Thank you, Keith [Nelson, Assistant Secretary, HUD], for that kind introduction.

Good morning. I'm delighted to be back at HUD and to join with Secretary Jackson in helping raise public awareness about the plight of foster children in our area who are in need of permanent, loving families.

And I especially want to recognize Maxine Baker, President and CEO of the Freddie Mac Foundation, for helping to make this Galley possible – she's actually an adoptive mother herself.

It's hard to believe, but more than half a million kids in this country are growing up in foster care. We have 6,000 children in foster care locally…nearly 600 of them in immediate need of a place to stay. Pictures of these children could full this entire building.

That's why what we are doing here today – in launching the Freddie Mac Foundation Heart Gallery -- is so important. It's one of the best ways we know how to bring public attention to this national crisis. And to help make sure these kids can find the home and family they so desperately want and need.

This Gallery is truly a labor of love – as dozens of local photographers donated their time and talents to create these portraits. I think you would agree that they managed to capture the soul, the spirit and the light that exists within these children – a light that is too often dimmed by despair, insecurity and waiting.

I ask you, how many foster children will go to sleep alone and hungry tonight? In a strange bed? Or even out in the cold on the streets?

I don't think any of us here today have all the answers, but the Freddie Mac Foundation Heart Gallery is helping to make a real difference in the lives of hundreds of local foster children waiting for adoption. Since the gallery was launched at Union Station last November, about a dozen of these children are in the process of being adopted. And eight of them have already found permanent homes.

But this gallery serves to remind us that all of these children are more than just numbers – they're beautiful kids, with hobbies and talents and dreams of their own.

And it's my hope, and Secretary Jackson's, that members of the HUD family will step up and consider opening their hearts and homes too to these very special children -- if not through adoption, then by becoming a foster parent.

Why, you may ask, is Freddie Mac, a major player in the secondary residential mortgage market, involved with children, especially foster kids? Well, just as our business goal is to increase homeownership, the Freddie Mac Foundation's goal is to make sure that these homes are happy, healthy places to live. And that foster children have a place to in these homes.

It's why we sponsor Wednesday's Child (a national televised campaign to find adoptive homes) and National Adoption Day. And in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, assisted nearly 4,000 foster children affected and displaced by the storm.

We're also always looking for partners to help us build awareness of foster children who are in need of loving, adoptive homes. In fact, we just signed up the local ball team, the Nationals, to help us put these children's faces in the public eye.

The Heart Gallery will soon move on to another D.C. location in a few weeks. But I hope the impact it will have on HUD employees will stay far longer.

Thank you again, Secretary Jackson, and everyone at HUD, for joining us in this effort to make home possible for our region's foster children.