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Indiana overhauls child-support payment system 

Amount shaped by time parent spends with child 

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By HAROLD J. ADAMS
hjadams@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

The Indiana Supreme Court has approved a sweeping change in the way child-support payments are calculated — one aimed at providing a financial incentive for noncustodial parents, usually fathers, to see their children more often.

The bottom line: The more time noncustodial parents spend with their kids, the less money they will pay to the custodial parent in child support.

The new rules, which take effect Jan. 1, will apply to all future custody arrangements and could be used to modify payments due under some existing child-support orders.

The changes are billed by the court as a move toward fairness to noncustodial parents who are often shortchanged under current rules. But some divorce attorneys believe they will give custodial parents an incentive to minimize the time children spend with the other parent. Others fear a parade to county courthouses to seek changes in existing custody orders.

The Indiana changes are similar to a proposal considered earlier this year by the Kentucky General Assembly. It died in the House Judiciary Committee but is expected to be offered again when the legislature meets in January.

The current Kentucky rules don't provide a credit for a noncustodial parent. Computations are based solely on the relative incomes of the parents.

The changes in the Indiana guidelines were made under the rule-making authority of the state Supreme Court and are the result of almost two years of work by the Domestic Relations Committee of the Indiana Judicial Conference, the organizing body of all Indiana judges.

The committee's chairman for the past seven years has been Clark Circuit Judge Daniel Donahue, whose final act in that capacity was to present the changes to the Supreme Court on Sept. 4.

In a recent interview, Donahue said the new guidelines will provide a child-support credit to the noncustodial parent that will be pegged to the number of times a child spends the night with that parent each year.

Existing rules provide a standard credit of 10 percent, which was originally based on a standard of visitation every other weekend, or 52 overnight visits a year. But in 2001 the Supreme Court increased the minimum standard to 100 overnights per year, though the 10 percent credit continued to be based on the 52-visit standard.

The Domestic Relations Committee recognized that more time with a child often translates into higher child-care expenses and concluded that the 10 percent credit was outdated, Donahue said.

"We had to be fairer than we had been to the noncustodial parents by recognizing those expenses," he said. "When the (2001 change) went into effect, it had the effect of encouraging the noncustodial parent to spend more time with their kids."

UNDER CURRENT rules, child-support payments are based primarily on an individual parent's share of the total adjusted gross income of both parents. The new rules abandon the fixed 10 percent standard in favor of a sliding scale. Depending on the relative incomes of the the parents, the new rules could even result in the custodial parent making support payments to a noncustodial parent who spends a lot of time with the child.

Parents who hold to the traditional standard of visitation every other weekend would get the minimum credit; those spending less time than that with their children would get no credit. Small increases in the credit will be awarded for every five overnight visits above 51 each year.

Donahue said the new rules recognize that some child-care expenses — such as for food or transportation — move with the child from parent to parent, and will "encourage dads even more to spend more time with the kids."

But some attorneys are concerned that the financial adjustments will backfire.

"I'm afraid it's going to create more problems," Jeffersonville attorney Les Merkley said.

He predicted that custodial parents who now agree to let children spend more than the minimum time with the other parent will start resisting.

"Once they see their child support is going to be decreased, they're going to hold firm on those parenting guidelines," he said. "I see it as decreasing parenting time."

Donna Bowles of Jeffersonville, whose divorce was finalized last November, said she is happy with the child support she receives from her ex-husband for her two teenage daughters.

SHE SAID her youngest daughter spends every other Saturday night with her father, who gets the 10 percent credit on his child-support payments. Their older daughter is away at college.

Bowles said the idea of a larger credit is fine but added, "I would have to feel that the visitation by the (noncustodial) parent would have to be a substantial amount for there to be a reduction in the amount of child support paid to the custodial parent."

She said the threshold for a larger credit should be in the range of 30 to 50 percent of the parenting time.

Ben Bowman of Floyd County, who is now going through a divorce, said he is paying child support to his wife based on an agreement the couple reached after they separated in November.

Bowman said he sees his 2½ year old daughter every day and keeps her overnight about once every other week.

"Right now it's not an issue," he said of the amount he pays.

But he said he can see how the new rules will help other noncustodial parents.

"For anybody that maybe child support's hurting them, that's definitely going to be a plus for them," he said. "Hopefully it'll be more of an incentive for some parents to spend more time with their kids."

Linda Lorch, a New Albany attorney, expressed mixed feelings about the new rules.

"I GUESS I think it's a good idea that the court has recognized that there is more sharing of time with children than there has been in the past," she said.

But she said she shares Merkley's concern about how custodial parents will react.

"One of my concerns is will it make parents be less willing to agree to shared time schedules," she said. "If it reduces mom's standard of living, is she less likely to agree to that?"

Robert Monday, Indiana coordinator of the Children's Rights Council — a national group that advocates financial equity and more parenting time for noncustodial parents — said such concerns are unwarranted.

Monday, who is president of Parents and Children's Equality, the Indianapolis-area affiliate of the Children's Rights Council, participated in the debate that helped shape the new rules.

"The more sharing of the parenting time you have, the more sharing you have of expenses, and it's easier on both parents," he said. "Yes, it's a reduction in child support in some cases, but it's also a reduction in cost" to the custodial parent.

Jeffersonville attorney Rebecca Lockard said it's good to give a larger credit to parents who do more than the minimum with their children.

She said the hard part will be predicting how much time the noncustodial parent will spend with the child.

"If you predict that this person is going to have 107 overnights and they end up only having 50, then we're going to have to go back and do another change," she said.

THE RULES do provide for a reduction of the credit if parents don't live up to their agreement, and Donahue acknowledged that such cases may arise.

But he added: "Being fair is not always being easy."

Some lawyers also voice concern that courts will be flooded in January with noncustodial parents who already spend a lot of time with their children and will want to receive the larger credit.

"I think that there will be parents that want to go back to court to have that issue addressed if they are seeing their children more" often, Lorch said. But Donahue said his committee set a high bar for modifications to existing child-support orders.

First, the existing order must have been made at least 12 months earlier than the request to modify it. Second, modifications will be granted only if the new rules would result in a difference of more than 20 percent in the amount of child support owed.

IN KENTUCKY, the plan considered by the General Assembly was proposed by the Kentucky Child Support Guidelines Commission, which was established by the legislature to study possible changes. It would have required a credit if a child spends more than 40 percent of the nights each year with the noncustodial parent.

It would have permitted a credit, at the discretion of the judge, when the figure is between 30 percent and 40 percent.

Harrison Circuit Judge Robert McGinnis, the commission's chairman, said he hasn't heard of any opposition to the change. He said the measure simply didn't get out of committee last year in a short legislative session. The commission plans to offer the same proposal again in January.

"And I'd say the chances are a lot higher of getting through this time," he said.

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