DES MOINES — Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird will host a press conference with NFL Hall of Famer Mike Singletary in West Des Moines today to announce Iowa’s partnership with the National Child ID Program. The program is a community service safety initiative that provides child identification kits to families of K-12 students across the state at zero cost. These kits give parents the tools to store their child’s DNA and help police trace their child sooner in the event they go missing.
About the National Child ID Program
- 450,000 children run away each year
- 300,000 children are abducted each year by family members
- More than 58,000 children are abducted every year by non-family members
That’s more than 800,000 children in America missing each year – one child every 40 seconds. Yet, when the National Child Identification Program began; less than two percent of parents had a copy of their child’s fingerprints to use in case of an emergency.
The National Child Identification Program is a community service safety initiative dedicated to changing these statistics, by providing parents and guardians, with a tool they can use to help protect their children. The ID Kit allows parents to collect specific information by easily recording the physical characteristics, fingerprints and DNA of their children on identification cards that are then kept at home by the parent or guardian. If ever needed, this ID Kit gives authorities vital information to assist their efforts to locate a missing child.
Since its inception in 1997, the National Child ID Program has distributed over 70 million kits throughout North America. The program has been recognized by Congress and today works with federal, state, and local leaders, coaches, athletes, faith-based organizations, and corporate citizens to increase the safety of children in communities across the country.
