Since Katrina local law enforcement and school officials have seen the problem of teenagers living in town without their families, but they’ve not been able to quantify the problem or figure out exactly how to deal with it.

“We’ve identified kids who are living with friends, relatives, aunts, uncles or on their own and we see that everyday,” said Kevin George, the principal at Rabouin High School, a recovery school located in downtown New Orleans. “It’s hard to quantify how many kids we have in that situation until we try to contact the parent or have them come to school for some reason.”

The Recovery School District is having a hard time getting a handle on the issue as well, because while a parent or guardian must register the child in school, what happens after that is not always known.

Judge David Bell said initially that about 30 to 40 percent of the cases in his juvenile court involved children living on their own. He said that number is now down to about 10 percent but he said he isn’t sure if that lower number is due to fewer kids living on their own, or fewer getting into trouble.

Bell said in most of the juvenile cases a parent or guardian is found, but other times the child has to be sent to the state.

“Normally, what we try to do is investigate strenuously a relative or a biological parent and try to put the family back together,” he said. “If we can't do that, then we will put a child into state custody."

Bell said one of the reasons that no one can get numbers on how many children are living alone is that they aren’t accounted for as long as they don’t engage in improper behavior, or don’t get caught.