Supporting Efforts to Promote Greater Awareness of Effective Runaway Youth Prevention Programs

Floor Speech

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Ms. McCOLLUM of Minnesota. Mr. Speaker, today we will vote on a resolution in support of preventive programs; yet this Congress continues to underfund the critical resources needed to address the problems faced by these vulnerable youth.

Homelessness is merely a symptom of a bigger problem. For many youth, their home situation is violent and it is unhealthy. The Wilder Foundation, a nonprofit health and human service organization that has served the greater St. Paul area since 1906, understands this issue well. They tell us that children who run away are three times more likely to have been physically abused, five times more likely to have been treated for drug and alcohol problems. These young adults need our help, they need our support, and they need the opportunity to know that they can get their lives back on track. And there are many in our community and across this country who are ready to serve homeless youths.

In Minnesota there are groups such as the Ain Dah Yung Center, serving Native American youths; the Bridge For Runaway Youth, and they are working hard to provide critical services.

When I visited one of the homeless shelters for youth just recently, I found out that they had to cut their hours back, that they could not provide a safe haven for children to escape the cold during the day and to get counseling, to reunite them with their families when possible or to put them in a place where they would be safe. These children need our assistance. They need a partner at the Federal level, one that they can count on, not only for well-intentioned resolutions but the dollars needed to provide those resources, those safe havens, especially as winter sets in on these young adults in Minnesota.

They need resources. They need beds. They need counselors. But most of all they need to know, our children need to know that Congress is prepared to vote for them and to approve not only this resolution but in the future the resources needed in order for them to turn their lives around.

Our children deserve our hope for a better future for them, and they deserve an opportunity to have that future.

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