Life on the street gets tougher for runaways

Solutions not easy to find
Last year, he told members of Congress how, at age 12, he ran away from an abusive home. He got help at a library affiliated with National Safe Place, an organization with more than 16,000 locations nationally where young people are put in touch with local crisis workers.

Still, many communities that want to establish Safe Places are turned down because they have few or no services to offer runaways.

Nine states have no Safe Places at all. That includes the home of the 13-year-old girl who was on the line with the Runaway Switchboard for more than an hour.

Several times, she adamantly refused to call the local sheriff or to get child protective services involved.

"All this stuff that's going on, it's just really overwhelming," she told McCormick, the call center volunteer. "I don't want my mom to go to jail. I can't do that to my family."

Eventually, though, she changed her mind. She asked McCormick to stay on the line while she spoke with a county social worker and then the sheriff.

"I've kind of run away from home," the girl told the sheriff's dispatch operator. "I need somewhere to stay."

McCormick waited on the line until a sheriff's deputy found her and picked her up. Finally, the girl was safe and members of the Runaway Switchboard staff looked relieved.

"You get used to some aspects of this," says Cori Ballew, a Runaway Switchboard supervisor who oversaw the call. "But you never get used to some of it, especially when it ends with no resolution."

Some runaways, like this one, find help of some kind, she says.

Others, faced with few choices, hang up.

More from msnbc.com Thanksgiving is about odd family dynamics First Read: Pardon my turkey, and other trivia 570,000 pager messages from 9/11 released Nissan hatches plan to boost battery cars   Silver Lining: Tales of struggle and hope On Twitter: Breaking news updates | Weird and wild

MORE FROM LIFE

Life Section Front

NYT: Penny-pinching holiday fliers start early NYT: Medical debt spurs more bankruptcies Newsweek: The history of America’s beloved turkey Winds send Calif. wildfire toward homes Tribes' casino push worries gambling foes ‘Recession gave me a new opportunity’ Census worker killed himself, police say In recession, pets go homeless in droves DOT fines airlines for six-hour tarmac delay Source: Palin book sold 700,000 in first week Life Section Front   Add Life headlines to your news reader: