BANGOR – About 60 percent of homeless people nationwide once were part of a child care system, and to reverse that trend, foster children must be placed with families before it’s too late, an adoption expert said Wednesday.

The lack of permanent attachment to a parent figure is the primary cause of homelessness, according to Pat O’Brien, executive director of You Gotta Believe! The Older Child Adoption & Permanency Movement Inc., a child placement agency in New York City.

People who think homelessness stems from poverty, unemployment, drug addiction or mental illness are mistaken, he said.

“The real reason people are homeless is the lack of any functional human relationship,” O’Brien told more than 60 child care professionals and foster parents Wednesday.

O’Brien cited federal surveys that indicated 60 percent of men in U.S. homeless shelters had been in foster care. About 56 percent of children living in youth homeless shelters were in the foster care system within the past year, he said.

Finding homes for those children before they are discharged from the system may be the solution, he said.

In Maine, about 42 percent of all foster care children are 14 years old or older, according to Bobbi Johnson, program administrator for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services in Bangor. Of 300 foster children in the Bangor area, about 150 are older than 14.

When a child enters the system, O’Brien said, the primary goal is to reunite the youngster with family or provide a permanent home. The aim for many older children is independent living, however, and that training is propelling children toward homelessness.

While most individuals leave the home they grew up in at 26, the foster care system is discharging them into an unknown world at 18, he said.

“[Child care services] are creating as much of a problem as we’re solving when we do this,” he said. “We plop kids in homes knowing they’re going to leave. That doesn’t make sense.”

O’Brien called for child care professionals to find adults willing to make a lifetime commitment to a child. That search entails capitalizing on any connection a child makes with an adult. A child’s attorney or a caseworker may show interest in adopting a child, and that curiosity must be exploited, he said. Ten social workers at O’Brien’s company have adopted children.

This year, 20 adoptions were completed as of June 1 in Bangor, according to Johnson. While adoption is the most permanent method, people can get involved in other ways such as guardianship.

“We can’t find homes for them without community involvement,” Johnson said Wednesday before the talk.

Tim Magee, 37, a foster parent from Sangerville, attended the conference Wednesday morning at the request of his foster child’s caseworker.

He and his wife discovered a 12-year-old girl who entered a local school district last year. The couple completed foster care training programs, and, since February, the girl has been in their care.

Despite many first-time parenting difficulties, Magee said he has built bonds with the girl and will continue to help her mature. Ideally, that process will culminate in adoption, he said during an intermission period.

“When she goes out into the real world, we’ll be there for her,” he said, reiterating a child’s need for a safety net. “We’re going to do everything we can.”