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DCF Launches New Campaign To Educate Parents

TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami/AP) — The Florida Department of Children and Families is launching a new campaign that it hopes will encourage parents to educate themselves about who they are leaving their children with.

The DCF campaign will target parents and guardians of children under the age of 4 who rely on child care and may be using a caregiver they know little about.

State officials say more than 25 percent of child protective investigations last year involved a non-relative caregiver as the alleged perpetrator. This represents more than 12,000 incidents of verified maltreatment at the hands of a non-relative caregiver in 2013.

DCF is partnering with more than 30 statewide agencies and organizations in the public awareness campaign, which includes networks of pediatricians and child protective investigators.

The new campaign comes just after CBS4 news partner published a series of articles called Innocents Lost about children who DCF failed and ended up getting killed.

(TM and © Copyright 2014 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2014 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

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