TEENAGE GIRL STILL SEEKING FOSTER FAMILY COUNTY OFFICIALS HAD VOWED TO LOCATE ADOPTIVE PARENTS.

Byline: TROY ANDERSON Staff Writer

Despite vows by Los Angeles County officials last year to help a teenage runaway foster child find a home, the now 17-year-old says she has had little help finding adoptive parents.

The tale by Krystina Kessler -- one of nearly 12,000 children placed in long-term foster care in the county -- raises new questions about new problems with the county's foster-care system.

``(The Department of Children and Family Services) discriminates against teenagers,'' Krystina told the Board of Supervisors earlier this week. ``They do not actively search and locate permanent homes for older youth.''

Dismissal sought

She said the department tried to dismiss her court case and return her to her ``alleged biological parents,'' whom she says the county took her away from in the first place because of an unsafe home environment.

``When that failed, they then recommended the dependency court put me in long-term foster care as my permanent plan, rather than adoption.''

DCFS spokesman Stuart Riskin said the department has made a concerted effort in recent years to more quickly move children out of foster care into adoptive homes, noting the DCFS has finalized more than 6,000 adoptions and reduced the average time from placement to adoption from 58 to 49 months in the past three years.

``But at the moment, we still have 700 children available for adoption, mostly older children, because they are harder to place,'' Riskin said. ``Of these 700, Krystina is one of these children. And we are constantly looking for good adoptive homes. People can call [phone] (for more information).''

Sherman Oaks attorney Ken Sherman, who has volunteered his time to represent Krystina, said Thursday that, in his experience as a former director at the Children's Law Center of Los Angeles, the department is ``less than helpful'' in expediting the process of finding permanent homes for teenagers.

``I've known Krystina for almost a year, and I have found her to be a very bright, focused person who is actively trying to find people she can call family,'' Sherman said. ``She is a very energetic young person, a very outspoken young person, and I think she is someone we need to listen to to make the system for older kids better.''

Tony Bell, spokesman for Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, who directed the DCFS in November 2005 to help Krystina find a permanent home, said they are confident the DCFS has done everything in its power and under the law to ``ensure the very best outcome for her.''

In recent years, the DCFS has been working to reduce the number of children in long-term foster care, which stood at 11,970 in March. Of these, nearly 7,000 are age 12 or older.

No safety nets

Child-welfare experts are concerned about the fate of these children, many of whom will age out of the system at 18 with little or no safety nets.

More than half will be unemployed, almost one-third will become homeless, and one in five will be incarcerated within two years of leaving foster care, according to the Children's Law Center.

``If we look at the statistics on what happens to teens that we don't find permanent homes for, it's not a rosy picture,'' said Miriam Krinsky, executive director of the Children's Law Center. ``And it's a picture that no parent would find acceptable, but as a community we are allowing that to continue.''

Experts say it's harder for the DCFS to find adoptive parents for teenagers, who make up only a small fraction of children placed in adoptive homes.

Of the 16,850 foster children adopted from 1998 to 2005 in the county, only 530, or 3percent, were age 16 or older, according to the University of California, Berkeley, Child Welfare Research Center.

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