We Turn Anguish Into Action
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Abducted & Missing Children's Recovery Project Dear Friend,
Please support our cause by pledging to our 2012 CFC Campaign—because your contribution will make a big difference. We’ve been helping parents find their missing children since 1993, when Polly Klaas was kidnapped. The search for Polly received so much media attention that phone calls began coming into the Search Center from parents whose children were also missing. While searching for Polly, volunteers at the Polly Klaas Search Center began to help other grief-stricken parents find their missing children. When a parent reaches out to the Polly Klaas Foundation for help, our professional caseworkers swing into action, providing the family with useful guidelines for recovering the missing child and working with them to create a personalized missing child poster. That poster can become a focal point for the search by getting that child’s photo to be seen by as many people as possible—as soon as possible. Posters are express mailed to the family so they can mobilize their community and the media. Caseworkers place each missing child’s poster on our website, and add links to that poster to our Facebook & Twitter pages. They also immediately send a special email with a link to the missing child poster to our Rapid Response Team eVolunteers, who print out copies and distribute the posters in their local communities throughout the country. Posters really do bring missing kids home. We’ve seen it time and time again. Caseworkers fax blast missing child posters to states and cities where the child or kidnapper might be, to places like gas stations, truck stops, fast food places, nursery schools, pharmacies, etc. Someone may see the poster, recognize the child, and then call us with information on locating the child. Our caseworkers immediately pass that information on to law enforcement. Missing children have even seen their own posters on the streets and in stores, helping them know they are being searched for. Here is one story of how posters brought a missing child home. A fast food employee saw one of our posters from a fax blast, and then saw the missing child in a vehicle going through the restaurant’s drive through. The employee called our 24/7 hotline and left an anonymous tip, with information that identified the vehicle. Our caseworker immediately called the police officer in charge of the case. That same day, a police sergeant called our caseworker to let us know he had the missing child safely in his squad car. We are there for every family as long as they need us. Sometimes the child is found quickly. Other times, we may be working with a family for years. Our caseworkers also counsel families on ways to activate their community to help search for their child, and on ways to keep the media interested such as organizing candlelight vigils and press conference. When the media calls us about a missing child case, we conduct interviews on TV, on the radio, and to the written press. We encourage the public to take notice of missing child posters and to “trust your instincts”. We help keep each family’s hope alive. We turn anguish into action. 85% of our kids return home.
We are encouraged by the tens of thousands of you who have joined our efforts to keep children safe. If you are a federal employee, in the military or with the postal service, please designate the Polly Klaas Foundation’s Abducted & Missing Children’s Recovery Project as your charity of choice during this fall’s CFC campaign period. Please do this before the deadline. The Polly Klaas Foundation continues to be a proud participant in the 2012 Combined Federal Campaign. Our Charity Code is: 41681 Abducted & Missing Children’s Recovery Project
An FBI agent commended us on our work, “Your involvement had a large part in getting him home” Thank you for your generosity.
P.S. A parent of a returned child sent us this note: wrote: “I want to thank you for your help and kindness during our search for my daughter…She’s been back for around 16 months now. It’s day by day but things look promising. Thanks again for all your help and I hope you are richly blessed in the coming year & beyond.” Please make your personal donation today, and so we can continue helping parents find their missing children.
********************* Tell your family and friends how they can help protect children with news and updates from the Polly Klaas® Foundation. Sign-up for updates from the frontlines of child safety and missing children. c. 2012 Polly Klaas® Foundation, 312 Western Avenue, Petaluma, CA 94952 |
