Stop Child Abuse Now (SCAN) - 945

Tonight's special guest is Mike Tikkanen from Minnesota, Founder of KARA (Kids at Risk Action) at InvisibleChildren.org. Kids At Risk Action is partnering with Minnesota Public Television to demonstrate why it is in our community's interest to stop the repeated failures throughout our child protection system and make children healthy. Brandon Stahl’s reporting on the tortured death of four year old Eric Dean after 14 ignored reports of child abuse by mandated reporters caused Governor Dayton to remark on the colossal failure of child protection and order a review of Minnesota’s child welfare system. Mike hopes changes will be made to the reporting, recording, and accountability as to how counties manage reports of child abuse and some effort will be made to change the dismal fact that Minnesota screens out 70% of child abuse calls and ranks 47th among the states in providing resources to children in child protection. 29% of children are sent back to the abusive conditions they were rescued from, and the average child is placed in four different foster homes. Mike asks, "Please support KARA’s effort to create the change to reach the tipping point to save children from the toxic homes and dysfunctional lives that hurt our schools, make our streets unsafe, and fill our prisons." Mike is passionate about improving the treatment of abused and neglected children and has formed his non-profit, Kid’s At Risk Action (KARA), to bring public awareness to children’s rights and form action groups to improve public policy towards at-risk children. Contact him at: Mike@Invisiblechildren.org