Nearly four months after Katrina, hundreds of children still missing

485 Katrina kids still missing; FEMA holding info
08:54 PM CST on Friday, December 23, 2005
Dave McNamara / WWL

Controversy brewed Friday over FEMA’s reluctance to release information on evacuees, data that some agencies have said could speed up the process of finding children missing since Hurricane Katrina.

It was not until the FBI began requesting information that FEMA this month turned over the records, which are protected by privacy laws.

Thousands of evacuees gathered along the I-10 at Causeway in the days following Hurricane Katrina to be airlifted to safety. In the rush to flee New Orleans, and the chaos that followed Katrina, families were torn apart.

Officials on the front lines of the search have said that those federal privacy rules may have hampered efforts to reunite families.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has a database with close to 500 names, all of them children whose whereabouts are still unknown.

Walter Fahr, manager of the Louisiana Clearing House for Missing Children, said FEMA has names, addresses, phone numbers, and social security numbers of evacuees that could help connect parents with children.

A FEMA spokesperson said the agency could only release personal information to law enforcement such as the FBI. FEMA’s Nicol Andrews said the FBI made its first request for a broad amount of data on December 5 and that information was released three days later.

There was a request for more information that was given to the FBI Thursday. Andrews said there has been no delay, adding that finding children has been a key priority for FEMA.

In Louisiana, Fahr said the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has had more expertise than FEMA in finding missing children.

The national center is still working to locate 485 children who are either missing or out of touch with their parents or guardian
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In addition to that work currently being done, FEMA has been operating its own missing persons hotline based in Baton Rouge.