PHOTOS OF KIDS TO BE POSTED WEB SITE WILL FEATURE MISSING FOSTER CHILDREN.

Byline: Troy Anderson Staff Writer

A Web site containing the names and photos of Los Angeles County's missing foster children will be launched within two weeks, officials said Friday.

Creation of the Web site comes on the heels of a report that lists the number of runaway and abducted foster children at 990, up from 740 in August. At the same time, the number of missing children who have been found jumped from 64 in August to 238 as of Nov. 30.

Juvenile Court Presiding Judge Michael Nash gave permission to the county Department of Children and Family Services to create a Web site containing the children's names, photos, descriptions, birth dates and where they were last seen.

``Judge Nash's order will allow for the full implementation of my motion to post identifying information on the county Web site that will find children and return them to safety,'' Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich said.

DCFS officials expressed optimism that the Internet will help them locate the missing children.

``Hopefully it will be very successful because our goal is to use every means to keep our children safe and in appropriate homes,'' DCFS spokesman Stuart Riskin said.

The Web site will be located on the county's home page at lacounty.info and on the DCFS and District Attorney's Office Web sites. The public will be encouraged to call the DCFS hot line at 1-800-540-4000 with information on the whereabouts of missing foster children.

Nationally, the total number of runaways, excluding those abducted by parents or relatives, was 9,964 in 2000. Los Angeles County, which has about 10 percent of the nation's foster children, also has about 10 percent of the nation's missing foster children.

Statewide, the California Department of Social Services reported in October 2001 that 498 children were classified as runaways and 751 as missing.

``This is a huge problem,'' said Janis Spire, executive director of the Alliance for Children's Rights. ``I think there are clearly places where kids are not being cared for the way they need to be.

``With more and more kids coming into the system, there is going to be more that drop out because it's not a good, safe place for them to be. We haven't fixed most of the problems that are keeping social workers too busy to notice the red flags. It surprises me that more of the kids haven't been recovered.''

Find the Children, an organization that posts abducted children's photos and names on its Web site, and Children of the Night, which rescues runaways from prostitution, have been working in coordination with DCFS to locate the missing children, said Marjorie Kelly, DCFS interim director.

Kelly said she is happy that the number of runaways and abducted children recovered has gone up since she made her first report on the missing foster children last year.

``I think there is some evidence that when the abducted-children's group here in the county posts children's pictures on the Internet, the recovery rate goes up,'' Kelly said.

As of Nov. 30, DCFS had 50,202 children under its supervision, including 31,150 in foster homes. Nationwide, 565,000 children are in foster care.