About 890 street children have been sent back to their home counties from Nairobi since the beginning of December.
Anne Lokidor, the city's youth affairs and education executive, also said tens of others have been taken to rehab centres
Lokidor said the move was part of a
multi-agency initiative that aims to rehabilitate and reintegrate street urchins without homes and parents and whose relatives cannot be traced.
“We are working with regional and county commissioners, and the Interior ministry to take them back to their homes," she said on Tuesday.
"We have realised some have homes and parents."
There are about 2,000 street families in the Nairobi city centre, the Globe Cinema roundabout being one of their most popular grounds. They have turned the pedestrian underpass in the area into their hideout.
Residents have complained that street children are being used by groups of fraudsters to beg, and that they have turned to
snatching handbags, jewellery, mobile phones and other valuables.
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The county's efforts to remove them from the CBD
have been unsuccessful. The official
said it will only be possible to relocate all street families from the CBD if "social and family problems” are addressed.
“Broken homes, extreme poverty, HIV/Aids, drugs and substance abuse and general family problems have perpetuated the problem,” she said.
But Lokidor noted that the construction of a rehabilitation centre on a 40-acre piece in Ruai was ongoing.
The Sh150 million centre will accommodate more than 3,000 children and will include primary and secondary school blocks and a vocational training centre.
The centre will have hostels for boys and girls who will be trained in masonry, carpentry and mechanics. It
will also have a medical clinic.
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Lokidor said the county’s four rehabilitation centres -
Bahati, Shauri Moyo, Joseph Kang'ethe and Kayole - have 320 children.
“Out of this number, 17 sat KCPE this year while nine sat KCSE. The best student in KCPE scored 371 marks and will be awarded the Governor’s four-year scholarship," she said.
She spoke at the launch of the Governor’s Christmas Tree Fund at City Hall on Friday.
The fund was launched to replace the defunct Mayor’s Christmas Fund.
It was founded in 1950s and involves mobilisation of resources from well-wishers to help destitute children during the festive season.