston from Arizona.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you very much, Madam Chair and Ranking
Member Platts, for holding this very important hearing.
Today, it is my distinct honor and pleasure to introduce a
fellow Tucsonan, Sue Krahe-Eggleston, who is director of Our
Family Services back home in Tucson. This service, Our Family,
provides a comprehensive range, Madam Chair, of services
addressing the needs of at-risk youth, children, families,
seniors and works with neighborhoods.
For the past 16 years, Sue, in her capacity as executive
director, has helped define back home for the community the
needs and the attention and the resources that youth in our
community need. For that, we are very grateful for her
leadership and for her very strong advocacy.
She is nationally renowned and recognized as an advocate
for children and family social services and currently serves as
a board member of the National Network for Youth. It is my
honor to introduce her.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and look forward to the
testimony of all our witnesses and welcome them, as well.
I yield back.
Chairwoman McCarthy. And I thank you.
Now I wish to recognize the distinguished gentleman from
Kentucky, Mr. Yarmuth, to introduce the next witness, Mr. Rusty
Booker.
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, Madam Chair.
It is my distinct privilege today to introduce a young man
of incredible strength and courage, Rusty Booker.
I met Rusty about 3 weeks ago at a forum I hosted on
disconnected youth in our mutual hometown of Louisville,
Kentucky. Rusty spoke of his experience with abuse, how he ran
away at age 12 and about his placement in five different foster
homes.
The power of his story comes not simply from the hand that
he was dealt but the way that he played it. So often, when we
think of disconnected youth, we think, often correctly, of
helplessness and victimization.
But this exceptional young man has long since left behind
helplessness and the role of a victim. After a childhood of
neglect, he took control of his life, set himself on a path
toward adult success.
He is determined to get a high school degree and join the
police force. Also, at the age of 17, he has dedicated himself
to helping others who suffered like he did, reaching out to
kids on the street.
Rusty is the success story. I thank him for being here to
share his story. He has demonstrated an awful lot of courage in
his life and today is one more chapter in displaying courage.
I also want to thank Safe Place for ensuring he could be
here today.
I yield back.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you.
Our next witness, Mr. Steve Berg, is the vice president for
programs and policy of the National Alliance to End
Homelessness. Prior to coming to Washington, Mr. Berg spent 14
years as a legal service attorney. Mr. Berg will speak to us
today about what the research on runaway and homeless youth
tells us.
Mr. Yarmuth from Kentucky will also introduce our next
witness, Mr. Ernie Allen.
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you again, Madam Chair. It is my big day
here today. Big day for Louisville, too.
You would be hard pressed to find someone who so
consistently has shown more devotion to the nation's missing
and exploited children than the next witness to be introduced.
My friendship with Ernie Allen goes back many years, to his
time in Louisville. He has always shown a selfless dedication
to serving our community as our city's director of health and
public safety, director of our county crime commission and now,
as founder, president and CEO of the National Center for
Missing & Exploited Children.
He serves all our communities today, having helped recover
well over 100,000 missing children, increasing the recovery
rate from 62 percent in 1990 to 96 percent today. Not despite,
but because of, his success, Ernie knows as well as anyone the
vast challenges still ahead of us.
And so, Madam Chair, it is my honor to introduce a true
humanitarian and an example for all of us, my friend, Ernie
Allen.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you very much.
Now I wish to recognize the distinguished gentleman from
Texas and our guest today, Mr. Lampson, to introduce the next
witness, Ms. Beth Alberts.
Mr. Lampson. Thank you, Madam Chair, and I certainly thank
you for allowing me to participate in the hearing today.
As founder and co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on
Missing and Exploited Children, thanks to the suggestion from
Ernie Allen a number of years back, I really am pleased to be
able to welcome Beth Alberts here.
Beth is the CEO of Texas Center for the Missing. It is a
not-for-profit organization, established in 2000 by Houston
executive Doreen Wise in memory of her son, Gabriel, after his
4-month disappearance and tragic loss. The center has one goal:
to keep vulnerable children and adults safe.
And since July 2001, Ms. Alberts has served as the director
of the Houston Regional AMBER Plan, the largest regional AMBER
Alert system in the country.
Ms. Alberts also serves as the coordinator for both the
Southeast Texas Child Abduction Response team, which is a
multi-jurisdictional, multi-discipline team of 70 different
agencies prepared to respond to endangered/missing child cases,
and the Southeast Texas Search and Rescue Alliance, a
consortium of volunteer search and rescue teams and missing
children's organizations, providing support to law enforcement
agencies and families of the missing.
Ms. Alberts serves as the secretary of the board of AMECO,
Inc.--it is an international consortium of missing children's
organizations--and is a board member of the Harris County
Department of Education's Safe and Secure Schools and sits on
the Children's Assessment Center Partnership Council.
A busy, busy lady, one that we have tremendous appreciation
for her for caring, for her willingness to help and give back
so much of herself and for being here today.
Welcome.
And, thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman McCarthy. And I thank you.
For those of you that have not testified before, you will
see in front of you a lighting system. Each witness will be
able to speak for 5 minutes. The warning lights are green.
Then, when you have yellow, you have a minute left. When it
turns red, I will let you go a little bit, but if you go too
long, you will hear a light tapping, which will get louder.
That goes the same for the members sitting at the dais.
Especially for us, right?
The first witness we want to hear from is Mr. Rolle, if you
would?
STATEMENTS OF CHRIS ``KAZI ROLLE'', CREATOR, ART START'S HIP-
HOP PROJECT
Mr. Rolle. Mike check, one, two, one, two. Peace and love.
My name is Kazi, also known as Chris Rolle. I was born on a
little island called Nassau, in the Bahamas. My mother was a
Jamaican immigrant who was trying to get to America, because it
was easier for a Bahamian to get to America than coming
straight from Jamaica.
At 6 months of age, she left on that journey and left me
with her friend. Her friend and her husband were very abusive.
And I lived there for 4 years. And at 4 years old, I was found
wandering the streets, and, subsequently, the Department of
Social Services in the Bahamas took me out of that home and
placed me in the Children's Emergency Hostel for orphans.
Catherine Brown, who was a social worker there, she and I
developed a relationship, and in 1982 I was fostered by her and
her family. And the adjustment was very difficult. I had
numerous behavioral problems. I always like to say she tried to
give me heaven and I gave her hell.
But she trucked on with me, and I was officially adopted in
1988, on November 4th, still posing a lot of behavioral
challenges. And the family didn't have the know-how or the
resources to provide me with the emotional healing and help
that I needed.
And, in 1990, I was forced to have to go back to the
orphanage. And in the orphanage, all the boys in my room, we
got in trouble and we were asked to leave the orphanage. Some
kids were adopted, and I went on to a psychiatric ward for
unruly children.
While I was there, the psychiatrist, his analysis came to
the conclusion that a lot of the stuff I was dealing with was
based on the fact that I missed my mother. I couldn't
understand why these strangers were doing so much for me and my
own mother could give me away.
So we contacted the American embassy, sent a letter to her
and found that she wanted me. We sent a one-way ticket, and I
came here on December 22nd, to America, in 1990.
We had a tumultuous reunion, and I found myself 2 years
later on the streets of Brooklyn. Wherever I laid my head was
my home, and got in a lot of trouble.
I was involved in street pharmaceutical corporations and
family organizations that were one color, if you understand
what I am saying. And they were my family.
After being incarcerated a few times, I decided that I
needed to get my life together, and I leaned on the people and
the resources that I knew. I was a part of a theater company
called Tomorrow's Future Theater Company, Elaine Robinson, and
she helped me to get into a school called Public School
Repertory Company, which was a last-chance high school for kids
who were interested in the arts.
There I found a guy by the name of Scott Rosenberg, who
founded an organization called Art Start, which was an arts
education organization. And he just gave me the opportunity to
just use my voice and use music and art. And I found that it
was really a healing tool, to be able to put my life and all
the things I was going through in music and art.
I created a play called ``Brooklyn Story,'' and I shared it
with people across the tri-state, and it moved a lot of young
people. And just to put it out there, I think that was the
beginning of my healing and a change for my life.
Scott also supported me in creating my own program, because
I made a commitment that I have got to give back. I understand
what these kids are going through and I understand the journey,
now. And I need to give back the same way that there were
people along the way that took the time out to give to me.
In 1995, I appeared on numerous shows for just gaining all
these awards and recognition for doing all of this work. In
2000, I made it all the way to the Oprah Winfrey Show, to
basically just say that this young brother has overcome some
obstacles and was once homeless and now speaks at Harvard and
across the world about how hip-hop can really heal and change
lives.
In 2007, this year, May 11th, a movie was released,
executive produced by Bruce Willis and Queen Latifah, that
chronicled my journey and the creation of this program, and a
lot of lives were moved based on that.
I am here today to just basically say that the step-
parents, the organizations like Art Start, like the Hip-Hop
Project, Network for Youth, all of the programs across the
country that are trying to really reach our missing children,
kids like myself, who were homeless and living in orphanages,
they need the resources.
They need the resources to do this work, because I could
have been that kid crawling through somebody's window or
robbing somebody, because when you don't have, you have to try
to get it by any means necessary. And the only reason there was
a change in my life, because there were programs and there were
people and institutions that had some type of resources and a
heart to try to help me.
And those people need the resources and help to continue to
do that work, because all young people need a place to call
home.
[The statement of Mr. Rolle follows:]
Prepared Statement of Chris ``Kazi'' Rolle, Creator,
Art Start's Hip-Hop Project
I was born in a little Island called Nassau in the Bahamas. My
mother was a Jamaican immigrant who was trying to get to Amercia via
the Bahamas , due the fact there were less obstacles for Bahamians
seeking to come to United States than there were for people coming from
here country.
At 6months old, my mother left me in the care of friends to venture
to the United States in hopes of opportunity. She had left three kids
before with my grandmother in Jamaica. She never returned for me. In
1980, the Bahamian Department of Social Services substantiated reports
that I was living in an abusive situation. At four years old, I was
found wandering in the streets of and was subsequently
institutionalized at the Children's Emergency Hostel for orphans.
Catherine Brown, a social worker at the hostel, developed a
relationship with me and in 1982, I was fostered by here and her
family. The adjustment was very difficult--they said that I presented
numerous behavioral problems at home and in school, as I could not
understand how strangers could love me when my own mother abandoned
him. Thank fully Mrs. Brown trucked on. I was officially adopted on
November 4th 1988.
I still got into a lot of trouble and posed ongoing challenges. Due
to lack of the proper resource to help me with my emotional issues, the
family came their wits end in dealing with me. In 1990, I was placed in
the Ranfurly Home for Children. While in the Ranfurly Home, I was
placed in a psychiatric ward for unruly children. It was determined by
the Department of Social Services that my challenges were directly
related to my early childhood experiences--as a result, the American
Embassy was contacted to locate my biological mother and on December
21, 1990, reunited with her in New York City, USA.
From 1990-1992, I's relationship with my biological mother was
highly tumultuous. By 1992, at age 16, I found himself homeless once
again, on the streets of New York City. From 1992-1994, Wherever I laid
my head was my home. Gangs were my family. Warm train station was my
apartment. Street Pharmaceutical Corporations became was my employers.
Five discount was how I shopped for clothing. It was all bout survival.
I found my self incarserated numerous time. I was on a road to nowhere.
All the people who said that I wouldn't amount to nothing were being
proved right.
In 1994, at age 18, I finally decided to get my life together. I
enrolled in Public School Repertory Company, a ``last chance''
performing arts high school and I discovered that I had a passion for
music and theatre, and realized the power of the arts as an outlet for
healing. I wrote a play based on my life story called a Brooklyn Story.
At Public School Repertory, I connected with Art Start--an arts-
based youth organization he also began writing, directing and acting
for the award winning urban theater company, Tomorrow's Future. My
play, A Brooklyn Story, earned me a New York Governor's Citation and a
Martin Luther King, Jr. Award. In 1995, I received the CBS Fulfilling
the Dream Award for my play and my work in schools and homeless
shelters advocating education and drug abuse prevention.
In 1999, having personally experienced the healing power of the
arts, I chose to dedicate my life to providing a similar outlet for
under-served youth. I created The Hip Hop Project, an award-winning
program that connects New York City teens to music industry
professionals to write, produce and market their own compilation album
on youth issues. The program attracted Russell Simmons and Bruce
Willis, whose support contributed largely the success of the program.
In 2000 I was featured on the Oprah Winfrey Show in a segment called
People Who Are Using Their Lives. In 2005 he passed the torch of
leadership of the Hip Hop Project one of my students, and joined the
organization's Board of Trustees.
I say all of this to say that I was that kid. Homeless. No where to
go. Pocket had rabbit ears. I had nothing. I was at the bottom. Rock
bottom. Being homeless. Not have a family. Not having resources,
influenced my choices. If no one was there to give it to me, I am going
to have to take it. Steal it. Whatever. By any means necessary. You
feel me?
We need more support for the programs like Art Start, Tomorrow's
Future theater group, The Hip Hop Project and all of the wonderful
people who take their time to help people like myself.
We also need to get the word out in a big way to caring community
members, parents, and young people themselves that millions of youth
experience homelessness in the United States each year. All of the step
and extend family members who step up to the plate, they need all the
support, resources and services available to assist them. These
programs, families and those working to bring about awareness
desperately need federal funding, cause these are expensive
undertakings. Every youth in the nation deserves a place to call home.
______
[Additional material submitted by Mr. Rolle follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
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Chairwoman McCarthy. I thank you for that testimony.
Mrs. Eggleston?
STATEMENT OF SUE KRAHE-EGGLESTON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, OUR
FAMILY SERVICES
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Good afternoon.
In addition to serving as the Our Family executive
director, I am also a member of the board of directors of the
National Network for Youth, the nation's leading organization
on youth homelessness. I am testifying on behalf of both
organizations today.
Our Family delivers the full continuum of runaway and
homeless youth programs, including a street outreach program, a
drop-in center, a shelter and family reunification program for
minor-age youth, a transitional living program for older youth
and supervised apartments for homeless young families.
My agency could not offer this programming without the
federal RHY funds. Arizona only appropriates a small amount of
targeted money for homeless youth, but many states do nothing.
The national system of support for this population is wholly
reliant on federal funds. Accordingly, RHY must be
reauthorized.
In addition, Congress should raise authorization and
appropriation levels, both to start new programs in underserved
communities, as well as provide a cost of living increase to
current grantees, which have operated at the same funding
levels year after year after year, despite inflation.
The causal factors for homelessness among young people in
Tucson match those across the country. Our agency has supported
youth in all manners of dire circumstances, and I want to give
you some examples.
There is a 14-year-old boy named John, who felt safer
living in a tunnel than with his abusive parents. Then, there
is a 16-year-old gay young person by the name of Paul dropped
off at our shelter by his mom, with his belongings in a plastic
bag, saying to us, ``Take him.''
Then think about Angie, a young mom standing outside the
hospital in Tucson with her four-pound little infant, not
knowing where she was going to go. Then, lastly, there is
Precious, a 21-year-old mom of two, living in her car because
the children's father had been incarcerated.
These are all stories of Tucson, but they could be stories
of any community across our country.
Yet we also see incredible resilience in our youth, young
people whose running away is an expression of their most basic
right to survive, young people seeking better options, young
people craving for caring adults and supportive peers for the
first time, or longing to mend those old family ties.
Our Family helps youth tap their inherent strength and
mobilize those assets for the youth's recovery and ultimate
well-being.
Now, turning to policy considerations, my written statement
includes 18 of the RHY reauthorization recommendations that the
National Network of Youth has put together. They are the
outcome of a consultation process we took with the grantee
community.
I will mention just two. First, we recommend the act
require a process for developing performance standards for RHY
programs so that all grantees would work towards common
performance expectations. Secondly, RHY grantees seek a process
to request reconsideration of unsuccessful applications when
there is a good cause.
We look forward to working with Representative Yarmuth and
the subcommittee leadership in developing the RHY
reauthorization bill. To complement RHY, we call on Congress to
pass measures that respond to the needs of homeless youth,
which surpass the scope of the RHY.
Among them, Congress should pass Representative Biggert's
forthcoming Homeless Education Bill. Also, Congress should pass
H.R. 601, the Homeless Student Aid Bill.
RHY programs have never intended to be the tools to end
youth homelessness. The act forms the safety net for
unaccompanied youth and must be continued, with increased
funding. But if we are to prevent and end youth homelessness,
we must go way beyond RHY.
We need more publicly funded resources for family substance
abuse, mental health and strengthening of family services. We
need a child welfare systems that permits youth to remain in
care until they research the developmental age of adulthood,
rather than the artificial legal age of majority.
We need to support reentry of youthful offenders, such as
the one that Representative Grijalva will be proposing.
Permanent housing targeted to youth is also required.
We are pleased to support Representative Hinojosa's
forthcoming Place to Call Home Act. It contains the solutions I
just identified and much, much more. It is a policy blueprint
for preventing and ending youth homelessness. We call on
Congress to follow its design.
Youth-serving organizations, young people and concerned
community members will continue to fight for the day when there
will be indeed a place to call home for all youth. Until then,
the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act must remain available for
the millions of young people in America each year without a
safe place to live.
And I thank you.
[The statement of Ms. Krahe-Eggleston follows:]
Prepared Statement of Sue Krahe-Eggleston, Executive Director,
Our Family
Part I--About Our Family
Sue Krahe-Eggleston is the Executive Director of Our Family, a
community-based organization in Tucson, Pima County Arizona which
offers services in four main areas, including youth services. Youth
programs include street outreach, youth center, shelter, and
transitional living for runaway and homeless youth.
Part II--Unaccompanied Youth Primer
Runaway and homeless youth are the most vulnerable of our nation's
disconnected youth. Between one million and three million U.S. youth
experience an unaccompanied situation annually. Unaccompanied youth
become detached from parents, guardians and other caring adults due to
a combination of family and community stressors. Data specific to Pima
County also point to large numbers of homeless, at-risk youth in the
region, with the same causal factors and risk factors as their peers
nationally.
Part III--Runaway and Homeless Youth Act Reauthorization
The federal Runaway and Homeless Youth Act (RHYA) has established
funding streams to support outreach, family reunification, shelter, and
transitional living programs targeted to unaccompanied youth, all in an
effort to provide a basic level of support for these vulnerable young
people regardless of the state in which they are living.
Federal RHYA programs are a substantial and reliable funding stream
to Our Family and other RHYA grantees. For organizations in many
states, RHYA funds are the only resources available explicitly to serve
unaccompanied youth. RHYA is the sole federal law targeted solely to
unaccompanied youth. Without RHYA, many unaccompanied youth in
communities across the nation would go completely without support.
Our Family urges Congress to reauthorize and strengthen the
programs and authorities of the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act. We
offer 18 recommendations for RHYA reauthorization. These
recommendations were identified after an intensive consultation process
with the RHYA grantee community convened by the National Network for
Youth, the membership association of RHYA agencies.
Part IV--Beyond RHYA
The Runaway and Homeless Youth Act, while a critical federal law
that must be continued and fully funded, is no substitute for the
aggressive interventions necessary to eliminate the very factors
causing unaccompanied situations among millions of the nation's youth,
or to respond to the resources and services needs of currently
unaccompanied youth that surpass the scope and purpose of the Act. We
call for action in juvenile justice, elementary and secondary
education, postsecondary education, workforce investment, and other
areas. We support the Place to Call Home Act.
Part I--About Our Family
Our Family makes Southern Arizona a better place to live, to grow
up, and to grow older with a continuum of services to people in every
stage of life. Last year, more than 29,000 at-risk children, youth,
families, seniors and disabled adults used our services, which include
counseling, education and mediation, housing, mediation and help for
people in crisis.
Our Family provides services in four main areas--counseling,
education and prevention, youth services, and services to older and
disabled adults.
Our youth services include:
Teens in Transition helps homeless and near-homeless youth
13-21 stay in school and gain the skills to succeed, through case
management, counseling, education and career planning, housing, and
help with basic needs.
Reunion House offers brief-stay shelter, respite and
family reunification services to youth ages 12-17, including systems
youth who are awaiting placement and homeless youth who want to come
off the street.
CommonUnity is a complex of safe, supervised apartments
and a community of support for homeless young mothers ages 18-21 with
up to two children. Life-skills classes and case management help
residents break cycles of poverty and crisis and create a support
network among themselves.
Skrappy's is a drug- and alcohol-free youth center. Young
people from all backgrounds participate in youth-led media arts and
theater projects, dance classes, health fairs, volunteer projects and
community activism, as well as concerts.
Street Outreach goes where homeless, runaway and street
youth gather and helps them come off the streets.
Of the more than 29,000 individuals who used Our Family's services
last year, six percent were age 12 or under, 54 percent were 13-17, 16
percent were 18-21, 18 percent were 22-59, and 6 percent were 60 or
older.
Our Family is a $4.2 million organization with 100 employees, as
well as an active corps of volunteers. It is accredited by the Council
on Accreditation of Services for Families and Children Inc. and
licensed as a behavioral healthcare institution by the Arizona
Department of Health Services. Services are available in English and
Spanish.
Our Family, created in October 2005 by the merger of Family
Counseling Agency and OUR TOWN, has a combined history of more than 75
years of service to the greater Tucson community.
Our Family invites Members of Congress and Congressional staff in
Arizona or visiting the Tucson area to visit our agency. For more
information, please visit www.ourfamilyservices.org or call (520) 323-
1708.
Part II--Unaccompanied Youth Primer
Unaccompanied Youth Basics
Runaway and homeless youth are the most vulnerable of our nation's
``disconnected'' youth. We refer to these two populations collectively
as ``unaccompanied youth.'' Like other disconnected youth,
unaccompanied youth experience separation from one or more of the key
societal institutions of family, school, community, and the workplace.
Their disconnection is accentuated by their lack of a permanent place
to live, which is not only disruptive in and of itself, but also
indicative of the larger socioeconomic instability they are
experiencing.
Between one million and three million of our nation's youth
experience an unaccompanied situation annually, according to various
estimates derived from government studies and data sets. Some of these
estimates do not include young adults ages 18 and older within their
scope.
Unaccompanied youth become detached from parents, guardians and
other caring adults--legally, economically, and emotionally--due to a
combination of family and community stressors.
Family Stressors--Many of our nation's unaccompanied youth are
compelled to leave their home environments prematurely due to severe
family conflict, physical, sexual, or emotional abuse by an adult in
the home, parental neglect, parental substance abuse, or parental
mental illness. For other youth, the values and traditions with which
their families operate prescribe that the young person separate
economically from the family unit upon reaching of majority or after
graduation, in some cases regardless of whether the youth is actually
prepared for independent adulthood. Others are expelled from the home
due to parental inability to accept the sexual orientation, parenting
status, mental or addictive disability, or normal adolescent behavior
of their child. For still other young people, their families are simply
too poor to continue to bear the financial burden of providing for the
youth's basic needs. Others are abandoned as their parents are
incarcerated. Youth in families that are experiencing homelessness may
be separated from the family unit--and become homeless on their own--so
that emergency shelter or domestic violence services can be secured for
the remaining family members, or to squeeze most of the family into
means of habitation that are too small for all of its members.
Community Stressors--State custodial systems--including child
welfare, juvenile justice, mental health, addiction treatment, and
developmental disabilities--which have responsibility for ensuring the
safety and protection of children and youth who are not properly cared
for by parents and guardians--are failing in general to accept older
youth into their custody due to financial limitations and policy
disincentives. Many of the young people who do come in contact with
public custodial systems are not adequately prepared for independence
and residential stability during their period of custody nor provided
an aftercare arrangement to support them after the custodial
relationship has ended. Many of these young people have no home
environment to which to return. Youth with mental illness, addiction,
and other disabilities face discrimination when searching for an
independent living arrangement.
Many unaccompanied youth who are psychosocially prepared for
independent adulthood are not economically ready for self-sufficiency.
Inadequate educational preparation, lack of employment skills, short or
non-existent work histories, language barriers, and undocumented
immigration status all contribute to the relegation of many youth to
unemployment or to low-wage jobs--neither of which generate income
sufficient for acquiring affordable housing.
Policy barriers also stand in the way of permanency for
unaccompanied youth. In some jurisdictions, youth below the age of
majority are prohibited from entering into leases or other contracts on
their own behalf. ``One strike'' laws prohibit individuals with
criminal histories from residency in public and assisted housing and
prohibit juvenile ex-offenders from returning to their families. And,
federal, state, and local public and assisted housing programs rank
young people low, if at all, among their priority populations for
assistance.
Regardless of the causal factor, unaccompanied youth, when left to
fend for themselves without support, experience poor health,
educational, and workforce outcomes which imperil their prospects for
positive adulthood. This results in their long-term dependency on or
involvement in public health, social service, emergency assistance, and
corrections systems.
Youth Homelessness in Arizona and in Pima County
Youth Homelessness in Arizona
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,
National Extranet Optimized Runaway and Homeless Youth Management
Information System (NEO-RHYMIS), 943 youth were involved with Runaway
and Homeless Youth Act emergency (BCP) and transitional (TLP) programs
in Arizona in the 2004-2005 federal fiscal year. Of this population, 67
percent were white, 6 percent were American Indian, 0.42 percent were
Asian, 10 percent were African American, 0.32 percent were Native
Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and 16 percent did not report
racial information. Within the population of those reporting ethnicity
(804), 14 percent were Hispanic. 42 percent were male and 58 percent
were female. Girls are more prevalent in every age group of youth
except for youth under the age of 12, where there are more boys than
girls. The vast majority (81 percent) of Arizona youth who receive
services through a BCP or TLP in that same time period entered the
program from a private residence; more than half of these youth came
from the home of a parent or legal guardian. Two percent of youth came
from correctional institutions, two percent came from residential
programs, four percent came from other shelters, two percent came from
other living situations, less than one percent came from the military,
and 10 percent came from the streets. 53 percent were attending school
regularly, and 3 percent had already graduated or obtained a GED. The
rest were not regularly attending school. 24 youth seeking BCP or TLP
services in Arizona were turned away during this time period.
Youth Homelessness in Pima County
Data specific to Pima County also point to the large numbers of
homeless, at-risk youth in our region. Pima County demonstrates a
number of factors that indicate significant need for the proposed
services. First, there is a high number of runaways in our county. In
2003, 3,036 runaways were reported in Pima County, accounting for 20
percent of all juvenile crime reported. This number amounts to two
percent of Pima County's total juvenile population. Second, runaways
face a pervasive drug economy in our region. The county lies 70 miles
from the Mexican border in a high impact drug corridor. Drugs flow
across the border and are distributed nationwide. Runaway and homeless
youth, always at risk for involvement in drug use and drug sales, are
at an especially high risk in Pima County.
Tucson's need for Runaway and Homeless Youth services is further
demonstrated by a Homeless Youth Survey administered in the spring of
2005 by the Tucson Planning Council for the Homeless Youth Committee
and Arizona State University's School of Social Work. Information was
gathered through 30 minute in-person and telephone interviews using an
18 page questionnaire that covered the following domains: demographics;
housing and living situations; education; employment and income
sources; sexual orientation, practices and risk behaviors and abuse;
physical health, mental health, and substance abuse; use of, access to,
and knowledge about community services, modes of transportation, social
networks and personal issues; and personal/familial legal concerns. In
total 458 surveys were completed. The information obtained indicates,
from the youth themselves, what are the most pressing issues for
Tucson's runaway and homeless youth. (Homeless in Tucson by LeCroy and
Milligan, 2005.)
Homeless youth interviewed ranged from 13-18 years old and were
predominantly Hispanic/Latino/a or white, heterosexual, non-married and
female. The majority of youth (76 percent) lived in Tucson before
becoming homeless. Over 60 percent of the youth had been homeless at
least twice during their young lives, with an average 3.5 times in
2005, up from 1.92 times in 2002. Over half of the youth had spent at
least one year of their life homeless and, at the time of the survey,
half had been homeless for more than 180 days. The average age at which
youth first became homeless was 14. Nine percent self-reported
homosexuality and 7 percent reported bisexuality. The main reasons
cited for leaving home the first time included running away because of
problems (24 percent), being removed by Child Protective Services (21
percent), and being kicked out or told to leave the home (20 percent).
Over 75 percent of the youth said they would not continue to be
homeless if they had a choice.
Forty percent of the youth spent the night prior to the interview
at a friend's house, 14 percent spent the night in an unstable
environment (e.g., park, wash, car, street, backyard), and 13 percent
spent the night at a family member's house. Notably, 10 percent of the
youth did not know where they would be sleeping the night of the
interview. Half of the youth (50 percent) were currently enrolled in
school or some other type of educational/training program, down
slightly from 2002 when 56 percent of youth surveyed were enrolled in
school and/or an educational program. Of those not currently attending
school, the main reasons reported were lack of a permanent address and/
or difficulties with transportation.
Many of the youth had experienced significant trauma before age 18,
and were still suffering its effects. 63 percent reported experiencing
verbal/emotional abuse, 52 percent said they had witnessed domestic
violence occur in their household, 50 percent reported witnessing drug/
alcohol abuse, 44 percent reported experiencing physical abuse, 42
percent experienced neglect, and 25 percent reported being sexually
abused (19 percent of females, 6 percent of males) before the . When
asked whether abuse/neglect was ever a factor in their leaving home, 60
percent of the youth said yes. Alarmingly, 28 percent said that they
had attempted suicide in the past, up from 19.5 percent in 2002. These
statistics substantiate the tenuous, high-risk situation that faces RHY
in Tucson, the risk factors they face for having unsuccessful
adulthoods, and the critical nature of getting services to them.
Our Family's Homeless Youth Profile
Data collected on homeless clients who received case management
services at Our Family between 7/1/05 and 6/30/06 (n=82) reflect
similar patterns to the County and the State. The average number of
runaway episodes was four. The current status of youth entering the
program included: 35 percent at home; 35 percent runaway; 17 percent
homeless; 9 percent throwaway, 8 percent other/street. Substance use
was a prevalent problem indicated at intake: 35 percent smoke
cigarettes; 55 percent use beer, wine or wine coolers; 45 percent use
hard liquor; 35 percent had 5 or more servings of alcohol on the same
occasion; 40 percent use marijuana; 10 percent use cocaine; 10 percent
use methamphetamines, 5 percent use over the counter drugs above
recommended dosage; 2 percent use inhalants; 40 percent use alcohol and
marijuana on the same occasion; 5 percent used two or more drugs
(excluding alcohol and tobacco) on the same occasion; 30 percent have
been asked to sell drugs and 12 percent have sold drugs. Approximately
30 percent of the youth said they had been physically abused by a
parent or guardian. 5 percent reported being sexually abused by parents
and another 12 percent reported being sexually abused by a parent's
partner. Almost all of them listed emotional abuse, and 30 percent said
that a household member abused alcohol or drugs. In addition 30 percent
had poor grades in school, 60 percent had been charged with a
misdemeanor, 5 percent with a felony, and 26 percent were depressed.
Trends in Homeless Youth Population Observed by Our Family
Our Family's Reunion House Basic Center Program (RH) has seen
double the number of youth 12-17 who are school dropouts at intake.
These young people have been absent from educational services often for
a semester or more and as such are a grade or two behind their peers. A
number of these youth profess to have no desire to continue their
education, seeing school as a useless and stressful environment.
Our Family's Teens In Transition TLP (TNT) has noted a continuing
high demand from couples coming in for services where the female is
significantly younger than the male. Because of the male partner's age
these couples are unable to access housing options and homeless couples
services targeted to underage youth. There appears to be no defined
reason for this shift but it is noteworthy and provides a considerable
challenge when attempting to provide housing for these individuals and
their children.
Our Family's CommonUnity TLP (CUP) has continued to see increasing
numbers of 22-24 year old mothers and their infant children on street
who are coming in to seek services. CUP must turn these mothers away,
as they are too old for the program. They are referred out to other
providers who often have considerable waiting lists or are limited in
their effectiveness with younger adults. Domestic and Relationship
Violence issues remain prevalent, with approximately 92 percent of the
young parents coming into CUP dealing with the effects of relationship
and domestic violence in their lives.
The Street Outreach Program (SO) continued to see an increase in
the number of youth dealing with death or loss of a parent or guardian
in their lives due to substance abuse. In many cases these issues
directly relate to the initial destabilization of the youth with their
families.
The Homeless Youth Services at Our Family continued to see a steady
increase in the numbers of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender
(LGBT) youth requesting services. This is due in part to increased
awareness through outreach to LGBT organizations as well as
establishing a positive rapport and reputation among LGBT youth. This
also highlights the number of LGBT youth who run away, are kicked out,
or who otherwise become homeless and need the services we offer.
CommonUnity and Teens in Transition Programs have seen increases in
the number of parenting youth that have inquired about transitional/
independent living services.
Tucson youth service providers also report an explosion of
methamphetamine use--a trend mirrored nationally.
Barriers Facing Pima County Homeless Youth
The Homeless Youth Committee of the Pima County, Arizona Plan to
End Homelessness has identified the following major barriers that
impede homeless youth in their transition back to permanent housing and
to successful adulthoods. (Plan to End Homelessness, Pima County,
Arizona, Spring 2006.)
While Tucson's youth services are extensive, they are not
enough to meet these needs. Homeless youth ages 18 through 24 have few,
if any, emergency and transitional housing options. Whether they are
``legally'' adults (i.e. over 18) or not, Pima County homeless youth
are at best uncomfortable, and at worst subject to victimization, in
adult shelters or service environments.
Youth of all ages have almost no affordable addiction
treatment options: in part because there is little funding to serve
them, in part because agencies which do offer youth treatment are
oversubscribed, and in part because youth simply do not feel
comfortable engaging in therapeutic environments with older adults.
LGBT youth, many of whom have already been victimized,
have no dedicated, safe emergency or transitional housing alternatives.
And all youth making a transition to independence need
serious--and now seriously underfunded--life and job skills training,
adequate housing, and often counseling.
Our Family has identified the following additional barriers, based
on our observation of the daily struggles of our residents and program
participants:
Some homeless youth and young adults are unable to access
HUD-funded homeless assistance services because their homeless living
arrangement, usually ``couch surfing,'' does not qualify as
``homeless'' under the HUD definition.
Many of our participants are unable to pursue the
postsecondary education and training they desire--and that is
imperative to move them to high-wage employment in high-growth
sectors--because they must forego education in order to maintain
employment, which is their sole source of income.
Homeless young families expend considerable resources on
childcare; subsidized child care slots are precious in our community.
Permanent housing to which our youth may transition is in
short supply. Youth and young adults are low on priority lists, or even
the community's radar screen as a subpopulation in need of housing
assistance.
Youth access to mental health services is a major
challenge; there is simply insufficient publicly funded mental health
treatment and support options for adolescents and for adults.
Reentry of youth offenders into the community is uneven,
and certainly far behind in program development compared to the system
of support for transitioning foster youth.
Runaway and Homeless Youth Act Program Basics
The federal government, through the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act
(RHYA) has established funding streams to support outreach, family
reunification, shelter, and transitional living programs targeted to
unaccompanied youth, all in an effort to provide a basic level of
support for these vulnerable young people regardless of the state in
which they are living. RHYA programs have the purposes of preventing
victimization and ensuring basic safety of unaccompanied youth and
ensuring their access to family reunification, housing, education,
employment training, health care, and other social services.
The RHYA Basic Center Program (BCP) provides grants to community-
based, faith-based, and public organizations to support family
strengthening efforts, including counseling, home-based services for
families with children at risk of separation from the family, and
emergency and respite shelter (no greater than 15 days) for youth under
the .
The RHYA Transitional Living Program (TLP) provides competitive
grants to community-based, faith-based, and public organizations to
support longer-term residential services (up to 18 months) and life
skill supports to youth ages 16 through 21 who are unable to return
home safely. TLPs assist youth in successfully transitioning into
responsible adulthood and self-sufficiency and connecting them to
education, workforce, and other supports. This program includes
maternity group homes, which are residential arrangements for pregnant
and parenting youth who are fleeing from abusive homes. Maternity group
homes assist these youth in accessing housing, prenatal care, parenting
classes, child care, and educational services.
The RHYA Street Outreach Program (SOP) provides competitive grants
to community-based and faith-based organizations to support street-
based outreach and education to homeless children and youth who have
been sexually abused or who are at risk of commercial sexual
exploitation.
RHYA basic centers and transitional living projects serve nearly
50,000 youth in all 50 states. RHYA street outreach projects make over
2.3 million contacts with youth annually.
The Runaway and Homeless Youth Act also authorizes funds for the
National Runaway Switchboard, a national communications system for
runaway youth and their families; regional training and technical
assistance for grantees; an information clearinghouse; a management
information system; research and evaluation; and peer monitoring of
grantees.
Congress first enacted the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act in 1974
as Title III of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act. It
was most recently reauthorized in 2003. RHYA programs are administered
by the Family and Youth Services Bureau within the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services (HHS).
Part III--Runaway and Homeless Youth Act Reauthorization
Need for the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act
Federal RHYA programs are a substantial and reliable funding stream
to Our Family and other RHYA grantees. For organizations in many
states, RHYA funds are the only resources available to serve
unaccompanied youth explicitly. More important, they are the sole
federal programs targeted to unaccompanied youth. Without RHYA, many
unaccompanied youth in communities across the nation would go
completely without support.
More RHYA Capacity is Needed across the Nation. The basic living
needs of too many of our nation's unaccompanied youth are not being met
through state and local child welfare systems or permanent housing and
homeless assistance programs. Furthermore, few states have established
funding streams targeted to unaccompanied youth. RHYA basic center and
transitional living projects served approximately 55,000 youth in FY
2005, yet estimates of the U.S. unaccompanied youth population are one
million at minimum, suggesting that at least approximately 950,000 of
the nation's unaccompanied youth are not able to access RHYA services.
Effectiveness of the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act
RHYA Projects are Cost Effective Alternatives to Custodial Care and
Arrest. The average cost of serving a youth in a transitional living
project of $11,877 is less than half the minimum cost of serving youth
through the child welfare or juvenile justice systems, with annual
costs ranging from $25,000--$55,000 per youth depending on the state.
Law enforcement officials are the referral source for 20 percent of
youth entering basic centers.
RHYA Projects Use Federal Funds to Leverage Community Resources.
RHYA projects succeed due to partnerships created among families,
schools, community-based organizations, faith communities, law
enforcement agencies, businesses and volunteers.
RHYA Projects Raise the Achievement Level of Unaccompanied Youth.
The last federally-funded evaluations of the Basic Center Program and
the Transitional Living Program found that they produced positive
outcomes for participating youth in the following areas:
Family Strengthening
Basic center youth reported lessened rates of family
conflict and parental physical abuse.
Transitional living youth reported that the program helped
them better manage communication and maintain positive relationships
with their families.
Education
School participation among basic center youth doubled
after basic center services commenced, compared to the participation
rate 30 days prior to accessing a basic center.
The proportion of youth in transitional living projects
attending college was three times that of homeless youth who were not
in a TLP.
Employment
Employment rates of youth in basic centers increased by 24
percent.
60 percent of transitional living youth were employed
part-time or full-time, compared to 41 percent of homeless youth not
participating in a TLP.
Runaway and Homeless Youth Act Reauthorization Recommendations
The Runaway and Homeless Youth Act is scheduled to sunset in 2008
and merits extension. In addition, new issues affecting unaccompanied
youth and unaccompanied youth service providers have emerged that
require a Congressional response. Our Family urges Congress to
reauthorize and strengthen the programs and authorities of the Runaway
and Homeless Youth Act in a timely manner. We offer the following
recommendations for RHYA reauthorization. These recommendations were
identified after an intensive consultation process with the RHYA
grantee community.
Funding
1. Reauthorize and increase authorization levels for Runaway and
Homeless Youth Act programs. The runaway and homeless youth
consolidated account should be authorized at the $200 million level in
FY 2009 and ``such sums as may be necessary'' in each of FY 2010
through FY 2013. The runaway prevention account should be authorized at
the $30 million level in FY 2009 and ``such sums as may be necessary''
in each of FY 2010 through FY 2013.
Funding levels for RHYA programs are inadequate for meeting the
need for such services. With estimates of unaccompanied youth at the
low-end of one million, and the RHYA basic center and transitional
living programs reaching only 55,000 youth annual, at least 900,000 of
the nation's unaccompanied youth do not have access to the supports and
services that RHYA programs offer. For these unserved youth, their
unaccompanied episodes are prolonged; they are at heightened risk of
victimization, poor health, school failure, and unemployment; and they
are thwarted from attaining safe, productive, and healthy adulthoods.
2. Increase the RHYA Basic Center Program allotments for small
states and for territories. The minimum BCP allotment for states with
small youth populations should be increased to $200,000. The maximum
BCP allotment for U.S. territories should be increased to at least
$100,000.
BCP formula allotments to states with small youth populations are
limited to $100,000. This amount makes it difficult for HHS to fund
more than one basic center in each such state, even though the
geographic swath of many such states tends to be wide. BCP allotments
to territories are limited to $40,000. This amount is hardly enough to
act even as seed money for basic centers in territories to leverage
non-RHYA funds.
3. Permit HHS to redistribute unexpended BCP funds to other BCP
applicants for a one-year grant period, after which time the amount
should be returned to the BCP general pool for re-allocation. RHYA
grantees and applicants would benefit from greater transparency and
standardization in the manner in which HHS reallocates ``unrequested''
BCP allotments from states lacking applicants to ``excess'' BCP
applicants from states with qualified applicants requesting a total of
funds that exceed the state's allotment.
RHYA Project Admission and Length of Stay Criteria
4. Limit basic centers to providing shelter services to individuals
who are years of age, with an exception that basic centers located in
states with child-caring facility licensure laws that permit a higher
age may serve up to the age permitted by the state law. RHYA grantees
and applicants would benefit from clarification on the maximum age of
youth permitted to receive emergency shelter through a basic center.
The current RHYA permits basic centers to provide emergency shelter to
youth ``not more than ,'' which some interpret to mean ages 17 and
under and others interpret to mean through age 18. To resolve confusion
in the field, we recommend that the maximum age for emergency shelter
services through a BCP be extended to youth ``who are years of age,''
which is in alignment with the maximum age used in the formula for
allocating BCP funds. However, grantees should be given the discretion
to serve youth over age 17 if the child-caring facility licensure law
in which the basic center is located permits a higher age.
5. Allow extensions in length of stay in basic centers from 14 days
to up to 30 days and in transitional living projects from 18 months
through 24 months, on a case-by-case basis, provided that the state
child-caring facility licensure law applicable to the basic center
permits a longer length of stay. RHYA grantees report difficulty in
ensuring safe exists for some of their program participants within the
timeframes required by current law. The grantees then find themselves
in the situation of either keeping the participant at the basic center
or transitional living project with other than federal funds, or
triggering an unsafe exit by the youth. Providing grantees limited
flexibility to keep some of their participants in service beyond the
target exit period would allow a greater level of individualized
support for those unaccompanied youth at greatest risk of unsafe
program exits.
RHYA Applicant Eligibility, Use of Funds, and Funding
Conditions
6. Add public entities as eligible applicants for Street Outreach
Program funds. Eligibility for the Street Outreach Program (SOP) is
limited to private nonprofit organizations, whereas public
organizations as well as private nonprofit organizations may apply for
BCP and TLP funds. Extending SOP eligibility to public organizations
would provide public entities receiving either BCP and/or TLP funds the
opportunity to build a longer continuum of RHYA services by also
competing for SOP funds.
7. Clarify that RHYA funds are to be distributed to organizations
and not directly to program participants. The President's FY 2007
budget request included a proposal to reserve a portion of Transitional
Living Program (TLP) funds for vouchers directly to participants to
purchase maternity group home services on their own. Appropriations
Committees in both chambers the 109th Congress, in consultation with
their authorization committee counterparts, concluded that a voucher
arrangement was neither contemplated by the statute nor in the best
interest of either the pregnant and parenting youth or unaccompanied
youth service providers. Accordingly, the committees rejected the
proposal in report language to accompany the FY 2007 Labor-HHS-
Education appropriations bills. Current law should be amended to
clarify that RHYA funds are to be made available for distribution to
organizations and not directly to program participants.
8. Allow transitional living projects to use RHYA funds for
facility renovation. Renovation costs should not exceed 15 percent of
the total first-year award. The current RHYA permits use of BCP funds
for facility renovation, but does not permit TLP funds to be used for
facility renovation. A parallel use of funds for renovation should be
extended to TLP grantees.
9. Require basic centers and transitional living projects to have
in place written emergency management and crisis response plans as a
condition for receiving federal RHYA awards. Hurricanes Katrina and
Rita focused national attention on the need to ensure more effective
responses to emergencies and crises, including by congregate care
providers. The 109th Congress recently amended the Older Americans Act
and the Promoting Safe and Stable Families Act to ensure that
federally-funded congregate care providers funded through these
programs have emergency management and crisis plans in place. A
parallel requirement should be established for RHYA basic centers and
transitional living projects.
Federal Program Management
10. Require HHS to develop performance standards for RHYA direct
service grantees. The HHS Secretary shall provide an opportunity for
public comment on the performance standards. At one time, HHS had
developed program performance standards for basic centers, and was in
process of developing program performance standards for TLP and SOP
grantees. These standards provided guidance to grantees on the minimum
expectations of program performance. HHS has suspended standards
development or activation lacking clear instruction in the RHYA statute
to support them.
11. Require HHS to develop a process for accepting and considering
appeals for reconsideration from unsuccessful RHYA applicants. The HHS
Secretary shall provide an opportunity for public comment on the
appeals process. The RHYA statute does not prescribe, and HHS has not
established, an orderly process for accepting or considering appeals
for reconsideration from unsuccessful RHYA applicants. Lack of a formal
process has led to lack of transparency whether or how reconsiderations
are made.
12. Add a finding on the applicability of positive youth
development to the organization and delivery of services to
unaccompanied youth. Inclusion of a finding on positive youth
development in the RHYA statute is important for encouraging grantees
to apply youth development principles to the development and
implementation of their projects.
13. Add a statutory definition of ``runaway youth'' identical to
the definition of such term in the Code of Federal Regulations. The
RHYA statute does not include a definition of ``runaway youth.''
However that term is defined in the Code of Federal Regulations (45 CFR
1351.1) as ``a person under who absents himself or herself from home or
place of legal residence without the permission of his or her family.''
For the convenience of policymakers, RHYA grantees, and the general
public, the current regulatory definition of ``runaway youth'' should
be inserted into statute.
National Activities
14. Require HHS to develop each fifth year, directly or via
contract, a national estimate of the prevalence of unaccompanied
situations among youth and young adults. The nation lacks a single,
reliable source of data on the prevalence of unaccompanied situations
among youth. The dearth of data impairs federal, state, and local
public policy decision-making, community needs assessment, service
organization and delivery, and performance measurement.
15. Require HHS to establish research, evaluation, and
demonstration priorities each two years and to provide an opportunity
for public comment on such priorities. The RHYA grants HHS authority to
make grants for research, evaluation, demonstration and service
projects. RHYA grantees, youth, advocates, and other stakeholders have
limited to no input into the identification or prioritization of issues
to be studied or evaluated.
16. Require HHS to conduct, directly or via contract, a study
demonstrating the economic and social benefit of providing emergency
housing, transitional housing, permanent housing and supportive
services to unaccompanied youth, and the extent to which that housing
and services offsets the costs of allowing such conditions to persist
for young people. While it is intuitive that interventions which
resolve unaccompanied situations among youth are more cost-effective to
the public in the long-term than ignoring the problem, there is yet to
be conducted an authoritative cost-benefit analysis to ``prove'' this
assertion. A cost-benefit study would be instructive to policymakers
about the type and level of investments in health and human needs
programs for children, youth, and families.
17. Authorize HHS to conduct, directly or via contract, a public
information campaign to raise awareness of the unaccompanied youth
population and their service and support needs. Unaccompanied youth are
a largely invisible or misunderstood population. Lack of public
awareness of this group of young people, their life circumstances, and
the interventions available to support them and end their homeless
situations, allows homelessness to persist among the nation's youth.
18. Amend the Higher Education Act to authorize forgiveness of
educational loans for workers in RHYA grantees with at least five
consecutive years of service. Nonprofit and public organizations
supporting unaccompanied youth face a number of workforce challenges,
including difficulty recruiting and retaining employees for long terms
of service, compensating employees at competitive wages, and attracting
employees with postsecondary education. Student loan forgiveness is a
strategy that has been deployed with success in other sectors to
recruit and retain workers in shortage occupations and should be
extended to the unaccompanied youth service sector.
PART IV--Beyond RHYA
The Runaway and Homeless Youth Act, while a critical federal law
that must be continued and fully funded, is no substitute for the
aggressive health and human needs interventions necessary to eliminate
the very factors causing unaccompanied situations among millions of the
nation's youth, or to respond to the resources and services needs of
currently unaccompanied youth that surpass the scope and purpose of the
Runaway and Homeless Youth Act. A comprehensive response to the causal
factors of and ultimate solutions to unaccompanied situations among
youth is required. We call the Education and Labor Committee's
attention to a number of opportunities beyond RHYA reauthorization
within its jurisdiction where decisive impact could be made for
unaccompanied youth.
Juvenile Justice
There is a clear intersection between the juvenile justice system
and youth homelessness, in terms of both youth entry into the system
due to their homeless and youth exit from the system into homelessness.
We urge the Committee to use the reauthorization of the Juvenile
Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act to break the connection between
juvenile justice and youth homelessness. We call for repeal of the
valid court order exception to the JJDPA deinstitutionalization of
status offenders requirement. We also call for the establishment of a
youth offender reentry grants program.
Elementary and Secondary Education
Youth experiencing homelessness encounter difficulties enrolling in
and attending School. These barriers include legal guardianship
requirements, residency requirements, lack of necessary immunization,
academic, or other records, and inadequate transportation to their
schools of origin from their temporary living arrangements. As a
result, many homeless young people struggle in obtaining education, or
fall out of the educational system altogether. Congress has responded
to the educational needs of homeless children and youth by establishing
laws and a grant program (the EHCY program) which ensure that children
and youth experiencing homelessness shall have a right to enroll,
attend, and succeed in school. We urge Congress to reauthorize and
strengthen the Education for Homeless Children and Youth program during
No Child Left Behind reauthorization.
Postsecondary Education
Postsecondary education offers students experiencing homelessness
and others hope for escaping poverty as adults. The Higher Education
Act has the potential to assist disconnected youth to graduate from
high school, apply for and access postsecondary education, and complete
their degrees--if they can access the network of HEA programs and
services. The most basic access barrier facing homeless students is the
very ability to apply for student financial assistance. We
Urge Congress to approve the FAFSA Fix for Homeless Kids Act (H.R.
601, Biggert), legislation that would allow youth to be considered
independent students for purposes of applying for financial aid (the
Federal Application for Federal Student Aid) if they have been verified
as an unaccompanied homeless youth by a school district homeless
liaison, shelter director, or financial aid administrator.
We also encourage the establishment of a supportive services
program for disconnected postsecondary students and the establishment
of a grant program to colleges and universities so that they may assist
homeless students in retaining campus or off-site housing during
periods when the institutions are closed.
Workforce Investment
Income is a necessary tool which unaccompanied youth must possess
in order for them to pay for housing and thus exit homelessness.
Workforce services for yout l far more than job readiness training and
job placement. Because of their developmental stage, youth require
comprehensive, intensive employment and training programs that involve
the following: job skill training, including classroom training, on-
the-job training, and apprenticeships; training in life skills and
work-related ; ploration of life options, including career paths that
are non-traditional for a youth's gender, race, culture and/or social
class; meaningful connections between youth and their peers, adults,
and communities; opportunities for youth to assume leadership roles and
develop responsibility, self-reliance, initiative and the desire and
ability to participate in decisions affecting their lives;
opportunities that take into account the life circumstances of youth,
such as housing, health, and transportation; and connections to
postsecondary education and training opportunities. Like other systems,
unaccompanied youth are experiencing difficulty accessing workforce
services in their communities. We urge the Committee to use the
reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act to help connect
unaccompanied youth to the workforce. We ask that runaway and homeless
youth organizations be added as members of local Youth Councils. We
also call for an assurance that Youth Councils permit unaccompanied
youth to participate in workforce services without parental consent.
Place to Call Home Act
In February 2007, the National Network for Youth announced a long-
term campaign to end youth homelessness. A Place to Call Home: The
National Network for Youth's Permanency Plan for Unaccompanied Youth.
Our Family supports the Place to Call Home Campaign.
The signature public policy component of the campaign is the Place
to Call Home Act, comprehensive legislation to prevent, respond to, and
end runaway and homeless situations among youth. The bill includes
provisions in the homeless assistance, housing, child welfare, juvenile
justice, public health, education, workforce investment, teen
parenting, and immigration areas. Representative Ruben Hinojosa (D-TX)
will introduce the bill imminently. We encourage Members of Congress to
join as original co-sponsors to the Place to Call Home Act.
______
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you very much.
Mr. Booker?
STATEMENT OF RUSTY BOOKER, FORMERLY HOMELESS YOUTH
Mr. Booker. Hi. My name is Rusty Booker. I am 17. I was
born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky. I just want to thank
all of you for giving me an opportunity to share my story with
you.
I was born to a mom, 17. Living with my mom and stepfather
was difficult. My stepfather came home every night drunk and
would beat my mom. My brother and I didn't sleep well, not
knowing if we would be next.
At age 8, my parents finally divorced, and my mom started
drinking. She never laid a hand on my brother and I. Drinking
was her way of forgetting the past.
I was sent with my stepfather and his wife at age 9. The
abuse soon started afterwards. My brother soon came afterwards.
I was placed in foster care and then, very quickly and
unbelievably, back with my stepfather.
Months after I was placed back with my stepfather, I
started sending letters to my previous foster family from an
abandoned house's mailbox, so my stepparents wouldn't know. A
month or so after the letters, I built the courage to run.
I contacted my previous foster family, and they told me to
look for a Safe Place instead of going back home. I went to a
library that had a Safe Place sign on the front. I was 12 at
the time, and until that day didn't know what Safe Place was
but glad that there was a public place, like the library, where
I could get help.
They took me to the YMCA Safe Place Services shelter in
Louisville. When I got to the shelter, the staff welcomed me. I
felt safe for the first time in many years.
They did an intake, provided me clothes, hygiene products
and clean linens. The next morning, I had a warm breakfast and
I met with a caseworker who would change my life forever, Mr.
Bill.
When we talked, at first I had a hard time connecting with
him and getting solutions, but it wasn't long before I was
sharing my life story with him. The shelter determined that
going home was not going to be possible, and I understood.
Within 2 weeks, they arranged for me to be placed in a
foster home with a loving family. But I still had problems, and
over the next several years I was placed in psychiatric
hospitals and along with that came therapy and meds.
Then came another foster home, group homes, even jail. I
started using drugs. And, after witnessing my friend get shot
in a deal gone bad, I thought to myself, ``Nobody asked me what
I wanted.'' I felt like I was to blame, and powerless to change
my life. I had no family, no home and, at this rate, no future.
After another failed foster home, I went to Safe Place
again and asked for help. I knew the shelter was there for me.
Again I felt safe and understood. I met with Ms. Missy and told
her everything that I had been through. She didn't judge me or
laugh at me. She understood me and made me feel wanted.
The next day I met Mr. Quan, a man with a story for every
lesson he learned that I needed to learn or had already but in
a rougher way. He, too, understood me. He has taught me very
many ways of how to not let little things get blown way out of
proportion.
And then there is Mr. Bill. When I met with him again after
several years, I gave him a hug. I felt so relieved to see
someone I knew that really cared about me and loved me more
than anyone I knew at the time.
I am not really going to put his business out on Front
Street, but I will say that he has been through a huge amount
of things that other kids and myself can relate to.
Mr. Bill, Ms. Missy and Mr. Quan and the other wonderful
and amazing staff at Safe Place Services are keeping me drug-
and alcohol-free. I don't know the last time I have felt this
good about myself.
To some, these people I mentioned may just be ordinary
people, but to me and 600 other kids a year in Louisville,
these people are heroes. Mr. Bill even gave up his vacation to
bring me to D.C. so I could testify.
There are 14 kids at the Safe Place Services right now who
have experienced many of the same things that I have. I would
like to be able to convince kids that Safe Place is a first
step to getting help and the shelter is a place where they can
feel safe and begin to solve their problems.
Many times, when I was younger, I wanted to run for help,
but when I was in a rural area there weren't many places to go.
Louisville is a smaller city, compared to here in D.C. or L.A.
or even Atlanta.
Kids all around the country, thousands of kids, feel like I
did. No one understands them, and they need a place to turn. I
hope that they, too, will be able to get to find a Safe Place
site, get to a shelter, feel safe and have a bed, a warm meal
and someone to talk to instead of roaming the streets or
bumming money.
I am asking for your help to make a difference for kids
just like me, because every kid deserves a second chance. I
plan to finish my GED and plan to go to college and get a
degree in law enforcement.
Thank you for letting me share the experiences I have had.
I know I am headed in the right direction. I used to always ask
myself, ``Why me?'' Maybe this is why. Maybe what I have been
through can make a difference for someone else. I hope you will
make it possible for kids like me to have these programs in
their city.
Thank you.
[The statement of Mr. Booker follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rusty Booker, Formerly Homeless Youth
My name is Rusty Booker. I'm 17 years old. I was born and raised in
Louisville, KY. I just want to thank all of you for giving me an
opportunity to share the story of my life with you.
My life was never easy. I was born to a mom of 17. Living with my
mother and stepfather was so difficult. My stepfather came home every
night, got drunk and beat my mom. My brother and I didn't sleep well
not knowing if we would be next. At age eight my parents divorced and
my mom started drinking. She never laid a hand on my brother and me.
Drinking was her way of forgetting the past. I was sent to live with my
stepfather and his wife at age nine. The abuse started then. Belts,
ping pong paddles, even his hand all against flesh. I wouldn't be able
to sit while my bottom and legs were marked with bruises. My brother
soon came afterwards. I was placed in foster care and then back with my
stepfather. Months after I was placed back with my stepfather. I
started sending letters to my previous foster family from an abandoned
house's mailbox so my stepparents wouldn't know. A month or so after
the letters, I had built the courage to run.
I contacted my previous foster family and they told me to look for
a Safe Place instead of going back home. I went to a library that had a
Safe Place sign on the front. I was 12 at the time and until that day
didn't know what Safe Place was but was glad that there was a place
like the library where I could get help. They took me to the YMCA Safe
Place Services shelter in Louisville. When I got to the shelter the
staff welcomed me. I felt safe for the first time in many years. They
did an intake and got me clothes, hygiene products and clean linens.
The next morning I had a warm breakfast and it was good. I met with a
caseworker who would change my life forever--Mr. Bill. When we talked,
at first I had a hard time connecting with him and getting solutions,
but it wasn't long before I was sharing my life's story with him.
The shelter determined that going home was not going to be possible
and I understood. Within two weeks, they arranged for me to be placed
in a foster home with a loving family. But I still had problems and
over the next several years, I was placed in a psychiatric hospital and
along with that came therapy and meds. Then came another foster home,
group homes, even jail. I started using drugs and after witnessing my
friend getting shot because of drugs, I thought to myself, nobody asked
me what I wanted. I felt like I was to blame and was powerless to
change my life. I had no family, no home and at this rate, no future.
After another failed foster home, I went to Safe Place again and asked
for help.
I knew the shelter was there for me. Again I felt safe and
understood. I met with Ms. Missy and told her everything that I had
been through. She didn't judge me or laugh at me. She understood me and
made me feel wanted. The next day I met Mr. Quan, a man with a story
for every lesson he learned that I needed to learn or had already but
in a rougher way. He too, understood me. He has taught me very many
ways of how to not let little things get blown way out of proportion.
And then there is Mr. Bill. When I saw him again after several years, I
gave him a hug. I felt so relieved to see someone I knew that really
cared about me and loved me more than anyone I know. I'm not really
going to put his business out to the public, but I will say that he has
been through a huge amount of things that other kids and me can relate
to. Bill, Ms. Missy and Mr. Quan and the other wonderful and amazing
staff at Safe Place Services are keeping me drug and alcohol free. I
don't know the last time I have felt this good about myself.
To some, these people I mentioned may just be ordinary people, but
to me and six hundred other kids a year in Louisville, these people are
heroes. Mr. Bill even gave up his vacation to bring me to DC so I could
testify today.
There are 14 kids at the Safe Place Services right now who have
experienced many of the same things that I have. I would like to be
able to convince kids that Safe Place is a first step to get help and
the shelter is a place where they can feel safe and begin to solve
their problems. Many times when I was younger, I wanted to run for
help, but when I was in a rural area there weren't many places to go.
Louisville is a smaller city compared to here in DC or LA or even
Atlanta. Kids all around the country, thousands of kids, feel like I
did. No one understands them and they need a place to turn. I hope that
they, too, will be able to get to find Safe Place sites to get to a
shelter, feel safe, and have a bed, food, someone to talk to instead of
roaming the streets, bumming money or doing anything just to survive.
I'm asking for your help to make a difference for kids just like
me, because every kid deserves a second chance. I plan to finish my GED
and plan to go to college and get a degree in law enforcement. Thank
you for letting me share the experiences I have had. I know I'm headed
in the right direction. I used to always ask myself ``Why me?'' Maybe
this is why. Maybe what I have been through can make a difference for
someone else. I hope you will make it possible for kids like me to have
these programs in their city.
______
[Additional material submitted by Mr. Booker follows:]
National Safe Place
Safe Place offers the first step to help for any young person at
risk of abuse, neglect or serious problems. The testimony presented by
Rusty Booker to the US House of Representatives, Healthy Families and
Communities subcommittee of the Labor and Education Committee
addressing Runaway and Homeless Youth issues represents just one young
man who was the victim of serious circumstances and made the decision
to ask for help. His courage and determination to alter the path on
which he was headed represents that of many other young people. More
than 205,000 youth have also made the decision to seek help at a Safe
Place location or contacted a youth shelter agency after learning about
Safe Place at their school.
Businesses and community buildings such as fire stations and
libraries are designated as ``Safe Place'' sites. Any youth in crisis
can walk into one of the nearly 16,000 Safe Places across the country
and ask an employee for help. These locations display the yellow,
diamond-shaped Safe Place sign on their location. Inside, employees are
trained and prepared to assist any young person asking for help. Youth
who go to a Safe Place location are quickly connected to the nearby
youth shelter. The shelter then provides the counseling and support
necessary to reunify family members and develop a plan to address the
issues presented by the youth and family.
In addition to providing youth in crisis immediate access to help
and safety at community locations, the visibility of Safe Place signs
makes the community more aware of some of the issues that young people
experience. As consumers enter their neighborhood market or convenience
store, the Safe Place sign is a constant reminder that keeping young
people safe is everyone's responsibility. Safe Place provides an
opportunity for the entire community to get involved in helping to
solve some of the serious issues that face young people and getting
their life back on track. According to Suzanne Quinlan, Human Resources
Director for Louisville area Dairy Queen corporate stores, ``You could
not pay us enough to take down the Safe Place sign. Even if we only get
one child, it is important that both kids and parents can easily find
Safe Places.''
The success of Safe Place is based on public/private collaborations
between businesses, school systems, fire departments, law enforcement,
and a network of volunteers. An estimated 250,000 employees at Safe
Place locations nationally are trained and ready to help a child or
teen. Transit systems in 45 cities designate their buses as mobile Safe
Place sites. When a youth boards a bus asking for help, the driver
contacts the dispatch office and a trained supervisor is immediately
sent to transport the youth to the shelter.
National Safe Place, headquartered in Louisville, KY provides youth
shelters across the nation with the infrastructure, materials and
training to establish and maintain a Safe Place program. Agencies
operating Safe Place receive all of the tools for successful
implementation. National corporations such as Sprint, Southwest
Airlines, and CSX partner with National Safe Place to offer support
benefiting youth in Safe Place communities through cause marketing
campaigns, awareness and education initiatives and in-kind
contributions.
National Safe Place currently partners with 140 shelters in 40
states. An equal number of runaway youth shelters could establish the
program, but have not because of limited resources. Safe Place expands
the reach of youth shelters, offering additional front doors in the
community where a youth can get help in his or her own neighborhood.
Often young people must quickly run from a dangerous or threatening
situation. Having a Safe Place nearby makes it possible for them to do
so.
Safe Place is a proven, nationally recognized program. Its success
is contingent upon each generation of young people understanding that
the Safe Place sign is a symbol of immediate help and safety and that
seeking help is a better resolution to their crisis than running.
Efforts must be made to bring Safe Place to the 10 states where it is
not available and to incorporate this outreach program within more
shelters. Safe Place is a cost-effective initiative. Businesses and
public organizations are willing to support the program to foster the
safety of young people and the community. Safe Place also empowers
young people to seek help earlier in their crisis before it escalates;
thus it is easier for shelter staffs to affect a positive resolution in
a shorter period of time. In many instances, it eliminates
inappropriate placements in the juvenile justice or other such systems,
saving tax payer dollars.
Rusty Booker testified on behalf of other runaway and homeless
youth in similar situations. We must make an effort to raise the
awareness of the services provided by runaway and homeless youth
shelters. Safe Place does that. An investment of resources for Safe
Place will benefit many other young people like Rusty.
______
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you, Rusty.
Mr. Berg?
STATEMENT OF STEVEN R. BERG, VICE PRESIDENT FOR PROGRAMS AND
POLICY, NATIONAL ALLIANCE TO END HOMELESSNESS
Mr. Berg. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you.
I would like just start by saying thank you for holding
this hearing. I know every person who is on this panel who has
done specific things to move this issue forward, move the issue
of homelessness forward. And we are grateful for that and for
what so many other members of Congress have done.
I am here to talk a little bit about some of the research
numbers about this problem. We have submitted our written
testimony, which I would refer people to. Part of that is a
bibliography which makes a pretty good reading list for people
who want to dip into the issue even further.
Let me just make a few quick points here, by way of
summary. The first point, it is a couple of bad news and a
couple pieces of good news.
The first piece of bad news is this is a sizable problem. I
mean, the number you recited, 1.6 million people, young people,
every year, this does not include people who are staying with
relatives or staying with friends. It is young people who are
in shelters, who are on the streets or who are staying
temporarily with strangers in often dire circumstances.
A striking finding of the research is that for more than
half of these young people, no one was looking for them while
they were going through this experience. There were not people
making police reports or posting things. They were on their
own, in many cases, abandoned by families or what supports they
had.
And the other thing is substantially fewer than half were
in shelters during these experiences. The rest, a small number
of the 1.6 million, was living with strangers. For the most
part, young people were surviving on the streets. They were
surviving in abandoned buildings. They were surviving outside.
The second piece of bad, but mixed, news is that many of
the young people how have these experiences, there are mixed
and complex and difficult histories. Severe conflict within the
family is a near-universal experience. Also prevalent are
issues of abuse and neglect, issues of abandonment, issues of
substance abuse, more often with the parents than with young
people. Issues of mental health and poverty is a common
occurrence.
The involvement with the juvenile justice system is very
common. The involvement with the child welfare system is very
common. These add up to the fact that prevention of
homelessness for young people, while extremely important and,
the research shows, doable, is difficult.
The good news, and I hope you take this from the hearing
and the witnesses that have preceded me, is that young people
are resilient. They go through these experiences, but the
research shows what many people who work in the field know from
experience, which is that despite incredible hardship and
incredible experiences, people, when they are given the chance,
do recover from the trauma and do go on to lead very useful
and, indeed, in many cases, exemplary lives.
The other piece of good news is we have a pretty clear idea
of what the interventions are that bring about those good
results. We could always have more on this, and one of the
probably areas where there is more research needed is sort of
individual rigorous evaluations of individual program models.
But, from the research that exists, we see that a stable
residence, a connection and attachment to a caring adult and
the supportive services that build on the strength of these
young people and that address the problems that they have get
good results. So sort of programmatically, we are aware of the
answers and we can put them into place.
The final point I would like to make, and the research
bears this out, is the urgency of this question. I think
sometimes in this day and age we are all a little too used to
the idea of homelessness and have lost, to some extent, the
idea that homelessness for anyone is an immediate and crucial
problem that needs to be dealt with as a crisis, an individual
emergency in each case.
I think certainly for young people this is the case. I
think the stories you hear will back this up. What I can say
about the research is, the longer young people stay homeless,
the worse their troubles get.
Every night is an additional risk of drug abuse and
addiction, of being the victims of crime or of turning to
crime, of sexual abuse, of physical abuse. Every night that
young people stay homeless increases the risk of deteriorating
mental health conditions, higher risks of suicide, the longer
people stay homeless.
These are young people who are in grave danger. But, on the
other hand, every night, young people are moved from the
streets into programs that prevent those dire consequences from
happening. We know what the programs are. We have good federal
policies in place.
We will be working with the committee staff to make them
even better through reauthorization, but the main point is we
need to get behind these programs and make sure they are funded
and available to everyone.
Thank you.
[The statement of Mr. Berg follows:]
Prepared Statement of Steven R. Berg, Vice President for Programs and
Policy, National Alliance to End Homelessness
Thank you, Chairwoman McCarthy, Ranking Member Platts, and the
honorable members of this subcommittee on behalf of our Board of
Directors and partner members for providing this opportunity to address
the subcommittee on research findings concerning youth homelessness in
the United States. I would like to start by congratulating this
subcommittee on its important work in addressing the need of homeless
and other vulnerable youth in our nation. The National Alliance to End
Homelessness believes that ending youth homelessness is well within our
reach. The population is small enough for our collective effort to
eradicate this social crisis among our states.
The National Alliance to End Homelessness is a nonpartisan,
nonprofit organization that was founded in 1983 by a group of leaders
deeply disturbed by the appearance of thousands of Americans living on
the streets of our nation. We have committed ourselves to finding
permanent solutions to homelessness. Our bipartisan Board of Directors
and our 5,000 nonprofit, faith-based, private and public sector
partners across the country devote ourselves to the affordable housing,
access to services, and livable incomes that will end homelessness. The
Alliance is recognized for its organization and dissemination of
evidence-based research to encourage best practices and high standards
in the field of homelessness prevention and intervention and we wish to
share our insights with you today.
As our name implies, our primary focus is ending homelessness, not
simply making it easier to live with. We take this idea very seriously.
There is nothing inevitable about youth homelessness in the United
States. We know more about youth homelessness and how to address it
than we ever have before, thanks in part to extensive research. We know
a great deal about the pathways into homelessness for youth, the
characteristics of youth who experience homelessness, and interventions
and program models which are effective in offering youth reconnection
to family, community, and stable housing.
We have been asked today to summarize the research available on the
characteristics and experiences of homeless youth, the causes of youth
homelessness, and the solutions to youth homelessness. We will also
point out the limitations of the research, and identify some research
questions that we believe need to be addressed.
Overview of research
Demographics and Experiences of Youth Homelessness
Homeless youth are typically defined as unaccompanied youth aged 12
to 24 years who do not have familial support and are unaccompanied, and
who are living in shelters, on the streets, in a range of places not
meant for human habitation (e.g. cars, abandoned buildings) or in
others' homes for short periods under circumstances that make the
situation highly unstable (so-called ``couch surfing''). Youth
homelessness is essentially caused by a breakdown in families, where
environments of abuse, neglect, or youth abandonment are exacerbated by
larger systemic issues such as poverty, unemployment, poor housing, and
lack of community and economic support in rural and urban
neighborhoods. Youth turn to shelters and the streets as an often
rational choice to avoid violence, abuse, neglect, and abandonment but
the alternative can be hard lives riddled with poor health and
exploitation by unscrupulous adults.
Two major incident studies by the U.S. Department of Justice and
Professor Ringwalt and colleagues estimate that the number of youth
below the who flee from their home, are barred from home by their
guardian, or experience homelessness ranges from 1.6 to 1.7 million in
the course of a year. Additionally, an unknown number of young adults
aged 18 to 24 experience homelessness each year. Some youth will remain
away from their home for only short periods of time (a few nights)
while others will experience long periods of homelessness and become
street-dependent. Street-dependent youth often sleep exclusively
outdoors, in public places, or in abandoned buildings, form their own
unique culture and family structure with other street-dependent youth,
and often rely on street economies such as prostitution, drug sales,
theft, or begging to meet their basic needs. However, street-dependent
youth represent a small minority of the total homeless youth
population. Local programs funded by the federal Runaway and Homeless
Youth Act (Department of Health and Human Services) served over 500,000
homeless and runaway youth in 2005. Homeless youth can be found in
urban, suburban, and rural areas through the United States and few
differences have been found when urban, suburban, and rural youth are
compared.
A 1999 study by the U.S. Department of Justice, the Second National
Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Thrownaway
Children, estimated 1,682,900 youth had a runaway/throwaway episode
that year. Of these youth, 37 percent were actively sought by their
caretakers and 21 percent were reported to authorities for purposes of
locating them. This study underscores that a majority of runaway and
homeless youth (63 percent) are never reported or sought after by their
parents or primary caretakers.
There is little gender disparity among various homeless youth
groups, except that youth living on the streets are more likely to be
male. While youth from all races and cultures run away, become homeless
or are thrown away by parents, shelter and housing programs report a
significant disproportionate representation of American Indian and
African-American youth.
Also, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender youth have been found
to be overrepresented in homeless and street populations with estimates
ranging from 11 to 35 percent. Compared to heterosexual homeless youth,
gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender homeless youth also are exposed
to greater victimization while on the streets.
Background information on homeless youth show that they tend to
come from low-income communities and their families are
disproportionately poor or working class. Many grew up in single-parent
households or blended families.
Contrary to stereotypes about homeless youth, studies have not
consistently shown that substance abuse is characteristic of a majority
of runaway youth. While many studies show use and abuse of drugs or
alcohol, research is inconclusive that homeless youth are more prone to
dependency. However, studies of homeless youth have shown high rates of
parental alcohol or drug abuse (24 to 44 percent) which likely
contributes to youth homelessness. Additionally, most homeless youth
are still in school but may have experienced difficulties, discipline
actions, and delays. One 2005 study showed that 79 percent of youth
were attending school on a regular basis before entering shelter.
Additionally, homeless youth are at elevated risk for mood
disorders, suicide attempts, and post-traumatic stress disorder. High
rates of behavioral disorders are also noted. Regardless of the
assessment method used or the sample, homeless youth are more likely to
experience mental health and behavioral disorders than adolescents in
the general population.
Numerous studies have indicated that once homeless, youth often
engage in sexual behaviors that put them at high risk for both sexually
transmitted diseases and pregnancy. Most studies indicate that a
portion of the homeless youth population engages in survival sex which
is the trading of for basic needs like a place to stay. A significant
number of homeless girls are also pregnant or parenting. One national,
representative sample study published in the American Journal of
Adolescent Health found that 48 percent of street youth and 33 percent
of shelter youth had histories of pregnancy or impregnating someone, as
compared to 10 percent of a nationally representative sample of housed
youth.
Homeless youth may be characterized by the length of time spent
homeless--recent runaways, transitionally or episodically homeless,
homeless and shelter using youth, and street-dependent youth who may
travel. Evidence suggests that differences may exist between subtypes
of homeless youth, and therefore, unique, targeted interventions may be
merited.
In summary, research has given us insight into some fairly constant
variables that cut across most homeless youth groups. The common
characteristics of their experience prior to becoming homeless include:
Abuse and neglect histories
Parental alcohol and substance abuse
Poverty (except runaways)
Broken family relationships (single parent, blended, or no
parental contact)
Severe family conflict
Difficulty with educational success and advancement
despite enrollment in school.
Research has also given us a warning that the longer youth remain
homeless, the greater their likelihood of experience a host of
troubles, including:
High rates of sexual activity
Acute medical problems
Alcoholism and alcohol/chemical addiction
HIV
Mental health diagnosis & institutionalization
Suicide
Physical violence
Sexual assault.
Pathways to Homelessness for Youth
Research offers information about the pathways into homelessness
for youth. Studies show that there are often multiple factors which
cause a youth to leave home: severe family conflict, physical abuse,
sexual abuse, neglect, substance abuse, mental health disabilities, and
abandonment. Youth consistently report severe family conflict as the
primary reason for their homelessness but also report multiple barriers
to reunification. Behavioral issues on the part of the youth may be a
source of the conflict, but this is certainly not always the case.
Beyond the individual and family problems, youth homelessness is
also fed by lack of affordable housing, poverty, and child welfare and
juvenile correction systems that fail to protect youth from shelters
and the streets.
A sizable minority of homeless youth have had histories of foster
care or juvenile justice placements and still end up homeless before
their 18th birthday. According to the 2007 National Symposium on
Homelessness Research, the percentage of homeless youth who report
previous placement in foster care or an institutional setting ranged
between 21 and 53 percent across studies. A longitudinal study by the
University of Chicago found that 14 percent of former foster youth
became homeless after being discharged from care. Another large
representative sample study of foster youth aging out of care by
Professors Fowler and Ahmed noted that 17 percent of homeless youth had
experienced literal homelessness during the 3.6 years after exiting
care. One predictor of future homelessness for foster youth is whether
the youth had repeatedly run away from placement. By contrast, feeling
very close to at least one family member reduced the odds of becoming
homeless by nearly 80 percent.
Homelessness may not be a surprising result given the multiple
placements and school transfers experienced by foster youth. One study
by Casey Family Programs found that more than 30 percent of foster
youth experienced eight or more placements with foster families and
group homes and a majority experienced seven or more school changes
between elementary and high school age. In addition to residential
instability, many foster youth face mental health problems and
developmental or behavioral challenges. The Northwest Foster Care
Alumni Study by Casey Family Programs found that foster youth
experience anxiety disorders, depression, panic disorders, and social
phobias at two to four times the rate of the general population.
Solutions to Youth Homelessness
There is a growing body of evidence about what works. We know
interventions that work to restore youth and offer them a pathway out
of homelessness. The past ten years of research and study have provided
some indication of methodologies which result in positive outcomes for
youth to prevent or end homelessness.
Most homeless youth do not experience long-term homelessness.
Homeless youth often go home, find relatives, or make it on their own
as young adults. In a 2004 study by Professor Paul Toro of 249 homeless
youth as compared to a matched sample of 149 housed youth, ages 13 and
17 years, conducted longitudinally over seven years, most of the
adolescents returned fairly quickly to their family of origin. Nearly
93 percent were no longer homeless after seven years of study. However,
not all were successfully reunified with parents. One third lived with
their families, about 20 percent lived with relatives or friends, and
over a third (34 percent) lived on their own. Therefore, the pathway
out of homelessness sometimes focuses on parents, sometimes focuses on
kin and extended family, and sometimes focuses on independent living.
Studies of what works focus on three areas. The first is early
intervention/prevention that seeks to avert a homelessness episode or
to ensure that a family separation does not result in an out-of-home
placement that so often leads to long term homelessness. The second is
interventions with youth who are already homeless, to rapidly reunite
them with their families while strengthening the families to achieve
more stability. The third is independent housing options other than
reunification for youth who will not be able to return to their
families. The implication of these three strategies is that the first
and best option is to try to reconnect youth with their families, and
only after this fails should independent living options be considered.
Initial early intervention and prevention services which focus on
mental health and family systems can often meet the crisis needs of a
family and prevent homelessness and/or foster care placement.
Two forms of mental health services have been identified that show
positive results in decreasing youth anti-social behavior and
aggression: multisystemic therapy (MST) and functional family therapy
(FFT). Both have indicated that youth recipients have significantly
fewer out-of-home placements and decreased recidivism to the juvenile
justice system.
Multisystemic Therapy is an intensive family- and community-based
treatment that addresses multiple aspects of serious antisocial
behavior in adolescents. MST uses family members to design the
treatment plan and attempts to encourage behavior changes by using
strengths in various areas of the youth's life (family, peers, school,
and neighborhood). Evaluations of MST have demonstrated the following
benefits:
decreased recidivism and re-arrests;
reduced adolescent alcohol and drug use;
reduced long-term rates of crime for serious juvenile
offenders;
improvements in family functioning;
decreased behavior and mental health problems for youth;
and
favorable outcomes at cost savings in comparison with
usual mental health and juvenile justice services.
Functional Family Therapy is so named to identify the family as the
primary focus of intervention. Therapists employing FFT believe they
must do more than simply stop antisocial or unhealthy behavior, they
must motivate families to change by identifying their strengths,
helping build on those strengths in ways that enhance self respect, and
offering recommendations on particular pathways for improvement. Data
show that when compared with other forms of community intervention like
probation support, residential treatment, and alternative therapeutic
approaches, FFT is highly successful. In randomized trials FFT was
shown to have reduced recidivism for a wide range of anti-social or
criminal behavior. In addition, studies have shown it to reduce the
cost of treatment.
Youth who are experiencing abuse or neglect at home could also be
diverted away from costly out-of-home placements and homelessness
through Family Group Conferencing or Family Group Decision Making
programs. In these early intervention and prevention programs extended
family, kin, and important people in the life of the youth come
together to implement a plan for the continued safety, nurturance, and
permanency of the youth. These programs show remarkable success in
stabilizing youth. Research on Family Group Decision Making found
reductions in re-abuse, increased family involvement, decreased
residential instability, and more extended families accepting care of
the youth.
Program models have proven effective at reuniting homeless youth,
even those with troubled histories, with their families.
Originally designed to assist young people who have been diagnosed
with mental health disabilities and their families, Intensive Case
Management (ICM) works with a family (in conjunction with teachers and
other helping professionals) to develop an individualized comprehensive
service plan. Case Managers who are professional and specially trained
conduct an assessment and assist in coordinating supports and services
necessary to help children and adolescents live successfully at home
and in the community. The case loads are small (1 to 10 or 1 to 12) and
offer round-the-clock access. Intensive Case Management services have
been used successfully with homeless youth. One study published in the
Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders noted that homeless youth
receiving Intensive Case Management services showed improved
psychological well-being, less aggression, and satisfaction with their
quality of life.
Both shelter and outreach services can be used as a gateway to exit
homelessness. A 2002 study by Professor Thompson and colleagues
compared 261 runaway and homeless youth who received services through
emergency shelter and crisis services with 47 at-risk youth receiving
services from a long-term day treatment program. The study found that
both groups experienced positive changes in their family relationships,
runaway behavior, school behavior, employment, sexual behavior and self
esteem. The study noted that there were no significant group
differences in the amount of change they experienced, leading one to
observe that the less-costly shelter system had as positive return in
positive outcomes for youth as the more expensive day treatment
programs.
Some youth will never be able to return to their families, and
there are successful housing programs that not only meet the housing
needs of such youth, but also have programming that addresses their
development needs and helps them to build relationships with adults and
with the community.
Multiple housing models exist for youth but they have limited
capacity in most jurisdictions. Examples of youth housing models
include: host homes, shared housing, community-based group homes,
dormitories, scattered site transitional housing, single-site
transitional housing, permanent scattered site housing with supportive
services, and foyer (employment-focused) housing. These models
incorporate life skills training, connection to caring adults, and
opportunities for growth, mistakes, and positive youth development.
Many homeless youth rely on such housing options when family members
are unwilling or unable to care for their nurturance and welfare. Most
homeless youth never receive housing benefits because of lack of supply
and long waiting lists.
Limitations of the research and unanswered questions
There is an extensive body of study and research on the
characteristics and demographics of homeless youth, as well as the
pathways or antecedent factors leading up to a youth turning to life on
the streets. Unfortunately, there are limitations to existing research
and we are left with remaining questions.
One problem is that studies that have examined homelessness among
adolescents have often cast the problem as individual vulnerability
instead of examining the broader environmental factors involved. This
has created the tendency by research to focus on the youth behavior in
risky situations while homeless, rather than on the adult behaviors
that often propel youth from their homes or on interventions and
supports that could end youth homelessness. Additional research that
focuses on child welfare, juvenile justice, and economic or social
network failures that have a role in youth homelessness may allow us to
address these causal factors.
Further, little research has been conducted on the inherent
characteristics possessed by youth which make them resilient to
negative outcomes despite their homelessness. Homeless youth are
resilient and creative and often exit homelessness after short periods
of time. While it is important to understand the deficits of homeless
youth, a greater understanding of their strengths and assets could lead
us to new interventions that build upon these strengths to help young
people gain residential stability and escape life on the streets.
There is little research that helps clarify the distinction between
youth who remain on the streets or hop between shelters and those that
remain housed with friends and relatives, either stably or unstably.
Further research is needed to understand which program models,
resources, or intervention methods best equip ``couch surfing'' youth
with the opportunity to find stable homes and brighter futures.
There are several programmatic models and methodologies which may
hold promise in working with youth. However, there is little rigorous
research that verifies results. School-based programs that offer youth
a safe way to access services or receive one-to-one counseling and
support may help prevent and end homelessness, but we have found little
evaluation of such programs. We also know that a minority of homeless
youth experience chemical or alcohol addiction, yet we do not know
whether out-patient support groups or residentially-based treatment
geared toward adolescents is more effective. Most of the research on
chemical and alcohol addiction is focused on adults. Further, given the
high rates of ual exploitation, molestation, and assault of homeless
youth, it would be helpful to have a better understanding of the level
of support, outreach, case management, and housing stability that are
needed to effectively escape prostitution and the commercial sex
industry. Another area of youth homelessness that has been under-
examined is the experience of undocumented youth who may flee to
America to escape abusive, violent, or neglectful families in their
home countries. We do not know the dimensions of this problem, or what
solutions are workable.
Finally, Congress has funded an array of services, housing and
shelter for vulnerable and homeless youth, although not enough to meet
all of the need. While we are able to point to some interventions that
offer solutions, the vast array of service systems have yet to be
rigorously evaluated. It would appear that critical research and study
in this area is in its own adolescent phase--able to produce some
solutions but not fully matured. When evaluations have been done on
local service systems or specific programs, rigorous experimental
designs have generally not been used and often lack comparative data to
allow cross-system comparison.
Implications
After a reviewing the current body of research and studies on youth
homelessness, the Alliance wishes to offer the following implications,
as a framework for this subcommittee in crafting public policy to end
youth homelessness:
1. Youth by definition are still developing and require attachment
to and the support of caring adults. Homeless youth are unique in that
they represent a population of homelessness that is impacted by
physical, emotional, and cognitive development. Any consideration,
intervention, or program model must consider how positive youth
development is both retarded and enhanced through our programmatic
responses.
2. Youth homelessness is as much about societal and system failures
as individual and family breakdown. The pathways to homelessness for
youth are about breakdown of families, abuse and neglect, but also
community systems (including economic conditions, social networks,
housing stock, and child welfare systems) contributing to youth living
on the streets of America.
3. Our targeted response should be tailored toward the length of
time spent homeless. Recent runaways and couch surfing youth should be
quickly served to find alternative family placements, while shelter and
street-dependent youth require intensive case work and access to
housing models grounded in life skills training and opportunity for
growth, with rapid stabilization in housing as the highest possible
priority.
4. We know some of what works and Congress should invest in those
interventions that have shown positive outcomes. Those typically tend
to be mental health services, intensive case management services,
respite care tied to family reunification counseling, and housing
coupled with life skills training and positive youth development
services.
5. We can end homelessness for youth, and prevent untold suffering,
hardship and expense in so doing. With coordination of services between
child welfare systems and community-based organizations centering on
family, health, and housing this is a social condition that is not
inevitable.
Thank you again and we look forward to working with you to confront
and end youth homelessness.
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M., and Toro, P. A. (2006) Community violence, race,
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(1998). The Prevalence of homelessness among adolescents in the
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from February, 2007.
______
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you, Mr. Berg.
Mr. Allen?
STATEMENT OF ERNIE ALLEN, PRESIDENT AND CEO, NATIONAL CENTER
FOR MISSING AND EXPLOITED CHILDREN
Mr. Allen. Madam Chair, members of the committee, I
particularly want to express my gratitude to my friend,
Congressman Yarmuth, and to the great leadership of the
Congressional Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children,
Chairman Lampson and co-chair Congresswoman Biggert.
I want to report to the committee that the progress in the
search for America's missing children is extraordinary. More
missing children come home safely today in this country than at
any time in the nation's history, and that is because the
leadership of Congress and the leadership of law enforcement,
we have been able to build a national network.
Today, images and information are transmitted instantly
across the nation. There are 50 state missing children
clearinghouses. Because of the AMBER Alert and the leadership
of great nonprofit organizations like the Texas Center for the
Missing, we are mobilizing the eyes and ears of the public.
Law enforcement is better prepared. There is more
technology, more resources. The good news is, it is working.
The bad news, as you all know, is that 2,000 children will be
reported by their parents to the police as missing today
somewhere in the United States.
And, the bad news is, despite all our progress and despite
a recovery rate in the upper 90s, thousands of children each
year still don't make it home. Our national center, which is
now 23 years old, at your mandate operates a National Missing
Children's Hotline.
We are currently handing about 300 calls a day. We have
handled 2.2 million over our history. And let me say the long
partnership with the runaway and homeless youth community is
extraordinarily important, because, for example, we link with
the National Runaway Switchboard.
When the kid calls our hotline, we pass them immediately to
the National Runaway Switchboard. And when the parent or a
member of the public calls the National Runaway Switchboard,
they send it to us. It is that kind of cooperation that I think
is essential in this issue.
We are focusing aggressively on issues like the long-term
missing. There are still thousands of children who have not
been identified, many of whom are deceased and whose remains
have not been identified, bringing closure for these families.
We are working with the FBI and others to provide direct,
on-scene response, technical experts to help law enforcement,
who may waste valuable time because they don't know what to do.
So there is enormous progress.
An area of perhaps greater challenge is the area of child
sexual exploitation. And let me just say a few words about
that. This is an issue that has exploded with the advent of the
Internet. In 1998, the Congress asked our center to establish
what it called the 911 for the Internet, a cyber tip line. Last
week, we handled our 500,000th report, and these reports are of
online enticement of children, ography, child sex tourism, a
range of child sexual exploitation offenses.
The good news is that these reports have led to thousands
of arrests and successful prosecutions. The bad news is that
this problem has proliferated. For example, ography has become
a multi-billion dollar commercial industry and the victims are
getting younger and younger. Our staff has reviewed 8 million
images and videos in an attempt to identify the children.
And what we have learned is that of the offenders how have
been identified, 39 percent have had images of children younger
than 6 years old. Nineteen percent have had images of children
younger than 3 years old.
This is an enormous challenge. Law enforcement is doing
more today than ever before. The FBI, ICE and other agencies
are gearing up the Internet crimes against children task forces
around the country are doing extraordinary work, but law
enforcement is under-resourced, under-manned and is tackling a
problem that is far greater than any of us ever thought.
The last thing I would want to point out is that a couple
of years ago, in the PROTECT Act, the Congress asked for us to
take on a pilot project to do background screening for youth-
serving organizations.
We have done that, and we have found that even though these
applicants are being fingerprinted and know they are being
subject to national criminal history background checks, fully 3
percent of the applicants have had criminal histories, many of
them serious criminal histories involving crimes against
children.
Background screening needs to be continued. This needs to
be a national effort for youth-serving organizations that is
fast, accurate fingerprint based and either free or as close to
free as we can get it.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
[The statement of Mr. Allen follows:]
Prepared Statement of Ernie Allen, President and CEO, National Center
for Missing and Exploited Children
Madame Chairwoman and members of the Subcommittee, as President of
the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), I welcome
the opportunity to appear before you to discuss issues affecting our
nation's children. NCMEC joins you in your concern for the safety of
the most vulnerable members of our society and thanks you for bringing
attention to the problems facing America's families and communities.
Let me first provide you with some background information. NCMEC is
a not-for-profit corporation, mandated by Congress and working in
partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice as the national
resource center and clearinghouse on missing and exploited children.
NCMEC is a true public-private partnership, funded in part by Congress
and in part by the private sector. Our federal funding supports
specific operational functions mandated by Congress, including a
national 24-hour toll-free hotline; a distribution system for missing-
child photos; a system of case management and technical assistance to
law enforcement and families; training programs for federal, state and
local law enforcement; and programs designed to help stop the sexual
exploitation of children.
In recent years, our nation has become outraged by the abductions
of children like Jessica Lunsford, Jetseta Gage, Erica Pratt, Shasta
Groene, Samantha Runnion, Elizabeth Smart, and many others. Their
stories have unleashed fear among parents everywhere who are asking,
``How safe is my child?''
The response is, ``Safer than ever before.''
More missing children are coming home safely today than at any time
in our history. Law enforcement is responding more swiftly and
effectively. There is a national network in place. Parents are more
alert, more aware, and talking to their children about their safety.
Yet that is not enough, and there are some inescapable facts.
Hundreds of children still do not make it home each year, and many more
continue to be victimized by acts of violence. In fact children are the
most victimized segment of our society.\1\ Further, research has
consistently shown that crimes committed against children of all ages
are the most underreported of any victim category.\2\
How has NCMEC responded to this?
We have worked with law enforcement on more than 133,000 missing-
child cases, and played a role in reuniting more than 115,000 children
with their families. We have a 96.2 % recovery rate, up from 62% in
1990. We have analyzed more than 500,000 reports of crimes against
children on the Internet, and referred them to law enforcement,
resulting in hundreds of arrests and successful prosecutions.
Here are some of the services we provide:
Hotline: Since 1984 our 24-hour, national and
international toll-free hotline has received more than 2 million calls,
or, on average, nearly 300 calls per day, intaking new cases and
receiving leads on current cases, which are triaged according to
urgency of the information and the case, and referred to the
investigating law enforcement agency. Information from callers about
runaway children is immediately transmitted to the National Runaway
Switchboard.
Case Management: NCMEC Case Managers serve as the single
point of contact for the searching family and provide technical
assistance to locate abductors and recover missing children.
Case Analysis and Support: Using NCMEC databases, external
sources, and geographic databases, our analysts track leads, identify
patterns among cases, and help coordinate investigations by linking
cases together. In 2006 NCMEC created the Attempted Abduction Program
to analyze attempted abduction trends and patterns and collect
information to assist law enforcement during investigations. Currently,
no other national organization aggressively tracks attempted abductions
across the United States.
Forensic Imaging: NCMEC provides age-progressed
photographs of missing children and reconstructed facial images of
unidentified, deceased children. Since 1990 NCMEC has age-progressed
the photographs of almost 3,300 children; these new photos played a
role in helping to identify and recover 768 children. Of the 117 facial
reconstructions performed by NCMEC forensic artists for law
enforcement, 29 children have been identified.
Cold Case Team: NCMEC works with families, law
enforcement, and medical examiners to resolve long-term missing
children cases, cases of unidentified human remains of victims believed
to be children and young adults, and ``cold'' child homicide cases.
Former homicide detectives review each case, develop a set of
recommendations regarding the investigation, and, if requested, provide
forensic resources. NCMEC is currently handling 468 cases of long-term
missing children, 201 cases of unidentified human remains, and 7
``cold'' child homicide cases.
Photo Distribution: NCMEC is actively distributing photos
of missing children via a wide array of resources, including franked
envelopes of members of Congress. Three hundred and fifty public and
private sector companies and organizations partner with us to
distribute photos, at no cost to NCMEC or taxpayers.
Team Adam: Created in 2003, Team Adam is a rapid, on-site
response and support system that provides no-cost investigative and
technical assistance to local law enforcement. It consists of 62
retired federal, state and local investigators experienced in crimes-
against-children investigations. NCMEC has deployed Team Adam 296 times
in 43 states, which has helped to resolve 321 cases of missing
children.
AMBER Alerts: NCMEC offers technical assistance and
training, in concert with the U.S. Department of Justice, to all state
AMBER Alert programs. We also disseminate AMBER Alert messages to
secondary communications distributors, such as cell phone service
providers.
Website: In 1997 we launched our website,
www.missingkids.com. The use of the web has enabled us to transmit
images and information regarding missing children instantly across
America and around the world. The response has been overwhelming. On
the first day of operation, our website received 3,000 ``hits.'' Today,
we receive more than 1 million ``hits'' every day, and are linked with
hundreds of other sites to provide real-time images of breaking cases
of missing children. To demonstrate the value of this in a real-world
sense, a police officer in Puerto Rico searched our website, identified
a possible match, and then worked with one of our case managers to
identify and recover a child who had been abducted as an infant from
her home seven years earlier.
Publications: NCMEC has designed, written, edited and
published many collaterals and publications for law enforcement, other
child-serving professionals, and the general public. Since 1984, NCMEC
has published more than 42 million copies of its publications.
Training: Each month, in our Jimmy Ryce Law Enforcement
Training Center, NCMEC brings in police chiefs and sheriffs for
training in the policy and practical aspects of missing and exploited
child investigations. In addition, we are also training state and
federal prosecutors, police unit commanders, and many others. We also
conduct on-site training sessions for hospital staff in preventing
infant abductions.
International Cases: NCMEC plays a key role in
international child abduction cases, handling all cases of children
abducted out of the United States, as well as acting as the State
Department's representative on incoming cases under the Hague
Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. Since
September 1995, we have handled 8,264 international child abduction
cases, resulting in the resolution of 4,714 cases. We are using the
Internet to build a network to distribute images worldwide in
partnership with Interpol. We also provide attorney referrals and other
assistance to American parents whose children were abducted to another
country.
While NCMEC's initial mandate was missing children's issues, NCMEC
has also been a leader in the fight against child sexual exploitation.
As technology has evolved and provided those who sexually exploit
children with more sophisticated and insidious tools to prey on their
vulnerability, the challenges of protecting our children have increased
in complexity and number. The mission and resources of NCMEC have
responded to this challenge in the following ways:
Exploited Child Division: In 1997, in response to the
increasing prevalence of child sexual victimization, NCMEC officially
opened our Exploited Child Division (ECD). ECD is responsible for the
receipt, processing, initial analysis and referral to law enforcement
of information about these crimes. As technology continued to advance
and the use of computers became more widespread, Congress recognized
the need to provide the public with a central reporting mechanism for
crimes against children on the Internet--and came to us.
CyberTipline: In response to Congress' request, NCMEC
launched the CyberTipline, www.cybertipline.com, in 1998. The
CyberTipline serves as the national online clearinghouse for
investigative leads and tips and is operated in partnership with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation (``FBI''), the Department of Homeland
Security's Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (``ICE''), the
U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the U.S. Secret Service, the U.S.
Department of Justice's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section and
the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Forces, as well as state and
local law enforcement. Leads are received in seven categories of
crimes:
possession, manufacture and distribution of ography;
online enticement of children for ;
child prostitution;
child-sex tourism;
child sexual molestation (not in the family);
unsolicited obscene material sent to a child; and
misleading domain names.
These leads are reviewed by NCMEC analysts, who visit the reported
sites, examine and evaluate the content, use search tools to try to
identify perpetrators, and provide all lead information to the
appropriate law enforcement agency. The FBI, ICE and Postal Inspection
Service have ``real time'' access to the leads, and all three agencies
assign agents and analysts to work directly out of NCMEC and review the
reports. The results: in the 9 years since the CyberTipline began
operation, NCMEC has received and processed more than 500,000 leads,
resulting in hundreds of arrests and successful prosecutions.
CyberTipline for Internet Service Providers: In 1998,
Congress passed the Protection of Children from Sexual Predators
Act,\3\ which requires that providers of electronic communication
services report apparent ography on their systems to NCMEC. To
facilitate this new role, NCMEC created a separate reporting mechanism
through which these providers can swiftly and efficiently transmit the
images and related information to NCMEC for analysis and referral to
law enforcement. In response to this congressional mandate, NCMEC
handles approximately 500 reports per week.
Child Victim Identification Program (CVIP): CVIP was
formally created in 2002 in response to the Supreme Court's decision
that federal laws prohibiting ography only apply to images of real
children and not to images that simply appear to be children.\4\ CVIP
analysts assist law enforcement and prosecutors by maintaining a
catalog of information about identified child victims, which can be
used to provide the evidence required to get a conviction in court. The
program also serves to assist law enforcement in rescuing children who
are currently being abused but whose identity and location are unknown.
To date, CVIP has processed more than eight million images and movies,
and has cataloged information about more than one thousand child
victims who have been identified by law enforcement agencies around the
world.
Here is but one example of CVIP's success: our analysts received
images of several young girls whom they did not recognize from previous
images. The photos were taken in various rooms in a home. By
scrutinizing the background in each image, our analysts detected clues
to the location of the girls: an ad for a local convenience store, an
envelope with the name of a storage facility, and a Girl Scout uniform.
A team of federal, state and local law enforcement used this
information to find the girls and arrest their abuser. He was the
grandfather of two of the girls as well as their legal guardian. He was
convicted and given a sentence of 750 years in prison. None of the
girls had told anyone about what he had done to them. Their abuse would
be continuing today if no one had tried to find them.
Partnerships with Internet Industry: Last year, six
Internet industry leaders, AOL, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Earthlink and
United Online, created a Technology Coalition to work with NCMEC to
develop and deploy technology solutions that disrupt the ability of
predators to use the Internet to exploit children or traffic in
ography. The Technology Coalition brings together the collective
experience, knowledge and expertise of its members and represents a
significant step towards making the world safer for our children.
NetSmartz411: This is a first-of-its-kind, online service
operated by NCMEC to answer questions about Internet safety, computers
and the web. It is provided at no cost to the public, in partnership
with the Qwest Foundation. Concerned parents, children, or anyone, can
directly access the NetSmartz411 library to search for information as
well as contact NCMEC experts to ask questions related to online safety
and the Internet.
Safety Education Campaigns: NCMEC has partnered with
federal agencies, industry leaders and public service organizations to
create campaigns to educate parents and children about Internet safety.
These safety messages include ``Help Delete Online Predators,'' ``Don't
Believe the Type,'' ``Type Smart. Post Wisely'' and ``Think Before You
Post.''
In recent years, Congress has asked NCMEC to undertake a number of
new challenges and responsibilities beyond its core functions. We have
welcomed them and believe that NCMEC is well suited to take on these
tasks. Further, we consider these initiatives to be an integral part of
our mandate as the national resource center and clearinghouse on
missing and exploited children. These new challenges include the
following:
LOCATER: Congress asked NCMEC to develop and implement a
program to enhance basic law enforcement technology in responding to
missing child cases. NCMEC created LOCATER, a web-based program which
enables police to create high-quality color posters for local
distribution when a child disappears as well as disseminate that
information online to other law enforcement agencies, the media and
other outlets. NCMEC has approximately 4,000 active LOCATER users.
NetSmartz Internet Safety Resource: When Boys & Girls
Clubs of America launched its effort to create technology centers in
all of its clubs, Congress asked that NCMEC develop a state-of-the-art
Internet safety resource to ensure that these centers could be used
safely by children. Thus, NetSmartz was born--an interactive,
educational safety resource for children, parents, educators and law
enforcement that uses age-appropriate, 3-dimensional activities to
teach children how to stay safer on the Internet. NetSmartz is now
available at no cost to other youth organizations, schools, and the
general public at www.netsmartz.org. Since its inception, 16 state
Attorneys General have recommended the use of NetSmartz in their public
schools; currently, all 50 states have schools that use NetSmartz.
Background Checks for Non-Profit Child-Serving
Organizations: In response to Congress' request in 2003,\5\ NCMEC
launched a pilot program to conduct national criminal history
background checks on applicants for volunteer positions with non-profit
organizations that provide services to children. Because it is a fact
that child molesters will seek legitimate access to children, these
organizations are particularly attractive to predators. To date, our
Background Check Unit (BCU) has conducted over 33,000 fitness
determinations based on criminal histories. A startling number of
applicants were found to have lied about not having criminal histories,
which included violent crimes and crimes against children. This project
has demonstrated not only the need for fingerprint-based checks of the
national criminal history database, as opposed to name-based checks of
state databases, but also the need to make these comprehensive checks
available at the lowest possible cost to ensure that these
organizations are able to provide the best protection to the children
they serve.
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita/National Emergency Child
Locator Center: The Department of Justice asked NCMEC to lead federal
and local efforts to recover the more than 5,000 children displaced
during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. Team Adam consultants were
deployed to the affected areas to serve as an on-site rapid response
and support system, providing investigative and technical assistance to
local law enforcement. Team Adam consultants also set up safe areas for
missing children in the evacuee shelters and, working directly from
these shelters, electronically transmitted information and photos of
the children directly to NCMEC headquarters. To manage the volume of
Katrina/Rita-related calls, NCMEC created a dedicated Katrina/Rita
Missing Person Hotline which we operated in addition to our existing
Call Center Hotline. In the aftermath of the hurricanes, NCMEC handled
more than 34,000 Katrina/Rita-related calls. NCMEC's relationship with
the media proved vital to our efforts--because of the ongoing
television coverage of NCMEC's Katrina/Rita Operation, millions of
people saw the photos of displaced children and got information that
led to their reunification. As a result of NCMEC's expertise and
ability to rapidly mobilize critical resources, all (100%) of the more
than 5,000 missing/displaced children cases reported to NCMEC in the
aftermath of the storms were resolved within 6 months.
In 2006, Congress passed legislation to create the National
Emergency Child Locator Center at NCMEC \6\ to similarly handle all
future such disasters. We have developed a Disaster Response Plan and
are actively working with the Department of Homeland Security, the
Federal Emergency Management Agency and the American Red Cross to
establish policies and procedures necessary for the Center's operation.
The Financial Coalition Against ography: At the request of
Senator Richard Shelby, NCMEC brought together leading banks, credit
card companies, third party payment companies and Internet service
companies, in a joint effort to eradicate the multi-billion-dollar
commercial ography industry from the Internet.
Sex Offender Tracking Team: At the request of the U.S.
Marshals Service, under its mandate per the Adam Walsh Child Protection
and Safety Act,\7\ NCMEC created the Sex Offender Tracking Team (SOTT)
to serve as the central information and analysis hub to help locate
non-compliant registered sex offenders. Analysts provide information
upon request to federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. In
addition, SOTT analysts compare NCMEC's attempted abduction data,
online predator data, and child abduction data to identify potential
linkages with non-compliant sex offenders being sought by law
enforcement. This information will be used to create more effective
prevention and response strategies regarding these offenders.
The legacy of missing and exploited children in the United States
can be seen in new laws, heightened public awareness, improved response
from law enforcement, and unprecedented national attention to
prevention and education. The recent resurgence of awareness of this
ongoing problem is a call to action to all law- and policymakers across
the country. Enormous progress has been made to better protect our
nation's children in the past 20 years, but our children deserve even
more.
Since 1984, per your mandate and with your support, NCMEC has been
proud to serve as America's national resource center and clearinghouse
for missing and exploited children.
Madame Chairwoman, we are deeply grateful for the Subcommittee's
leadership and support, and, as always, stand ready to work with you
and your committee to bring more missing children home and keep every
child safe.
endnotes
\1\ Children as Victims: 1999 National Report Series. Washington,
D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office of
Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, May 2000, page 6.
\2\ David Finkelhor and Richard Ormrod. Reporting Crimes Against
Juveniles. Washington, D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice,
November 1999, page 3.
\3\ P.L. 105-314.
\4\ Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition, 535 U.S. 234 (2002).
\5\ The Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the
Exploitation of Children Today (PROTECT) Act, P.L. 108-21.
\6\ Defense Appropriations Bill, P.L. 109-295.
\7\ P.L. 109-248.
______
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you, Mr. Allen.
Ms. Alberts?
STATEMENT OF BETH ALBERTS, CEO, TEXAS CENTER FOR THE MISSING
Ms. Alberts. Thank you so much for letting me come from the
small state of Texas today to talk to you.
During 2006, there were more than 650,000 children reported
missing in the United States and more than 60,000 of those are
in my home state of Texas. Of these Texas cases, at the end of
2006, 5,182 of those children remained missing. Those are the
kinds of things that make me lie awake at night and wonder if
we are ever going to get all of those kids back.
I beg you, when you are looking at the issue of missing and
homeless children, not to differentiate between them, even if a
child left home voluntarily. Any child who is away from home,
from a stable, loving environment, is a child at risk.
No child chooses to be marginalized. Children never
knowingly choose to expose themselves exploitation and
victimization. A child who chooses to run away is always
running to a better place, they hope, than the place they have
been. They do not consciously choose to become vulnerable to
predators and exploiters.
Children who live on the street have three ways to support
themselves: They steal from us, our communities; they sell
drugs; and they sell themselves. Many resort to all three,
creating yet more victims.
It has also been said that children are our most valuable
resource, but this is seldom reflected in our practices as a
society. With our national focus on terrorism, we worry more
about an enemy we cannot see, cannot know and whose motives we
cannot understand than those who threaten our children daily.
Make no mistake, the animals who prey on our children are
terrorists of the worst order, and they target our most
vulnerable citizens, those who represent our future, our
children.
Predators systematically and methodically threaten and
terrorize our children on all fronts, whether they are runaway
or homeless children, those threatened by their own family
members or by ographers who line their pockets with the profits
from the sale of innocents.
Our defense must be no less systematic and methodical. The
primary motive for stranger abduction is sexual assault of the
child, and child molesters have on average 117 victims prior to
their first arrest.
Children are no longer safe from these terrorists online,
on the streets, in their homes or even in their beds. And what
is our response? Very little response, until that particular
chicken comes home to roost in our backyard. And then we are
outraged and we pick up the mantle and carry on.
But we must act now, before another young life is lost,
before another child loses the very innocence that defines
childhood.
There is good news. There is hope. There are concerned
citizens working together, such as the member organizations of
the Association of Missing and Exploited Children's
Organizations and the National Center who work tirelessly to
ensure that no stone is left unturned in the battle to protect
our children and to punish the guilty.
The AMBER Alert program has been so successful and has
accomplished so much. The multi-jurisdictional, multi-
discipline child abduction response teams now are poised to
take this critical notification system one step further by
providing for an immediate, full-scale response to a critical
missing child incident.
The attorney general's Project Safe Childhood has begun
successful efforts to pull together teams to wage war on
Internet predators. And as a response to continued threats to
our kids, small, independent efforts are popping up across
communities daily.
I am very proud of the staff and volunteers of the Texas
Center for the Missing for being on the front lines, providing
both leadership and training to others in the field for all of
these critical programs.
Unhappily, I must report to you that not one of these
programs is adequately funded and few, if any, receive a penny
of government funding at the local, state or national level.
Local grassroots efforts are the most effective method for
delivering prevention efforts and saving children's lives.
If only a fraction of our war on terror dollars was devoted
to the protection of our children, we could dramatically reduce
the number of children traumatized.
Margaret Mead said, ``Never doubt that a small group of
thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it
is the only thing that ever has.''
I believe that we at the Texas Center for the Missing,
through our extensive collaborative partnerships, and through
our champions like Congressman Lampson, that we have begun to
have a tremendous impact on this problem. But true social
change does not happen in isolation. It happens through the
concerted efforts of a diverse group of caring, committing
citizens focusing on a complex issues and seeing, really
seeing, not just the forest, but the trees.
We must ensure the replication of these collaborative
networks 10,000-fold are our country and the world to save both
our children and ourselves from a future more bleak than we can
imagine.
Thank you.
[The statement of Ms. Alberts follows:]
Prepared Statement of Beth Alberts, CEO, Texas Center for the Missing
The problem
During 2006 there were 662,228 children reported missing in the
United States and 60,729 in my home State of Texas (The National Crime
Information Center, 2007). In Texas, 5,182 of those cases remained
active at the end of 2006, and I lie awake at night wondering if we
will be able to recover all of those missing children.
Any child who is away from a stable and loving home is a child at
risk. No child chooses to be marginalized. Children never knowingly
make a choice to expose themselves to exploitation and victimization. A
child who chooses to run away is always running from a bad place to
what they hope is a better place. They do not consciously choose to
become vulnerable to predators and exploiters. It has often been said
that children are our most valuable resource, but this is not reflected
in our practices as a society.
The National Runaway Switchboard reports between 1.6 and 2.8
million youth run away in a year and that youth aged 12 to 17 are at
higher risk for homelessness than adults.\1\ Despite these startling
statistics, law enforcement training academies are not required to
provide any Amber Alert or missing persons investigative tools,
training, or resources. Local nonprofit agencies must fill the void.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Hammer, H; Finkehor, D. & Sedlak, A. (2002). Runaway/Thrownaway
Children: National Estimates and Characteristics. National Incidence
Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Thrownaway Children. Office
of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The solution: Local nonprofit leadership and collaboration
Harris County, Texas, represents Texas Center for the Missing's
largest client base. Harris is the largest of the 13 counties in Texas
Center for the Missing's primary service area and has a larger
population than 24 states in U. S. From 2005 to 2006, the number of
children reported missing rose from 11,648 to 14,809 and in Harris
County alone, from 8,905 to 11,134--both of these represent more than a
25% increase! Might I repeat, this is a 25% increase in just one year.
Despite these alarming numbers, there is no dedicated funding for local
prevention efforts or law enforcement investigation and response.
Yes, there is some good news. Strategic partnerships are being
formed across the United States and North America. Collaborative
efforts like Project Safe Childhood and regional Child Abduction
Response Teams are set to have a significant impact through both
prevention and recovery of missing children. However, neither of these
vital projects is funded. Local organizations are required to tap into
their already stretched budgets to provide the people, the time, the
resources, and the coordination to make these efforts successful.
Roles of Texas Center for the Missing: A model for local efforts
Texas Center for the Missing offers, or coordinates the delivery
of, services to meet the needs of the entire spectrum of missing
persons issues. I would encourage other communities to implement a
similar comprehensive community child safety plan that should include:
Programs to educate parents and caregivers in the ways to
safeguard children on the streets and on the Internet, and exactly what
to do, step-by-step, if a child does go missing;
Encouraging families to discuss safety issues and to
create their own emergency response plan;
Programs to educate our children in ways to stay safe in
our community and on the Internet, and alternatives to running away;
Fast public notification of a missing child via the Amber
Alert for abducted children, or other systems for those missing
children who were not abducted;
Timely, coordinated responses to endangered missing child
incidents; and
Follow-up and aftercare for victims and families.
Texas Center for the Missing's advocacy and support services for
victims and their families include guidance in reporting and finding a
missing or abducted child, guidance in finding a runaway child, a
resource database for abduction survivors and their families, and
liaison support between families and law enforcement including case
management, reunification, and information and referral services.
Amber Alert
The National Center on Missing and Exploited Children reports that
there are 121 Amber Alert programs across the United States credited
with recovering 236 children. In the 13-county Houston Region, covering
more than 12,000 square miles and a population of more than 5.5 million
people, we have issued 65 Amber Alerts representing 70 children. Of
these, children in 58 cases were recovered safely, 3 were found
deceased, and 4 remain missing. This is an 89% success rate and
exemplifies what a powerful tool the Amber Alert can be.
The Amber Alert has made a huge difference in missing child cases;
however, it is imperative to understand what the Amber Alert is and
what it is not. The Amber Alert is a very effective tool for law
enforcement to enlist help in tracking down an abductor, the abductor's
vehicle or the missing child. It is a way for the media and the general
public to assist in the recovery of an innocent child and a malicious
predator.
The Amber Alert is not a panacea. It will never replace a thorough,
efficient, and effective law enforcement investigation. It will not
replace vigilant supervision of children by trusted adults nor will it
replace missing ion and education programs. It will not replace
adequate prison sentences and good criminal justice supervision of
probationers or parolees and, in particular, child sex offenders.
Rapists and child molesters are serial offenders. It is well documented
within the mental health community that most sex offenders are beyond
rehabilitation (``compared to non-sex offenders released from State
prisons, released sex offenders were 4 times more likely to be
rearrested for a sex crime.'' \2\ ).
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\2\ Report on the Recidivism of Sex Offenders Released from Prison
in 1994. U.S. Department of Justice-Office of Justice Programs: Bureau
of Justice Statistics.
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Law enforcement officers are the only ones who can issue an Amber
Alert for an abducted child. It is a critical element in the resolution
of a child abduction, but it is only a part of what we must do to keep
children safe. We must each do our part by protecting children and
responding when they are in danger. It is my fervent hope that someday
soon we will not need the Amber Alert, the Child Abduction Response
Team or a National Missing Children's Day because all of our
community's children will be safe.
Southeast Texas Child Abduction Response Team (SETCART)
The Southeast Texas Child Abduction Response Team (SETCART) is an
effort to bring seasoned investigators, tenured prosecutors, search-
and-rescue volunteers and victims' advocates together to work the most
urgent child abduction cases. The Southeast Texas Child Abduction
Response Team will enable the immediate deployment of all necessary
resources for qualifying cases and therefore positively impact these
serious, life-threatening scenarios.
Texas Center for the Missing and the Houston Regional Amber Alert
are providing leadership for the development and implementation of the
Southeast Texas Child Abduction Response Team. Our effort was the first
in Texas and serves the region that historically has the most missing
child cases in the state. With over 150 law enforcement agencies in the
Southeast Texas region, this is a Herculean effort that requires
unbiased leadership and strong relationships within the community.
Currently, more than 70 law enforcement agencies in our region have
signed on to SETCART.
SETCART is a multi-disciplinary, cross-jurisdictional, pre-planned
and coordinated response to cases of endangered missing children and
child abductions based upon a highly successful model system operating
in Florida. While Florida has a state mandate and state funding with
which to implement their CART process, Texas is not so fortunate.
SETCART is a grassroots-driven effort in which participation is purely
voluntary for all of our member agencies.
Missing Persons Response Kit
Texas Center for the Missing has also developed a Missing Persons
Response Kit for law enforcement agencies so that they have at their
fingertips the tools and contacts to provide the fastest, most
effective response in the critical period after a child is missing.
Amber Alert and Missing Persons Investigation training is provided upon
delivery of each resource kit. Contents of the Resource Kits can be
found in Appendix A.
Southeast Texas Search and Rescue Alliance (SETSARA)
One of the greatest achievements of Texas Center for the Missing
has been the coordination of the Southeast Texas Search and Rescue
Alliance (SETSARA): a coalition of volunteer search-and-rescue groups
and law enforcement partners. Prior to the creation of SETSARA, law
enforcement had little confidence in the professionalism of search-and-
rescue experts and, therefore, did not access this important resource.
To compound the issue, there was a mutual feeling of distrust among the
individual search-and-rescue groups so that communication was limited
and duplication of efforts was common. Now local groups work together
to offer effective and efficient search resources to law enforcement
and the community.
Formed in 2001, SETSARA provides its membership with search
training and public safety agencies (e.g., law enforcement, fire
department, and wildlife agencies) with awareness, education, and
search services. By providing necessary resources to law enforcement
(and only the resources they need and request), we enable law
enforcement agencies to focus on what they do best--the investigation.
Association of Missing and Exploited Children's
Organizations (AMECO)
AMECO is an organization of member agencies in the United States
and Canada who provide services to families with missing and exploited
children. Our mission is to build and nurture an association of
credible, ethical and effective non-profit organizations that serve
this vulnerable population.
In partnership with the National Center on Missing and Exploited
Children and the International Center on Missing and Exploited
Children, the member organizations of the Association of Missing and
Exploited Children's Organizations, of which Texas Center for the
Missing is one, serve hundreds of thousands of children and families
each year.
These passionate, professional, caring staff and volunteers work
diligently to protect children. Most of us feel it is a mission, a
calling, and not just a job. However, we are truly fighting an uphill
battle. Two things threaten the work we do: a lack of awareness on the
part of the community and legislators about the severity of the
problem, and the lack of funding to support these critical life-saving
efforts.
Our greatest challenge has been that funding dollars are scarce
while demand for our services continues to increase!
Crime-Stoppers
Another collaborative partnership that Texas Center for the Missing
has found to be successful is working with the local Crime Stoppers
organization. Crime Stoppers of Houston works closely with Texas Center
for the Missing and the Houston Amber Alert to maximize the publicity
of open Amber Alert cases on the anniversary of the child's abduction.
The press conferences convened by Crime Stoppers of Houston provide
another tool for law enforcement agencies to secure leads in a cold
case.
The Internet Threat
I believe the battle to protect our children has moved, largely,
from the street to the Internet. This is not good news. Unfortunately,
the Internet has re-defined who is accessible and expanded the victim
pool exponentially. A single predator can communicate with hundreds of
children and set them up for victimization. Predators share their
victims with other predators and manipulate children to self-exploit by
sending s across the internet which are then shared among these heinous
criminals.
Locally, Texas Center for the Missing participates in the US
Attorney's Southern District Office efforts to implement this vital
program. Prevention is key to educate children on the dangers they face
online, as well as how to avoid self-exploitation. The very simple
concept that, ``Digital is forever.'' is often lost on the most
impressionable in our society--young teenagers who are looking for
``safe'' ways to rebel against their parents and expand their
boundaries as young adults. To address this issue, Texas Center for the
Missing has developed a cadre of internet safety education programs
which are modeled closely upon the National Center for Missing and
Exploited Children's NetSmartz program. Preventing a child from being
abused or exploited is the ultimate goal in all of our educational
programs. A complete list of our educational programs can be found in
Appendix B.
Project Safe Childhood
Guided by the leadership of the Attorney General, Project Safe
Childhood (PSC) aims to combat the proliferation of technology-
facilitated sexual exploitation crimes against children. The threat of
sexual predators soliciting children for physical sexual contact is
well-known and serious; the danger of the production, distribution, and
possession of ography is equally dramatic and disturbing. The response
to these growing problems must be coordinated, comprehensive, and
robust. It must aim to investigate and prosecute vigorously as well as
protect and assist victimized children. At the same time, it must
recognize the need for a broad, community-based effort to protect our
children and to guarantee to future generations the opportunity to grow
safely into adulthood.
Project Safe Childhood is a definite step in the right direction,
pulling together diverse teams working together to keep children safer
online, to snare Internet Predators and prosecute them to the fullest.
Unfortunately, the predators are cunning, incredibly technologically
savvy and highly adaptable to all of the obstacles we place in front of
them. We must arm ourselves better against this crime on all levels or
we will remain seriously outgunned. As Attorney General Gonzales says,
``We can not prosecute our way out of this problem.'' Sadly, this
program, too, is unfunded.
jenny's story*
In January, 2006, a petite, 15-year-old girl from League
City, TX, was lured away over the Internet by a 26-year-old man
who lived in her area. He picked her up, took her to his house,
drugged and raped her and shared her with two of his friends,
one of whom carved Xs with a razor blade from one of her pelvic
bones across to the other. 18 months later she and her family
are still struggling with their recovery while having to deal
with the court, the DA's office and the fact that one of the
perpetrators of this heinous crime is on the run and may never
face justice. This traumatized victim and family strive
everyday to get their lives back to normal.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Jenny's name has been changed to protect her identity.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Many civilians as well as law enforcement officers do not
feel that internet lures are a danger or on some level believe
that a child who leaves of their own volition is not endangered
or does not deserve emergency response. Jenny's story
exemplifies how a child's single poor choice can lead to a
nightmarish experience that becomes a life sentence for and her
entire family.
Next steps
The U. S. Attorney General's Project Safe Childhood, Jessica's Law,
which has been passed in various states across the country, and the
recently passed Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act provide even
greater support of programs to arm children and families as well as
punish those who would rob our children of their innocence.
We are fortunate to have all of the partnerships and programs
discussed in this document, but it will take all of us, working
together, to truly protect our children. In the past, we could let our
children play in the front yard without standing guard over them. In
the past, we could put our children to bed at night and comfortably
expect to find them safely there the next morning. Unfortunately, these
two simple acts, and many more, can no longer be taken for granted. We
have seen children snatched out of their yards and their school and
play areas, off the streets in our communities, and from their very
homes, that place we all think of as a haven.
rachel
Robert Cooke, whose daughter Rachel has been missing since
January 2002 says ``When I first met the director of Texas
EquuSearch, he told me my wife Janet and I are now in a special
club. It's a club no one wants to join. It's a club of sorrow
and grief. It's the club of parents and families of missing
children.
The club is full of emotions. There is anger at the person
who took your loved one. The worst feeling of all is
helplessness. What can I do? What haven't I done? We've posted
flyers and passed out bumper stickers and buttons, but nothing
has brought our Rachel home.
Many sleepless nights occur in the club. When you are able to
sleep and you awake, you wake up to a reality far worse than
any nightmare. The guilt is overwhelming. Why was I not there
to protect her? Why didn't I teach her how to protect herself?
I am her father; it was my job to protect her. Well, I say it's
time to reduce the membership drive for this club''.
Funding
Nothing to which I have ever been exposed has affected me as deeply
as this issue. I have never been more convinced that working together,
caring people can make a difference. I have never been more convinced
that we can, we must, do more to protect our children and keep their
families from joining ``the club.''
Unfortunately, most people believe that the missing children
problem is solely the province of law enforcement and is already well-
funded by our tax dollars. As a result, concerned citizens are unaware
of the need to support this effort. The truth is a very different
story.
Did you know that there are no designated funds for our Amber Alert
system? There are no monies at the local, state or federal level to
help offset the costs associated with administering this important
effort. Each year in the thirteen-county Houston-Galveston region,
populated by more than 5 million people, 12,000--15,000 children are
reported missing, and Texas Center for the Missing is responsible for
all costs associated with administering the Amber Alert in our high-
need region.
Legislation and other public policy issues to pursue
Comprehensive Funding Tied to Collaborative Efforts
Establish Statewide Minimum Standards for Certification
for Search and Rescue Volunteers
Give parole officers the right to enter sex offenders
residences so law enforcement officers do not have to wait hours for
warrants when looking for an abducted child
Conclusion
Regardless of the circumstances under which a child is missing or
homeless--abduction, runaway or thrownaway--each of those children,
dulled by that trauma, represents a bright future--our future. However,
we must devote resources to helping them regain the innocence and sense
of hope that will inspire them to become an active, caring part of the
communities in which we live. Otherwise, we have condemned them and
ourselves to less--less quality of life, less security, less of a
safety-net for those closest to us.
When I was a child, I dreamed of having a child, loving and
nurturing a young life. When I realize that dream and had my two
daughters, I poured my heart and soul and most of my energy into
protecting them and raising them. They were my number one priority, as
they should be.
Too often children are not the number one priority of their
parents, or of the communities and society in which they are reared.
Lip-service is paid to them in grand speeches and editorials, and
through poorly funded programs that address piece-meal programs instead
of servicing the spectrum of comprehensive needs.
Ultimately, we are judged not on what we say but what we do, and
children learn from us too--not from listening to what we say but by
watching and emulating what we do, and recognizing where they fall in
our priorities. I believed while raising my young children that the
world was, at least generally, a safe place. I wonder what young
mothers think now.
Unfortunately, adults no longer represent figures of authority to
our children, those to whom respect is due. Adults are seen as threats
to, or targets of, children. However, we must not blame the child. The
child learns by example, by our actions not our proselytizing.
We can blame the media, the celebrities, and law enforcement, but
we are the ones who must bear the brunt of the blame--parents,
grandparents, citizens of the communities in which our children grow
up, decision-makers and policy-makers. We must ask ourselves each day
``Am I putting the welfare of our children first?''
We are fortunate in the Houston area to have a comprehensive
network of organizations that mobilize and deploy resources to help
save children. Most areas don't. However, would it not be better to
eliminate the problem of missing children by putting child predators on
notice that we won't tolerate them targeting our children, and if they
do, we will hunt them down like the animals they are?
Predators like Joseph Smith, who murdered Carlie Brucia in Florida
in 2004 and will never be released from prison, will never victimize
another child, but those like him are legion. Our best defense against
his type are more, and better-funded, programs like the ones AMECO
Organizations offer to parents and children in how to reduce the ways
for them to become victims.
Each time a child has been abducted--my heart is crushed, and I
want to rewind the clock to see what could have been done differently
to prevent the tragedy. But all I can do is help when I can and stay
steadfast in my convictions that we can reduce these incidences.
Working in the missing child field has changed my life forever. I am
convinced there is no more challenging or rewarding work, nor has my
contribution to any field been more important. Together we can save
lives and childhood's innocence.
For the victim and family involved in an abduction or Internet
luring case--the victimization is a ``life sentence''. Their lives are
normal the day before the incident, but during and after it there lives
will never be the same again.
______
[Additional materials submitted by Ms. Alberts follow:]
Appendix A.--Law Enforcement Missing Person Resource Kit Inventory List
Pre-Planning
When It's Not an Amber Alert: Developing a Missing Child
Response Plan
Law Enforcement Policy and Procedures for Reports of
Missing and Abducted Children
Amber Alert
Houston Regional Amber Plan Brochure
Missing Children, the (Houston) Amber Alert and You
Website Overview (www.amber-plan.net)
User Name and Password
Navigating the Online Web Activation System
Contact Information
Houston Regional Amber Plan (includes After Action Report
Form)
Texas Amber Alert Network
Amber Alert (National) Brochure
Amber Alert Fact Sheet
Amber Alert Best Practices Guide for Public Information
Officers
Amber Alert Best Practices Guide for Broadcasters and
Other Media Outlets
Local Resources and Investigative Checklists, Alert Systems, and Guides
Resources for Law Enforcement--Texas Center for the
Missing
Investigative Checklist for First Responders
Alzheimer's and Related Disorders Missing Person Checklist
Lost Person Questionnaire
A Child is Missing Flyer
Critical Reach Alert System Packet
FBI's Child Abduction Response Plan: An Investigative
Guide
Missing and Abducted Children: A Law Enforcement Guide to
Case Investigation and Program Management
Recovery and Reunification of Missing Children: A Team
Approach
Texas Checklists, NCIC, DNA Tools, and Clearinghouse Services
Basic Checklist for Working Unidentified Person Cases
(Texas)
NCIC $M Messages
Information on the Texas Missing Persons DNA Database
Texas Missing Persons CODIS DNA Database Sample Collection
Kit
Sexual Assault Medical Examinations Reimbursement Form for
Law Enforcement Agencies
Laboratory of Forensic Anthropology and Human
Identification: Case Submission Information
Texas DPS Missing Persons Clearinghouse Brochure
Texas DPS Special Crimes Service Overview
Texas DPS Missing Persons Clearinghouse State and Federal
Missing Persons Statutes
National Resources
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC)
Resources for Law Enforcement Professionals
NCMEC Nationwide Support Services
Association of Missing and Exploited Children's
Organizations (AMECO) Membership List
National Association of Search and Rescue (www.nasar.org)
Safe Return: Alzheimer's Disease Guide for Law Enforcement
Resources/Websites of U.S. Departments
NCMEC General Information and Publications
National Training Available
Family Resource Packet
When Your Child is Missing: A Family Survival Guide
Texas Crime Victims' Compensation Application Form
(English)
Texas Crime Victims' Compensation Application Form
(Spanish)
Victim Support Resource Database (Greater Houston Area)
A Family Resource Guide on International Parental
Kidnapping
Alzheimer's Association Brochure
SafeReturn--Wandering: Who's at Risk?
Covenant House-Texas Flyer
Discs and Software
Simple Leads Management System
Federal Resources on Missing and Exploited Children: A
Directory for Law Enforcement and Other Public and Private Agencies
______
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Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you very much.
There are many of us that sit on the Education Committee
that feel very strongly--before I came here, I was a nurse, so
I kind of look at things holistically. And many of us are
looking at those young families from when the child is born to
be able to reach out and give help to them at that particular
time, hopefully so that we won't be running into problems later
on, working with the parents and certainly working with the
newborn child.
But, with that, Rusty and Mr. Rolle, I guess I would want
to hear from you. You have been through the justice system, you
have been through foster homes, you have been through homeless
shelters.
Where do you feel could be an improvement as far as where
did the system drop both of you? Where did we lose you, as a
society? What could have been done, or what do you think could
have been done? Because I am sure you probably thought about
that, if somebody had gotten to you at an earlier age to work
with you, or did you have to go through it, just grow out of
it, or with the help that you got?
Could you put your mike on?
Mr. Rolle. Today, I had a conversation with Vicki. She runs
the Network for Youth. And I didn't know of half of the
services that were in New York City. And I didn't know how to
get to the place that would have told me where the services
was.
I kind of just stumbled on people in the community just
trying--when I got kicked out of my mother's house, I was
walking down the street and a friend of mine who was in the
theater group said, you can stay at my house. I had this big
bag of stuff in my hand, and he said, what happened? I told him
what happened. But that was only because I was a part of that
group.
And this was out of our own pocket. We met at the local
school, so it was just her ingenuity, trying to figure out how
to do something, because she just had a heart. Even myself,
with the work that I do. So a lot of it is, I guess, public
awareness, or in entertainment we say marketing, to be known.
I don't know, sitting on the subway, I can see a place, see
signs or see something that is attractive to a young person
that he can say, all right, if need something, I could call
this number. And I never knew of any places like that. So I
think that was missing.
And then for me, personally, I think where I got lost a
little bit was the arts in the school for me, being in school--
not so much the arts, but a place to kind of just talk, if that
makes sense. When I heard him speak, it touched me, because I
feel like that is why I couldn't pay attention in school, or I
acted out, was because I didn't have a place that I could talk
about those things.
Who wants to hear about some kid, what he is dealing with?
So that is where I kind of got lost.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you.
Rusty?
Mr. Booker. I guess I could say, going through everything I
went through, I guess I can say I always felt like I could go
to Safe Place to get what I needed done.
Chairwoman McCarthy. How did you find out about the Safe
Place, just to go to them?
Mr. Booker. When I was 12, my previous foster mother told
me about it and she told me to go to the library and ask for
it. And it took me a couple of hours. I sat there thinking,
because I was kind of scared about what was going to happen
afterwards, after I got there.
But I finally got the courage to walk up there and ask for
it. And, like I said, when I got there, I talked to somebody
and within 2 weeks I was with that previous foster mother that
had told me about it.
And I don't feel like the state really did anything after I
left there to find me somewhere to go. They just stuck me back
in an abusive home. And there, I just went downhill. I once
again was in that home and it wasn't doing anything for me.
I had nobody to talk to, was roaming the streets, selling
drugs, doing drugs, just doing whatever I pleased. And nobody
was ever there for me.
Chairwoman McCarthy. And I guess just a follow-up question,
for the rest of the panel, especially with what kind of
background checks are we doing for the foster homes that these
kids are going into?
And what are we doing as far as when you talked about the
first thing I was talking about--obviously, we should be
fingerprinting those that are working with children. We should
be doing the same thing with the elderly, in nursing homes.
I happen to think we should be going both ways, because
there is a lot of abuse in nursing homes, also. But I will go
back with what is the answer? When these kids go into foster
homes and they turn out to be bad homes and these kids have no
place to go?
Mr. Allen. Madam Chair, clearly, there are an extraordinary
number of committed, dedicated people doing great work. I mean,
what we hear around the country is there just aren't enough.
And there are inadequate resources to support these alternative
programs and been the basic social services programs.
And state and local governments are just overwhelmed with
the sheer magnitude of the problem. And I think this is a very
complex answer, and it is one that involves more resources and
also involves--you talk about background screening.
We have dealt with these cases all the time that make it to
us and we just have to build systems where the protection of
the child is paramount in all of this. And I think there are
ways to do that, but it is complicated.
Chairwoman McCarthy. I will finish up with this. I know
back in New York many years ago, actually, my neighbor took in
foster children for a long time. One of the problems that she
came across was back then every 2 years, even though the
children were with her, happy, they had to be moved out so
there would be no attachment. Thank goodness we have outgrown
that, hopefully to a large extent.
With that, Mr. Platts?
Mr. Platts. Thank you, Madam Chair.
My thanks again to all of our witnesses and, Rusty and Mr.
Rolle, or Kazi, if you prefer, especially the two of you, being
willing to come and share your personal experiences and
stories. It certainly helps us better understand the real-life
aspect of these issues.
And I commend your courage in doing so and through your
efforts of ensuring that your challenges result in positive
outcomes for others. And that through your efforts here today
and not just today in testifying, but in your work, in your
community, in your efforts, that you are going to make a
difference for others. And so I especially thank you.
And I would like to recognize, and I don't know if he is
comfortable, and I don't know who he is, so if he is not, but
if Mr. Bill, as referenced here, if you would like to stand and
be recognized on behalf of all of those who work with children.
[Applause.]
We appreciate your helping Rusty to be here and, as I say,
in kind of being recognized on behalf of all of our men and
women throughout the country who are working on behalf of youth
to improve and ensure the safety of their lives, so thank you.
Mr. Allen, I want to follow up, and you talked about it in
your written testimony and in your oral testimony, about the
background checks, this effort to try to ensure that predators
don't get access through a legitimate program. Did you say 3
percent on average?
Mr. Allen. We have done in the pilot that was set up under
the PROTECT Act, the FBI runs the records, and then we do
fitness determinations so that we communicate to the youth
organization on a red-light, yellow-light, green-light basis.
We have reviewed 25,000 applicants, and of that number,
roughly 7 percent had criminal records and slightly less than 3
percent had what we considered disqualifying criminal records.
This is in every case knowing that they are being fingerprinted
and knowing that they are going to be subjected to a national
FBI-based criminal history background check.
Mr. Platts. Given that that is 3 percent of that 25,000, so
we are talking a significant number, that are seeking access to
children that shouldn't be, what happens once you make the
identification?
I guess, does law enforcing in any way follow up on that
information? Are those who obviously present information either
falsely, that they have no reason--I imagine some of those 3
percent in their adjudication probably are prohibited from
having contact with children.
Is there any specific follow-up mechanism to ensure that
not just they are prevented from being in that program, because
the worry is they will go to another program and not get
caught?
Mr. Allen. Yes. Now, I think the key point in all of this
is in many of these instances, these offenders have not done
something wrong by applying to be a volunteer, absent some kind
of violation of their parole condition or probation condition,
but where possible, where actionable, we are making sure that
the appropriate law enforcement agency gets that information.
Mr. Platts. Because by them having it, there may be
something in their parole that says no contact and the fact
that they actively sought would then be evidence that they are
violating that parole.
Mr. Allen. Yes.
Mr. Platts. Okay, related to that, and, Ms. Alberts, I
think it was in your testimony you talked about access to
parolees and parole officers being given more access on a
timely manner where there is belief that perhaps a child has
been abducted or sexually abused by someone on parole.
Ms. Alberts. Absolutely. There are several cases. If you
will recall, the Jessica Lunsford case, that was a case right
there where she was in that parolee's residence, that had they
not had to wait for a warrant, something could have been
hopefully avoided at that time.
We just felt that, in working with our law enforcement
agencies, that the probation and parole officers have rights of
access to the domicile for welfare checks or those kinds of
things. And why not in a case, during those critical first
hours that a child is missing, if we can close in and close
that gap, I think that would be phenomenal.
Mr. Platts. I assume that most of that is probably going to
be driven by state law in most prosecutions.
Ms. Alberts. Right, right.
Mr. Platts. Although there are federal prosecutions as
well. And I guess I was under the belief that someone on parole
basically gave up their right to privacy while they are on
parole. But your understanding is that if they go in for other
reasons, but they still have to----
Ms. Alberts. My understanding is that in order to come in
in a circumstance like this, it still has to meet the probable
cause in order to justify a warrant. That is my understanding.
I am not an attorney, but that is what my law enforcement folks
are telling me.
Mr. Platts. I see my time has expired. I am not sure if we
will have a chance to come back with a second round. If not,
again, I want to thank each of you.
Is it okay if Ms. Eggleston had a follow-up I think?
Chairwoman McCarthy. Oh, sure.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Many of the RHY providers are licensed
by the state. So in Arizona, and I speak about my own state,
every staff member that works, or volunteer that works in our
programs have to be fingerprinted and have to go through a
background check.
Yes, we do get those few that knowingly apply for
positions. The challenge we have is the time line to get that
information back. It is a drudgerous process. So even a good
person coming to volunteer that has no background until they
are cleared, we can't let them work with our young people.
So the challenge we have is the time line. It can take 3 to
6 months and it costs, $60, $80 a pop to have it done. So, for
us, most of us are licensed. Most of us that provide the
services within the RHY umbrella meet those criteria, but it is
a time line issue more than anything else.
Mr. Platts. Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman McCarthy. You are welcome.
Mr. Grijalva?
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you, Madam Chair.
And, as my colleague Mr. Platts mentioned, let me thank Mr.
Booker and Mr. Rolle. Your persistence and your strength is
something that I respect and admire very much. Thank you for
your testimony.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston, a couple of questions. Do you have any
data, or even an idea, of the percentage of homeless young
people in the centers that you have that have aged out of
foster care?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Congressman, I could tell you an
approximate, but I could gather that information for you
specifically and get that to you in writing. We see a lot of
street kids that have aged out of the system, by choice
sometimes. They don't want to be involved with the system. They
have been involved with the system that has been very difficult
for them for a long time.
The foster care system isn't always a friendly system, to
say the least. So most of them would rather not be involved
with the system, and as soon as they turn 18, they disappear.
But the Chafee funds that came in a few years ago picked up
a lot of those kids. But I can get you that information.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you.
Your agency operates a residential program for homeless
young families. Tell the committee a little bit about that and
about what I perceive to be an increasing need for that kind of
residential service.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. The young families that we see,
whether they are single-parent families or intact young
families, just trying to get by in today's time, it is very,
very difficult. The housing costs, just the day-to-day living
costs, become insurmountable. In the service delivery system we
have, we have young couples.
We have couples that are under the or 24 sometimes, but
mostly under the , that choose to have children and they are a
couple. And some are married, some are not. But they are a
couple.
Being able to serve them is a huge gift to our community,
and it is one that the need for that kind of service has become
more and more apparent as time has gone by. I think we see that
across the country with that.
Of course, single moms, single dads, raising kids at age 19
years old is a huge challenge today. We see it.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you.
And one other question, if I may. Some examples of how your
agency provides positive youth development principles to the
young people that you work with. I think this legislation, this
authorization, is also about youth development. It is not just
a safe harbor. There are things that need to occur as part of
that safe harbor.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. For me, the biggest issue around
positive youth development is having the kids involved with
every step of their process within the system. People can't
decide what is going to happen to a 16-year-old by themselves.
That 16-year-old or 15-year-old or 18-year-old needs to have a
voice in what happens to them, for them, with them.
Also, getting the kids involved at all levels of our
organization is really important, and most of us within the RHY
community, kids are on our boards. Young people serve on our
advisory committees. They have a say in how the program
operates and what services they need.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you very much.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. You are welcome.
Mr. Grijalva. A final question. Mr. Berg, you mentioned in
your oral testimony, I don't know how to describe it, but you
become desensitized, tolerate, benign acceptance of the idea or
the concept of homelessness, and, in this specific instance,
homeless youth.
We talked about outreach. We talked about getting
information to those persons that need it. But how do we combat
that attitude? I sense it as well. There is a margin of
tolerance--``Oh, they are homeless''--and you kind of walk away
from it.
Mr. Berg. Yes, thank you, Mr. Grijalva. I agree. I think
hearings like this are helpful. The more community-based kind
of hearings, I think the more people can hear from,
particularly in the issue of youth homelessness, from young
people themselves who have gone through these things.
I think that is very effective. I know I constantly talk to
members of Congress and their staff who us sort of wonky, D.C.
types can talk until we are blue in the face, but what they
remember is talking to a person who had been homeless and
suddenly realizing that this just wasn't some number on a page.
We struggle with that all the time. The other part is we
need policies that are directed at immediate solutions, short-
term solutions, getting people off the streets and into some
sort of stable housing, fast. And we need to have performance
measures for providers that include those.
I know the National Network for Youth has been in favor of
that. Those are some of the things that will be helpful.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman McCarthy. You are welcome.
Mrs. Biggert?
Mrs. Biggert. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
One of the first situations I think that caused me to get
so interested in these types of programs was having a neighbor
who had a daughter that was troubled and was a runaway. And
they never found her, never heard from her. My neighbor died
not too long ago, and I think that was the thing that was so
troubling to her, was never to know what had happened to her
child.
And for all of the good work that all of you do on this, I
noticed that, Mr. Allen, you have a cold case where you are
still working on finding those missing children that have been
gone for a long time.
Mr. Allen. Congresswoman, the media spotlight dims and the
world forgets, but these families don't forget. And so we have
a team that is actively looking at these long-term cases,
trying to look for new leads. We have resolved, having worked
more than 5,000 of these cases, resolved about, as I recall,
368.
All but 12 of them were resolved through identifying a
deceased child. And while that doesn't bring a live child home,
at least it brings closure. But I think it is important.
These are long, long-term cases. And in 12 of the cases,
where law enforcement had run out of leads, the child was found
alive and was brought home. So it is really important that we
not forget about these kids that are out there.
Mrs. Biggert. Thank you, and thanks for all you do on that.
And then, Mr. Berg, how do you reach runaways? Or any of
you that are in these services, and I know so many times that
they are ready to come home if they can find a way home or a
pathway to connect with their families again. How do you
encourage that? How do they get to know about the services?
Mr. Berg. Yes, I think one of the things is the runaway and
homeless youth programs of course include a very active street
outreach program that I think is very effective and reaches
lots and lots of people and are very effective where there is a
family ready to take a child back.
I would note parenthetically that there are many situations
where that is not the case, where the outreach is a good first
step, but there is nothing behind it. And that is why more of
the kinds of programs, transitional programs and permanent
housing options, are very necessary.
But I think people in the field have really developed this
sort of art and science of outreach to a very great extent.
There are a lot of very skilled practitioners who carry this
out.
Partly, it is knowing that there are options available and
just making sure that people know what those are. I mean, the
story about sort of not having a place to find about what sort
of services are available I think is sort of a common one.
Mrs. Biggert. Well, one of the bill that I am working on is
to provide for homeless children who are emancipated and are
not working with their parents, or there is no connection. And
right now, they cannot get scholarships to college because the
parents can't or won't sign the form and they won't disclose
their finances, which of course they wouldn't be using for
their child's education, anyway.
Do you have any idea how many youth could take advantage of
something like this?
Mr. Rolle. I had a couple of things, but just on that
particular point, the state of California, they did something
very similar where they wanted to talk about foster care,
because it is very, very high there. And one of the things that
I found when I emancipated is I didn't know where to go to go
to the next level.
And I think that I am creating a network for the people in
positions like yourself to look down at all of these people
doing this work and connect them, because sometimes we don't
know about each other.
And if there is a network of I don't have them, you have
them, and we both kind of converse about what are the things
that we can help each other on, I think that is very important.
And a lot of times everybody is fighting for the money. There
is not enough money. So if there is enough money, then we are,
like, we can work more together.
So I think that is very important, especially for
emancipated youth, because they are the ones who feel the
jails, fill the cemetery, the s, because those girls, a lot of
them go to college. They are the ones that are in the clubs,
trying to go to college, really, trying to find a way. And the
innovation is not there, and I think that was wonderful, what
Ms. Eggleston said about having the young people involved.
Because young people, that is who evolved us as human
beings. They are the ones that think innovatively and come with
new ideas. And one of the feelings for most young people is
that we don't matter.
I think she said an excellent point about terrorism. We
know that that matters in America, but we don't feel as young
people that we matter, by the way the funding goes, that there
is not a feeling or a marketing from the government to say that
young people matter and we don't want them homeless, we don't
want them running away from home.
That feeling is not there, so I think innovation and having
more strong voices of young people to say something about it.
Mr. Berg. If I could just add on that particular piece of
legislation. I hope everyone, other members of the committee,
are aware of this particular piece of legislation.
I can't tell you the numbers, but it is maybe not like the
worst-off kids, but the idea that young people who have been
abandoned by their parents can't go to college because there is
nobody to sign the financial aid forms, I find that personally
offensive. And I am glad it has been dealt with.
Mrs. Biggert. I hope all the members know, because if they
sign up as co-sponsors, we can get it through much faster. So,
thank you.
I yield back. Thank you.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you.
Mr. Yarmuth?
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, Madam Chair.
And to all the professionals on the panel, thank you very
much for being here. Thanks for all you do to help with this
serious national problem.
Kazi, thank you for your story and for all you do.
Rusty, you did a great job and your community is very proud
of you, and I am very proud to be your Congressman, so thank
you for everything you have done today.
And Mr. Platts beat me to introducing Bill, but I will say
that this morning, I was talking to Bill, and he mentioned the
fact that when he was younger and people were deciding what to
do, that all of his friends were becoming lawyers and
politicians. I don't know who all those people were. But the
implication may be that he hadn't chosen the right path, but I
know he knows he did. And I know today Rusty is grateful that
he did, and so are we.
Kazi mentioned something that leads me to a topic that came
up in our forum that we held a few weeks ago. And that was the
fact that even in a community like Louisville, which has
national Safe Place headquarters and a wide array of services
that are available to homeless and runaway youth, that there is
no continuum of contact with the young people who are
disconnected.
And they go from one service, where they do get some help
or attention, and then they are back into the community and
disconnected once again and they go through a series of these
encounters with services. But nobody is there to kind of help
them through the entire process.
Any of the professionals who would like to comment on that,
and with specific reference to whether they know of any models
for providing some kind of continuum.
Ms. Alberts. I like to think we are, and I think that what
you have heard today in talking about the partnerships and
collaborations, I think that is the key. You will notice in my
written testimony, one of the things I said was to tie funding
to collaborative efforts so that people don't feel like it is
okay to operate in isolation when they hit a particular point
on a spectrum of services.
There needs to be a requirement that you know what came
before for the child and what needs to come after, because
children fall through the cracks. They get a little bit of this
and they get a little bit of that. And they try to make a
patchwork quilt out of it, and there are huge, gaping gaps in
those services.
This is a pet peeve of mine. I have been in nonprofit
management for 27 years, and the reason we have the program
that we have at the Texas Center for the Missing is that I
recognize the need to make sure that if we are not doing it,
somebody is doing it, all along, from the beginning to the end
of those programs, because it is the only true way to make a
difference. It is the only way to save those kids who need
help.
And communication, collaboration, partnerships, whatever it
takes. And no territoriality. There is no my piece of the pie
needs to be bigger than your piece of the pie.
I don't know who the author of the quote is. It is unknown,
but it says it is amazing what you can get accomplished when
nobody cares who gets the credit.
Mr. Yarmuth. Did you want to respond, Ms. Krahe-Eggleston?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. I would really like to.
Mr. Yarmuth. Sure.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. I have the honor of working in a
community that works very hard at collaboration for the young
people that we serve. We have a small group of providers of the
types of services that I referred to today. There is four or
five of us in town, and we meet every week or every other week,
at least, and talk about the cases that we have.
The money only goes so far, so we try not to duplicate
services. We really have those conversations across the board
that our case managers have.
Good case management, to me, is the key, building that
relationship with the young person and being able to maintain
that. Funding that we get our service that we get that are
narrow based, where there is a finite beginning and end, it
doesn't do our young people any good.
What does the best for your young people is a continued
involvement over the long haul. It is the relationship Rusty
talked about with his workers. It is the relationship that the
young people we are involved with--in our young moms program,
we have been involved with moms for the last 6 years and we
know, and they stay with us a couple years, we know where 97
percent of those young women are today and keep in touch with
them regularly.
That is the key to success.
Mr. Yarmuth. I would like to also maybe add another element
to this discussion, and that is the connection between the
juvenile justice system and the social services that are
available for the homeless, because obviously many of the kids
who are homeless and runaways end up in an encounter with the
juvenile justice system.
Is this something that your experiences has shown that
works or is there sometimes too great a disconnect between the
judicial system and the social service aspect?
Mr. Allen. Just a brief comment, and I think these folks
know better than I, but when I got into this, when we got into
it, in the 1970s, the whole premise was you would have the law
enforcement system over here that is viewing these kids in one
way. You have the social services system over here that is
viewing these kids in another way. And the kids get caught in
the cracks.
And so our whole beginning in this effort in Louisville 30
years ago was to create a police-social work team, to kind of
blur the traditional lines and the traditional turf battles
between jurisdictions, between units of government and,
frankly, I think there are models all over the country where
that is working and working very well.
And when you put people together, they can share
information, even though their mindset and their approaches are
different.
Mr. Rolle. I had just something real brief on that. I think
that one of the key things is the innovation. And the reason
why I say innovation, there is a song by a guy named Justin
Timberlake. He had a song called I am bringing sexy back. But
if you translate that into the work that we are doing, it is
old ideas in a new time.
Even the funding that is for stuff like this is, to my
understanding, the same amount that it has been many, many
years ago, and the economy is just different. So even finding
the people working in social services, and I know a lot of
them, they are burnt out.
Their bosses don't even care, because their salaries don't
really--so that feeling that you get burnt out doing this work.
People need things. They need you to be excited about coming to
work and that is why they fall through the cracks in the
juvenile justice system.
For people doing this youth work, there needs to be
innovation in how we deal with them. We need to make the job,
for lack of better words, in the way that I know how to
translate it, is sexy. People need to feel like I want to be
involved with the youth and giving back. So that is one thing.
And another thing, something that you asked earlier, I
think, when we fall through the cracks is in the foster home,
when you go back there, there is not--I think that instead of
just placing them in a home, the whole house should now go
under some type of training.
In New York City, there is a place called Harlem Children's
Zone, and that is a great model for a lot of things that he is
talking about. But, the Harlem Children's Zone, they provide
training from birth, when the baby is still in the womb, for
certain families, so that those families can have that
training.
And it is sexy to go there and the whole environment. The
funding is there, the whole environment says that, all right,
our youth matter. So I would just say innovation is the key
word.
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Chairwoman McCarthy. You are quite welcome. When you were
talking about burnt out, I am thinking of my nurses, all over
the country. We are trying to work on that, too.
Mr. Sarbanes?
Mr. Sarbanes. Thank you, Madam Chair, for holding the
hearing.
I wanted first to salute Representative Biggert for her
work on these issues. In particular, we have been working
recently on the McKinney-Vento funning, which is critical in a
whole host of areas in terms of keeping families together and
combating homelessness among young people. And Representative
Lampson, who has obviously been right on the forefront of
dealing with issues of missing children.
Can you quantify the extent to which the issue is about
communication and coordination and collaboration for purposes
of finding kids who have fallen through the cracks, versus real
services that have to be provided through affirmative outreach?
Because what I gather from the discussion is there is a
certain amount of this which is just making sure that we are in
touch with each other better, so that when kids disappear or
run away, or are lost or missing, there is a communication
infrastructure in place that allows you to find them and get
them back home.
But there is another dimension, which is reaching out to
kids on a continuous basis and having resources behind that so
that you can not just get them reconnected, but support that so
that they don't fall into the cracks again. And I don't know if
you can quantify how that splits out.
You will probably say that they are too interrelated to
separate, but I don't know if anybody wants to comment on that.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. I think for education purposes, the
thing that helps the most is people just knowing what is going
on. The schools are a great place to connect with young people.
If they know there is a safe place out there within their
school structure and the school is aware of what is going on in
the communities, they are a huge help.
We have found that over and over and over again. Youngsters
as young as 8, 9, 10 years old, know that there is a principal
or a teacher or somebody that has the information about a
service, whether it be in regards to homelessness or a
multitude of services.
But the school system, I have found, is probably one of the
best ways to get the information out so that teachers know that
there are services out there, so that those other significant
people in the little ones' lives start young enough that notice
things going on with a child and his family. And teachers are
great at that.
Sometimes, they don't know the resources that are out
there. So, in my book, it is really important that the
education process is a community-wide process about the
services that are out there and what needs to happen, but, as
well, it is our responsibility to get that information out.
We spend a lot of time in the schools, mostly middle
schools and high schools, but we get information out to all the
counselors on a regular basis, and I think that is part of that
prevention and early intervention piece that may avoid those
children hitting the streets at age 16 or 14.
Mr. Sarbanes. The other question I had is that in the
larger committee, Education and Labor Committee, we have had
numbers of hearings over the last few months on the issue of
economic insecurity in the country. And I would imagine that
you all can sense the interplay between this predatory culture
on the one side and the economic insecurity of any families on
the other.
And as economic insecurity is heightened in the society, it
leads to increased pressures on families. It helps break down
families in ways that then makes them much more vulnerable to
the predatory side of our society. And if you could comment on
that, if you are seeing the trends of that sort of interplay
between this culture and economic insecurity.
Mr. Rolle. I experienced that. It wasn't in this country,
but coming from a poor country, the reason why I was in that
abusive situation was really based on that. The lady that my
mother left me with, my mother got stuck in America and she
couldn't leave.
So the lady that I lived with, I was there too long and I
became another expense. And the stress of that, and then her
husband leaving, was the reason why I became the stress
release. When the resources are there for people--she was a
stepparent--so when the resources are there for people like
her. And it goes even deeper, because the reason there are not
resources for people like her is because the agencies that do
the work feel as if they don't have enough resources and then
it trickles down.
Even the brother here, he said when his father left and his
mother was dealing with it, she had to go through her healing,
she needed to know that there were resources and a place for
her, because of what she was dealing with trickled down to him,
and it goes on.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Many, many of our young people are
homeless due to economic issues, whether it means a parent
became incarcerated and all of a sudden there is no more money
at home, or that mom had another baby and you are 16, you are
17, just go fend for yourself.
The economic issues are huge, and we have many, many young
people that live 10 to an apartment, just to try and get by.
And they are okay, they are doing their best to get by.
A lot of our young moms come to us with a garbage bag of
clothes and that is it, and a baby on their hip, and have no
place to go. Think about affording just diapers today. Just
think, if you have been to the grocery store lately and bought
a box of diapers, think about living on minimum wage, having to
pay a portion of childcare if you don't qualify and having to
pay for food, housing. Just the day-to-day living is almost
impossible. And it is very hopeless for many of them.
Mr. Sarbanes. Thanks for your testimony.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Mr. Lampson?
Mr. Lampson. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Wow, what magnificent stories. It is hard to know where to
start and I wish I were a member of your committee. It would be
fun to work with on one hand. On the other hand, you would
probably reach a little bit of a level of frustration because
there probably are more questions than there are answers to
give.
But as I was listening to everybody's stories, the things
that I thought of were some luck involved on the part of
finding the right people, just happening across the right thing
that Mr. Booker came across the Safe Place. And I want to ask
you a question about Safe Place in just a minute.
I keep writing down, time and time again, commitment. I
write down the word ``money.'' Our children are an investment.
We are choosing, it seems like, to postpone that investment,
and instead of trying to make the resources available now, as
difficult as it is, we are choosing to not do it and then we
are choosing to pay for people to stay in prison or hospitals
or to support the criminal activity that they are getting away
with.
For me, right now, it is hard to find the answers to the
questions in listening to what you all are doing. I found, when
I visited a Boys and Girls Club--I happened to have been in
Galveston, Texas, about 2 years or so ago, when a truant
officer brought a 12-year-old little girl in, and I got to sit
in on the interview there with her and found out what
difficulties that she was facing.
She didn't have anyone to listen to her about her problems
with education. She thought all the teachers hated her, didn't
like her, weren't willing to help her. She thought she was
dumb, stupid, couldn't pass classes. She was making F's in
every subject.
And through the course of the conversation with her, we
found out that she did have some interests. She was interested
in astronomy and, interestingly enough, she actually picked up
a book on calculus to, she said, try to help herself understand
some of that. And here is a 12-year-old reading a calculus
book, and I don't even know what calculus is. Knowing then that
students, kids, have great opportunities if we would but see it
in them.
And I want you to talk some more, Ms. Eggleston, if you
don't mind. You talked abut this catch-22 of getting kids
caught in a situation where they have to maintain employment in
order to stay afloat financially. Employment prevents them from
being able to go into school and taking opportunities, whether
it is secondary or post-secondary, any of them.
What can policymakers do to help right this lack of--what
are the specific things that you would tell us to try to put
into words, policy?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. One of the first things I would do is
talk about true age, of being able to be independent. I don't
know how many of you are parents, but I know my children, when
they were 18, weren't able to support themselves.
We forget that these children are our children as well, and
that magic across our country is a falsehood, as far as I am
concerned. So, for me, taking a policy look at what is the age
of majority, because that dictates a lot of things in our
world.
Again, I think about my own family, and these are no
different. To me, that is really important. The other issue is
being able to afford to do all those things that the
affordability is impossible. Finding jobs that pay well isn't
easy. A living wage is not $8 an hour. I don't know any
community where you can live on $8 an hour, to be honest, if
you are a single mom trying to raise a child.
A lot of our issues around unaccompanied and disconnected
young people, these are people that don't have support systems.
These are people that don't have you or me or an aunt or uncle.
We find that we play that role for so, so many.
We supplement rents all the time for young people. We help
pay utilities. We try and take care of the young people that
are lucky enough to touch the service delivery system. There
are a lot that don't. There are a lot that don't.
So how do we expand that safety network? I mean, that is a
resource issue. A lot of us raise a lot of money in our own
communities to supplement what we get from what comes from our
federal friends.
Mr. Lampson. Well, the specifics are the things that are
going to be hard. Changing the age of majority, maybe. Minimum
wage, we already----
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. You are working on that.
Mr. Lampson [continuing]. Have done.
I want to talk at some point in time, and my time is up,
but, Mr. Booker, I do want to find about Safe Place, because we
have Project Safe Place in my congressional district.
And I want to find out the comparisons. I know that it
started in Louisville, Kentucky, at the YMCA, a great project.
And then, obviously, some work that Ms. Alberts is doing on
ography that we would also like to question about.
But I just want to thank the chairwoman for allowing me to
participate in this committee hearing today.
Thank you so much. It is a great set of presenters.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Thank you, Mr. Lampson.
Just to let you know, we are going to go through, if it is
all right with the witnesses, another set of questions. Not
everybody wants to ask questions, but some of us do.
As I told the witnesses earlier, I have a markup, so if I
get up and leave, it is not anything that you said, and one of
my colleagues will take over the chair.
One of the things, listening to all of this, how much
federal money do you actually get for the shelters themselves,
or how do you operate the shelters? Where do the bricks and
mortar come from?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Well, I can speak for myself. I think
I will speak for many of the shelters across the country. Our
communities are wonderful supporters of the service that we do.
The federal money that we receive does not cover the cost
of the services. It is the seed money that opens the door for
other things. The shelter-specific money, in my case, covers
about half of the ongoing expenses within our agency.
I find money through private sources, through grants,
through fees, through any other way I can to supplement those
dollars. But the federal money is a base that we work from.
Chairwoman McCarthy. The other reason that I am asking is
because I sit on Financial Services, and with that we are
starting a new program this year that will follow through, and
I have to look into it and I have to bring it up to my chairman
on that particular committee.
But being when we are talking about, especially those that
are transiting from ``a young teenager'' to that 18 to 21, when
that seems to be the most vulnerable time for a lot of these
young people, that there should be some sort of housing that
could come out of HUD.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Well, every community deals with that
difference. CDBG has been, for years, a good friend for many of
us in helping to fund bricks and mortar, at least in our
community, using our community section eight has been a place
that we also used.
Those kind of resources are out there if you can get to
them. In our community, the one I come from, it is very
friendly for those things, but every community isn't that way.
Chairwoman McCarthy. But from that transition age, from 18
to 21, is it better for them to have their own apartment,
because you had mentioned at 18 it is kind of hard to be on
your own, or would it be better that there would be almost like
a group home type thing, with three or four young people
together and maybe one house mother, house dad?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. There are many, many wonderful program
models, including all that you said. There are apartment
complexes across the country that have developed it. Kids have
their own little piece of that apartment complex. There are
housing units that are, again, the example you gave, many kids
live there and there are staff members that come and go.
I think the key to all this is that caring adult more than
anything else. All these programs are just different
environments. Is there one that works for every child,
absolutely not.
Chairwoman McCarthy. Does anyone else have any?
The other thing, just going through, thinking about what
each and every one of you has said, from a young child, teenage
years, foster homes, shelters. We also deal with juvenile
justice on this committee.
Last week, we passed mental parity. Hopefully, we will have
resources out there to help, again, more students.
But when a young person is in the juvenile justice system,
or a young person might even be in prison, they come out and
they are homeless. And they would have a record, which there is
a big debate going on in Congress, because a lot of times then
they can't get a job.
Prison, if you really look at the term, means
rehabilitation, depending on what the crime was, obviously. But
a lot of our young people that do go to prison, and I talk to
my correction guys all the time, one of the things that they
are lacking is they need mental health, most of them, and they
need to get a high school education because most of them have
learning problems.
So, again, when I say I look at things holistically, my
mind is going from one pot to the other pot and how do we bring
it all together? I think we have our work cut out for us on
this committee on how we are going to be able to pull these
things out.
And one of the things that Mr. Platts and I have tried to
do on this committee is to have more joint hearings. When we
did juvenile justice, we brought in the Juvenile Justice
Committee also, so we had a joint hearing so we can try and
figure out, how can we work together? And I hope that we will
be able to continue doing that in the future for other
hearings.
Mr. Platts?
Mr. Platts. Thank you, Madam Chair.
As a parent, one of the things that has just been, I guess,
startling in both the testimony, again, written and oral, is
just the numbers. The national numbers of 600,000-plus missing
in a year, the 1.6 million-plus runaways.
In the survey, Ms. Krahe-Eggleston, that you referenced in
your testimony, that 6 percent are 12 or under in a typical
year, seeking your services, and especially startling that 28
percent had attempted suicide.
As a nation, the alarm bell should be going off, when you
look at number after number, and certainly each of you
understand that. And we need to do a better job at it.
I don't know if you can give me an answer on how we can do
a better job, and it is the funding side. For the various
programs, I don't know if you have available to you today or a
ballpark of what you spend per child that you serve in a year
on average and what percentage, in a percent standpoint, or a
dollar standpoint, is from either the federal government
specifically from these programs that we are talking about
reauthorizing and funding or from taxpayers, federal state and
local.
And that may not be something that you readily have
available.
Ms. Alberts. I can tell you right off the bat, it costs us
about $10 per client per year, and we get zero of any kind of
government funding. It is all private.
So the passion I hope that you hear in my testimony and
what I am talking about, it is there always and this is to me
why I lie awake at night. It is not only these missing kids and
the roughly 4 to 8 percent that will never be located in our
country, but the fact that I, unfortunately at times throughout
the year wonder where my next paycheck is going to come from.
Because, again, I am going to use that patchwork quilt
corollary for our budget is like that. We are literally
scrambling constantly, looking for funds and trying not to do
what unfortunately I have seen programs do in the past, which
is mission drift and have their mission follow funding as
opposed to seeking funds that actually do fit the mission.
But none of these things are easy answers. Like I said, 27
years of nonprofit management, and these social issues are
dramatic. I really applaud your efforts to bite off a big piece
of this, but, again, I am going to tell you, It is
communication and collaboration, as well as funding and caring,
committed folks that will stay in the field.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. In my written testimony, there are
some examples of cost-benefit on a national, especially with
the Transitional Living Services. So you could pull some of
that information, or we could get you some more on that line.
But, most of us, it is a combination of resources that make
this work. Because the RHY funds have been flat for so very
long, in order to continue to do the work we do, we have to
figure out ways to supplement other ways.
And if I just want to add a little bit to something that
was just mentioned, I know I am taking up your time. But the
issue of work force is a huge issue for us. And I know that
there are some issues on the table around college and waiving--
--
Mr. Platts. Forgiveness and things?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. That would be a huge gift in our
field. You would have more people coming to our field. And that
work force issue is one that as an executive director I am
challenged with daily, daily.
Mr. Platts. Thank you.
Mr. Rolle. Can I just say to that?
Mr. Platts. Yes, sure.
Mr. Rolle. I just want to second the last thing she said.
Go back to that innovation, it means innovator. That is the
same work that I do with the Hip-Hop Project. The Hip-Hop
culture has transcended from this subculture within the United
States to a global culture, and all of the young people respond
to that.
One of the things--Madam Chairperson just left--that she
said was that she tried do this kind of joint work, meaning
bringing the stuff that is going on in the jails with the
social services.
So it is the same thing we are finding in education, that a
lot of people don't want to get in education, or kids don't
think that that is cool, to be in education and understand
their work. So a lot of the work that I am doing within hip-hop
is to try to explain to these artists, and work with young
people before they become these successful artists that their
work is joint.
Jay-Z, do you know who Jay-Z is? Somebody like Jay-Z, who
is like God out there in the realm of hip-hop and the idol of
those guys who are going to jail, half of the reason they are
going to jail is they want to be the next Jay-Z. But they don't
know that Jay-Z may not realize the power that he has.
If he said, ``We are going to go to school.'' Or the fact,
if he was here today, the power and influence that he can have
with what he has within the culture of hip-hop that is global
to really say something and do something.
So I just say that I second what she says in that the field
of education, the field of social work, is not cool to get into
mainly because people don't feel that they can take care of
their families. It is something that they are doing unless
there is just a passion there.
Mr. Platts. And I see my time is up.
And maybe just a final comment, Mr. Chairman, and it kind
of follows on Kazi's kind of broad picture here, is that while
today's hearing is specifically the Runaway and Homeless Youth
Act, Missing Children's Assistance Act, that issues, mental
health parity that the chair had referenced.
There is legislation that Danny Davis and I are sponsoring,
education begins at home. It is about teaching parenting skills
to low-income new parents, to how to establish a good home
setting for their newborns, their children, counseling services
in our schools.
All those in the end relate to kind of the underlying
problems that drive to this issue. And that while we are
focused on these acts, that we also need to be advocates and
pursuing those issues, as well.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Grijalva [presiding]. Thank you, sir.
And let me turn to Mr. Yarmuth for any additional questions
you might have.
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have one thing
I would like to pursue.
We talk a lot about numbers in this topic, and I think the
value of this hearing is to hear from Kazi and Rusty, people
who put a human face on these stories, but numbers are
important when we are talking about legislation and planning
and budgeting and so forth.
But I would like to ask Mr. Berg, is the methodology we use
to kind of make estimates about homeless, runaway kids in this
country adequate, or are there some things that we ought to be
doing to give us a better, more accurate picture of what we are
dealing with?
Mr. Berg. You can draw some conclusions from the evidence
that exists, but I think there is definitely a need for a
better job of knowing how big the problem is and some of the
other dimensions of it. I think the adult homeless system has
been working a lot on that over the last few years.
The system that is in place in the runaway, homeless youth
programs is good and provides a lot of good data, but not
everyone is in that system. I think there is a lot to be said
to getting a better handle and investing a little bit on
getting a better handle on the size of the problem.
Mr. Yarmuth. Mr. Allen, you have dealt with this, too. What
are your thoughts?
Mr. Allen. Yes, I think there is a significant need for
better data across the board. In the area of missing children,
what is called runaway, thrown away children, the Justice
Department research, it is done once a decade. So we are still
citing data from 1999 research, which was released in 2000.
One of the things that we are working on now with various
parts of the Justice Department is I think it is very important
that there be an annualized data set, drawn from existing data
sources.
One of the problems right now is that the NCIC reports, the
National Crime Information Center, reorts at the FBI really
don't break out reported missing children by usable categories.
So it is a huge challenge, but frankly I think there ought to
be numbers in this field, just like there are numbers in the
Uniform Crime Reports that tell us how many burglaries and how
many auto thefts there are a year. Because we need to be able
to track this year to year to have a better sense of whether we
are making progress or not.
Mr. Yarmuth. Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Oh, I am sorry.
Ms. Alberts. I just want to second that emotion. This is
the only field that had the dearth of information and data.
When I ran the substance abuse program, I could wake up on any
day and tell you roughly how many kids were using what drug in
the high schools. The data, particularly funding sources, they
want that data. They don't want it to just be anecdotal, I know
we are doing great stuff and here is why. We need that data.
Thank you, that is huge.
Mr. Berg. And I think this relates to what Mr. Grijalva
said before, which is the feeling of sort of like we have had
this problem forever and we just learned to tolerate it.
On homelessness, people support doing something about
homeless. They support it a lot, but they believe there is
nothing that can be done, which is not the case. But we need to
be able to have data to show people, show the public, that we
are succeeding at this. We have programs that work. We can have
whole communities that are reducing the number of homeless
people.
Without a functioning data system, or without a very good
data system, you won't be able to make that case.
Mr. Yarmuth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you, sir.
And let me turn to Mrs. Biggert for any questions she might
have.
Mrs. Biggert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I just wanted to ask Rusty, after you have listened to all
of the talk here, if you have any ideas on how best to spread
the word about the Safe Place for other children who have found
themselves in the same situation. From all this talk, I think
you were very fortunate to have found that place.
Mr. Booker. I think so far they are doing good, but they
could make a lot of improvements. The public signs that they
have in Louisville, they have them on TARC buses, the
libraries. Safe Place, White Castle donated $30,000 to Safe
Place, and that White Castle was made a place where a child or
a teenager can go and ask for a Safe Place to get help.
But I feel that there are more places and more things that
can be done, and we all need to work together to see what can
be done.
Mrs. Biggert. Well, I really was taken by your story, and I
have to ask you, did your brother had the opportunities that
you had? Did he do all right?
Mr. Booker. My brother is currently locked up until he is
18. And, yes, he did have some of the opportunities I had, but
he really had nobody to help him after he got through those
opportunities.
Mrs. Biggert. A while back, after Columbine, we had a task
force here of members of Congress. We heard from a lot of
experts and did field hearings. But the one thing that was so
true is that violence begets violence and it usually starts
with the back of a hand, and that is usually a parent.
We see all the things that happen and they are so terrible,
so I really applaud you for finding your way and hope that
there will be a lot of other children that will be able to do
that.
Thank you for being here.
I yield back.
Mr. Grijalva. Thank you.
Mr. Lampson, questions?
Mr. Lampson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I wanted you to talk about Safe Place, and you did, so
thank you, you got that in.
Ms. Alberts, we spend, $7,000, $8,000 a year on a child in
school. What does the state of Texas appropriate each year for
programs for children who are not in school?
Ms. Alberts. Not enough.
Mr. Lampson. Do you have any idea?
Ms. Alberts. We usually fall pretty low on the totem pole.
There are no specific funds in the state of Texas for the type
of work that we do.
Mr. Lampson. No specific funds available for what you are
doing.
Ms. Alberts. No. We have worked a lot in the runaway
community with Covenant House and some of the law enforcement
agencies, and there are some small bits of money that they
piece together, but there is nothing comprehensive.
Mr. Lampson. How do they get it? Do they get it through
grants?
Ms. Alberts. Yes, yes.
Mr. Lampson. As far as an appropriation that would go to
every county or to every child, there is not. Do you know of
any programs at the federal level?
Ms. Alberts. No, I am not familiar with any program that
looks at that at all, that deals with that, that services that.
Mr. Lampson. And what about at the federal level? Is there
anything that anyone knows about? Obviously, there is some
appropriation at the National Center for Missing and Exploited
Children, but is there anything that filters down to Child
Protective Services or other programs that will be able to grab
hold of a child and help point them into a program?
When I mentioned the little girl a while ago, we got her
into three different places to live. And the little-bitty bit
of funds that they had ran out and all three programs closed
while she was participating. We had to get one and move her to
another and so on.
People try, they are, but if they don't have the resources
to be able to do it, it is not going to succeed.
What were you going to say, Ms. Eggleston?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. Many states do nothing, many states
and local communities.
There are a few states, and I am not sure of the specifics.
I can tell you which states do and don't. I can get that
information to you.
In Arizona, we have about less than $0.5 million a year
that is spread out amongst our communities.
Mr. Lampson. What is the best state that you know of? And
is there one that could be piloted, or could be copied, where
we find some way that we might do something that would be
beneficial?
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. I don't know that I can tell you that
right now, but I can give that to you.
Mr. Lampson. I would appreciate it if you would. Would you
all rather see grant programs and let the people somehow or
other apply for money? Or would you like to see some kind of
mechanism to get money into specific agencies that might be
able to help locally? Would you comment on that? Anybody, all
of you.
Ms. Krahe-Eggleston. What would I like? Any of those would
be nice.
I think recognizing those groups in the communities that
have experience. I think the challenges that we have with
grants, state grants, have to do with procurement issues and
laws around how money can be sorted out through the states. At
least in our state, there are laws around how money can be
allocated.
It just can't go to any program. You have to go through a
process to get it. Private money, we are always applying. Most
of us apply a lot to a lot of private--you heard White Castle.
White Castle does stuff in Kentucky. Our local electric company
in Tucson does a lot for a lot of us. We need all of them.
Mr. Lampson. Ms. Alberts, were you going to say something?
Ms. Alberts. I was going to say, one of the things that we
talked about, I thought about something after we finished. The
Harris County Sheriff's Office is the only agency in our area
that has a specific runaway division. They actually have a
squad of officers to deal with that problem, and it is very
successful in how it can be, given its scope.
And they are tied in well with the social service agencies
in the area. But I think runaway and homeless youth, I think
looking at what happens to a child, the bulk of the resources
for a law enforcement agency are spent picking up those
runaways and taking them home.
That is another of those areas where it is not against the
law to run away. There is nothing that can be done.
Occasionally a judge will say somebody has to do community
service or something. I think that is another one of those
places that we might look at trying to figure out how to
intervene there.
Mr. Allen. A quick comment, and I think this is more
historic, and these folks may be able to correct me. But what
we hear from the runaway community is that the Runaway and
Homeless Youth Act is helpful in terms of a certain level of
support, but particularly in the areas of the more difficult
problems, the chronic runners, there becomes a place where
there really aren't resources to address the kids with the most
serious needs.
We hear from communities all the time, that they are
funding for shelters for the first time a kid runs, or for the
early part of the episode. But the really longer term, the
chronic, the most serious challenge. Really, this is the
problem that is answered simply through resources.
Mr. Lampson. If there were going to be a comprehensive
study, who would do it? Who should do it? About what you were
speaking of a little while ago, Mr. Allen?
Mr. Allen. Are you talking about data? Are you talking
about a study of what the best models are and where the gaps
are?
Mr. Lampson. Both.
Mr. Allen. Well, historically, as it relates to data, what
the government has done has been to go to universities and God
bless universities and the work they do, but that is expensive.
I think we need to develop a systematized way to capture data,
reported data, and interpret it.
For example, that is what we are trying to do on the whole
area of missing children. There are police reports all the
time. Maybe we don't have it for all 50 states, but maybe it
can be extrapolated----
Mr. Lampson. Would the National Center be the appropriate
place to go for that, or would one of the federal agencies?
Mr. Allen. I think the National Center, with the National
Institute of Justice, or the Bureau of Justice Statistics or
somebody like that, the people who are already capturing data.
As it relates to the runaway and homeless youth community,
I am not sure, but I think that same model can be replicated.
In terms of who should develop the models for identifying where
the gaps are, I think you go to the leadership of the national
runaway community and you gather the experts and you say this
is where services are adequate, this is where services are not.
Here is the void and here is what it would cost to fill that
void, based upon the numbers of kids who are identified in
these services.
Mr. Lampson. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Grijalva. Let me on behalf of the chair, the ranking
member and the members of this committee thank each and every
one of you for your testimony. It is invaluable as we go
through this reauthorization process.
Much of what was said, I personally felt that the issues
that we talked about and the chair mentioned it, not only this
reauthorization, but how we are conscious with every piece of
legislation that we are working with, that we are integrating
this group of young people into that process, be it health
care, be it education, be it the issue of economics, be it the
issue of reentry for people coming out of the justice system. I
think all those are valuable things that we need to be
conscious of as we go along.
But, with that said, let me thank you very much as we go
forward.
As we conclude this hearing, I would like to invite
everyone to the reception that is being sponsored by the
National Network for Youth, shining a light on youth
homelessness. Mr. Platts and Chairwoman McCarthy are serving as
honorary co-sponsors of this event.
One of our witnesses, Kazi, will speak with homeless youth
of D.C. and share clips from the documentary, the Hip-Hop
Project. It is going to be in room B-369 of the Rayburn
Building, of this building, at 6:30.
As previously ordered, members will have 14 days to submit
additional materials for the hearing. Any member who wishes to
submit follow-up questions in writing to the witnesses should
coordinate with majority staff within the requisite time.
And, with that, without objection, this hearing is
adjourned. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Altmire follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Jason Altmire, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Pennsylvania
Thank you, Madam Chair, for holding this hearing on runaway,
homeless and missing children.
It is estimated that between 1 million and 1.7 million youth
experience homelessness on a yearly basis. Some of these children are
homeless for a few nights while others are homeless for long periods of
time. Youth who become homeless run a high risk of being physically or
sexually abused and are also more likely than their peers to engage in
high risk behaviors.
Title III of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act
authorizes federal programs that help combat youth homelessness. As
Congress reauthorizes the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention
Act I hope that we study how to improve the programs authorized by
title III.
Thank you again, Madam Chair, for holding this hearing. I look
forward to continuing to work with you on this important issue. I yield
back the balance of my time.
______
[Whereupon, at 5:05 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]