Brittany Patterson

On a late winter evening about three years ago, Barbara Hernandez stood in front of half a dozen members of the Riley Elementary School Parent Teacher Association in Long Beach, Calif.

For sexually exploited minors, breaking away from the streets is no easy task, but when they do, most find a system which has few places for them to go. A gargantuan stuffed teddy bear dominates an iron-framed twin-sized bed in the brightly painted bedroom.

New funding is raising the profile of commercially sexually exploited children, and hopes that California can do a better job to protect them. A recent infusion of funding from both the state and federal government, as well as a push from Governor Jerry Brown, has sped up California’s efforts to create a comprehensive plan to better serve commercially sexually exploited children, or CSEC.