WOODSTOCK, Ont. - It wasn't the break they were hoping for, but family members of a much-loved little girl absent from their lives for more than a week are latching onto a police decision to reclassify the case of Victoria Stafford as an abduction to keep their well-worn hopes alive.

In his first public address on the mysterious disappearance that's captured international headlines, the top cop in this small southwestern Ontario city announced Friday he'd brought in reinforcements from Ontario Provincial Police.

The provincial force will assume leadership in probing the eight-year-old's mystifying disappearance.

The Grade 3 student, known to family and friends as Tori, has not been seen since leaving her school with an unidentified woman on April 8.

Oxford Community Police Chief Ron Fraser and the police inspector taking the reins of the investigation suggested there remains every likelihood of finding the girl. Yet they refused to say what prompted the change in status or why the investigation remains tightly focused on her hometown of Woodstock, near London.

Police would only say they're working on several leads.

Word of additional police support was enough to shift a belief in Victoria's mother that police haven't made much headway.

"I feel that they are closer," Tara McDonald said on her front lawn following the chief's announcement.

"I feel it. I don't know why, I don't know what the reasoning is, but I do have a feeling that they do know something."

Her eyes covered by enormous dark sunglasses, McDonald said although she's been satisfied with the efforts of Oxford police, "it's about time" her daughter's case was upgraded.

McDonald had lashed out at police earlier in the week for not calling Tori's disappearance an abduction.

Wondering why so much time had passed before provincial police were brought in, she urged them to expand the parameters of the investigation.

"I just want it to go further," she said.

"Nobody in Woodstock ... would be stupid enough to keep her in Woodstock because she would be spotted in a New York minute and it would be over for whoever's done this," she said.

Speaking on behalf of Rodney Stafford and his side of the family -- the girl's parents are separated -- Tori's aunt Rebecca Stafford said they've been pleased by how police have handled the investigation so far.

However, they don't feel that calling the incident an abduction is anything more than "semantics"; for them the change brings value only if it draws more attention to the case.

A brief video showing a woman with long brown hair and a puffy white coat walking with Tori is the only tangible lead police have publicly discussed. No one has come forward to identify the woman, and her face is not clearly visible in the grainy footage.

Tori's mother remains convinced the woman is a stranger to her daughter and family. However, relatives on the girl's father's side say they pray the abductor is known to the child.

"My belief is if it is someone that knows her, there's less of a chance that she would be hurt by that person," said Rebecca Stafford, who explained her family drew that conclusion after watching the footage.

"I do honestly believe her body language is that of Victoria when she is happy, and if I dare say it, excited. I did have a memory flashback when I was watching that video."

Provincial police Det.-Insp. Bill Renton, who will spearhead the investigation, said officers have "pretty substantial direction" regarding the woman's identity, but he declined to divulge more.

Police have said it appears as though the girl is willingly walking with the woman, and Renton said there's been no change in that assessment.

Fraser spent the first minutes of the news conference defending his force's initial response to disappearance, including the decision not to issue an Amber Alert.

For an Amber Alert to be triggered, police must believe a child under 18 has just been abducted, consider the child to be in danger of serious bodily harm, and have enough descriptive information of a suspect or vehicle.

Although police were told around 6 p.m. on April 8 that Tori had gone missing, it wasn't until the next day the video was analyzed and revealed the girl was led away from the school by the mystery woman, Fraser said.

John Durant, the executive director of Child Find Ontario, said he supports the police's reasoning of why an Amber Alert wasn't issued.

It would be dangerous to water down the rules for calling an alert because it would reduce the impact they have on grabbing the public's and media's attention, Durant said.

He noted there are more than 20,000 reports of missing children every year in Ontario alone.

"You would have quite a few Amber Alerts going off on a daily basis," Durant said.

"The public would probably stop taking it as seriously."

Oxford police had said in the early days of the investigation that since they had no definitive evidence Tori was taken against her will or had been harmed, they would treat it as a missing person case.

The force also said it did not have the resources to co-ordinate a large-scale ground search, and police forces from surrounding areas, including provincial police, were called in to assist.

The Oxford force has had access to provincial police resources all along, and taking the lead in the investigation does not mean more resources are being put into the effort, Renton said.

"This will have no bearing on how we deploy our resources or change the focus of the investigation," he said.

Despite no sign of Tori having been found since she went missing, McDonald believes her daughter is still alive.

"She's here, she's somewhere. I'm her mother. I know her better than anybody else on the planet, and I feel that she is alive -- for sure."