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These children are missing
By JAY CRIDLIN In Florida, there were Rilya Wilson and Alfredo Montes. Around the country, there were Danielle Van Dam and Jessica Smart. It's been a rough year for missing children nationwide. Monday, Florida will give the issue a statewide forum with Florida's Missing Children's Day. "It's a day to look back and reflect on those children in the past that have gone missing, and those that we've found," Larry Long, a spokesman for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, said Friday. "It's kind of a recommitment that we're going to try to keep children safe." Gov. Jeb Bush will speak about missing children in a Monday morning ceremony at the state Capitol. "The goal is to get the word out more and let people still know that there are missing kids in Florida, and we need some help to try to find these kids and bring them home," Long said. Given the state's recent troubles with missing children cases, said Jack Levine, president of the Center for Florida's Children, one day devoted to them may not be enough. "Certainly, we believe in public awareness," Levine said. "But the reality for Florida is that every day needs to be missing children's day." Children, he said, "are at risk if they are at runaway or missing status. . . . And these are the children who are most vulnerable to molestation, to maltreatment, and frankly, to murder." State child care and protection cases have grabbed more and more headlines in recent years. Cases involving the Department of Children and Families -- that of Rilya Wilson, 5, missing more than a year before her state caseworkers noticed, or that of Alfredo Montes, 2, of Polk County, beaten to death at a babysitter's house while under DCF care -- have turned state child care into a major issue. In July, DCF workers failed to visit 1,238 children in state custody. In May, that number was 988. Monday's ceremony is taking place just a few weeks after a shakeup in the top ranks of the DCF. Agency spokeswoman Sarah Robinson said that Jerry Regier, the man tapped by Bush to head DCF, will be in attendance. But Long said Missing Children's Day is designed to draw attention to more than just children missing under state care. From January to June, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement received 25,997 reports of missing children, Long said. In 2001, there were 52,000 cases. Long said that 95 percent of the cases involve runaways. Less than 1 percent are predatory abductions. Levine said the high number of runaway cases could be partly due to the state's attractiveness to runaway children elsewhere in the nation. "We have to remember that we are a magnet for children on the run," he said. "If you're in Wisconsin and it's November, you're not going to run north." Levine said one of the best ways to prevent children from going missing is to take care of those who aren't missing. "I would emphasize not only the children who are missing, but I would also seek a commitment for services for the children whose whereabouts we know," he said. "The reality right now -- and it's sad but true -- is that the only children's program in Florida without a waiting list is the morgue."
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From the Times state desk Lucy Morgan
From the state wire
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