3,000 KIDS ARE SAFER IN SONOMA

Clowns, toys, and rockin' good music marked the Klaas Foundation's Safety Days for seven weekends in November and January at the Santa Rosa, California, Downtown Plaza Mall. More than 3,000 kids were photographed and fingerprinted for safety I.D. kits provided free to their parents.

White-face clowns Carol Stone and Vickie Ott of Larkspur, Mary Kuder of Mill Valley, and Claude Gipson of Healdsburg kept children and parents laughing.

Albany Detective Sergeant Bill Palmimi, in a gleaming Elvis costume, sang rock-beat safety songs composed by his accompanist, fellow police Sergeant Art Clemons. Eight- year-old blues prodigy Sean Erickson and his group, which includes sister Nicki, Mallory Andrizzi, and Phillip Fraser -- all pupils of Windsor Schools -- belted out their catchy rhythms.

Children's fingerprints are an important part of their Polly Klaas I.D. Kits.

The long-term Safety event was co-sponsored by Bank of America. Staffer Diane McDowell and her team from the Bank of America snapped the identification pictures, while a play area sponsored by Discovery Toys was set up to amuse the toddlers.

The Klaas family and volunteers from the Foundation handled the fingerprinting, assisted by volunteer policemen and firemen from local departments.

Sonoma County's schools will carry on the child identification program with 50,000 Polly Klaas ID kits, funded by last year's highly successful Charlie Musselwhite benefit concert in Santa Rosa.

KLAAS FOUNDATION STARS IN THE MEDIA

The past months have seen Foundation representatives carrying the message of child safety and awareness to the public on a number of TV news and talk shows.

• The Foundation's CallHome Card was recently featured on A Current Affair, in a segment produced by Marc Klaas. The show resulted in at least 8,000 telephone queries about the prepaid calling card, which allows children to call home from a pay phone without money. For more information, call 1-800-206-2600.
• On Feb. 9, Marc Klaas spent an hour discussing child safety issues, on "Larry King Live." He also recently taped a Donahue program about California's "three strikes" law and two Rolanda shows on child safety issues.
• To raise public awareness, Klaas also filmed a segment for American Journal on seven-year-old Morgan Nick, abducted on June 9, 1995, and still missing from Alma, Arkansas.
• Klaas's father, Joe Klaas, recently taped a Leeza show on the U.S. trial system.
• The Feb. 6 cover story In USA Today was an extensive article on "Keeping Polly's Promise." This in- depth analysis analyzed the Foundation's goals and accomplishments.
• As a response to the Amber Hagerman tragedy, Marc Klaas addressed politicians and the public at a town hall meeting on child safety in Arlington, Texas, sponsored by WFAA-TV. On Feb. 6, Klaas spoke to the Comstock Club, in Sacramento, California, about children's rights in America from a historical perspective.