The Coalition, a national organization based in Arizona headed by James Rodriguez, drew nearly 500 people discussing all aspects of fatherhood, from providers of fatherhood services, children’s advocates, judges, social workers, Head Start and child support staff from all 50 states and several foreign countries.

1. Barry Williams, the originator about 40 years ago and national president of Lone Fathers Association Australia, the well organized fathers’ umbrella organization, represents about 22 separate organizations in Australia. Australian judges are supposed to give physical joint custody, Williams said, but the effort is constantly undermined by opposing women’s groups.
2. 1. Dr. Ron Mincy, a professor at Columbia University School of Social Work, who is the unofficial “guru” of the U.S. never-married fathers movement, pointed out there is no consistent, dependable source of funding for fatherhood projects in the U.S. as there is for women’s or domestic violence groups. He said funding is inconsistent, and rarely given to the same groups that got it before, with constantly changing government officials, so that the wheel has to be constantly re-invented.
   2. Mincy said that the federal government needs to adopt a national version of the New York State Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) that provides stronger incentives to work and pay child support. There should be a federal version of this self-support reserve, along with a broad outreach campaign that uses a wide array of agencies the serve children and families to make poor non-custodial fathers aware that they are eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit /(EITC).
3. I spoke on the relationship between father absence and the increase in crime, drugs, poverty, teenage pregnancy, and gangs. I said that if a child has a committed, involved father, the child would be less likely to join a gang.

The AZFF is the West Coast’s counterpart conference to the East Coast’s annual conference sponsored by NPCL (National Partnership for Community Leadership) which will hold its next conference on June 12-15, 2012 in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. NPCL is headed by Dr. Jeffery Johnson.

1.  a bill requiring a mandatory one-year waiting period prior to marriage dissolution,
2.  a bill establishing a Center to develop capacity to prevent unnecessary divorces, and
3.  a bill on education requirements for divorcing parents.

Office of Child Support Enforcement, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Fatherhood Initiatives in the Administration’s FY 2012 Budget March 06, 2011 The President has a deep and long history of supporting policies that can lift up fathers— expecting them to take responsibility for their children, but also helping them be the fathers they want to be by making policy changes and offering services that encourage, not discourage, healthy and active paternal involvement. There are many facets of this Administration-wide effort, as is made clear in the President’s FY 2012 budget request. The budget request includes new investments of $305 million in FY 2012 and $2.4 billion over ten years for the Child Support and Fatherhood Initiative. The budget also proposes continued funding of $150 million to support the Healthy Marriage and Responsible Fatherhood grant program. Both initiatives are part of HHS’s efforts to ensure that children have the support and involvement of both parents.

CHILD SUPPORT and FATHERHOOD INITIATIVE

The FY 2012 budget includes several legislative proposals to continue a commitment of vigorous child support enforcement, a continuous emphasis on program outcomes and efficiency, and provisions to help further encourage fathers to take responsibility for their children and to promote strong family relationships. The Child Support Enforcement program is administered by HHS’s Office of Child Support Enforcement within the Administration for Children and Families. These proposals include:

• Improved distribution policies to ensure that when non-custodial parents do the right thing and pay child support, their children benefit. The proposals encourage states to distribute more child support payments to families so that more of the support paid by fathers reaches their children. Taken together, these distribution proposals are estimated to result in an additional $1.9 billion in child support payments reaching the children. They include:
• Encouraging states to pass through the current child support collections to TANF families, rather than retaining those payments;
• Granting states additional flexibility to discontinue the requirement that child support payments be assigned to the state when a family receives TANF assistance;
• Requiring that when children are in foster care, the child support payments made on their behalf are used in their best interest;
• Prohibiting the use of child support from fathers to repay Medicaid costs associated with giving birth—a policy already discontinued in many states;
• Including a short-term five-year pool of funds to offset a significant share of states’ costs in implementing the distribution policies; and
• Providing one-time funds to states for necessary adjustments to their computer systems.
• Fostering fathers’ engagement in their children’s lives. The Budget provides $570 million over ten years to support increased access and visitation services and integrates these services into the core child support program. A few states currently help parents establish access and visitation agreements with significant success and modest costs. These services not only improve parent-child relationships and outcomes for children, but can also lead to greater, more regular payment of child support. Research shows that when fathers spend time with their children, they are more likely to meet their financial obligations. This creates a “double win” for children – an engaged parent and more financial security. The Budget includes proposals to:
• Update the statutory purposes of the CSE program to recognize the program’s evolving mission and activities that help parents cooperate and support their children;
• Require states to establish access and visitation responsibilities in all initial child support orders; and
• Encourage states to undertake activities that support access and visitation, implementing domestic violence safeguards as a critical component of this new state responsibility.
• Short-term Increase to Incentive Pool. The CSE program clearly demonstrates a high return on investment. For every dollar invested in the program, CSE collected $4.78 in child support. The Budget includes $600 million for a temporary increase in incentive payments to States based on performance in FY 2012 and FY 2013. These payments are to be based on state performance, which continues an emphasis on program outcomes and efficiency while also helping states overcome short term fiscal stresses.The Budget also continues a commitment to vigorous enforcement. The FY 2012 proposal includes several additional proposals aimed at increasing and improving collections and improving efficiency and effectiveness by:
• Requiring States to amend their uniform interstate child support laws to ensure efficient international child support case processing as required by The Hague Child Support Treaty;
• Closing a loophole to allow garnishment of longshoremen’s benefits;
• Improving the processes for freezing and seizing assets in multistate financial institutions;
• Providing tribal child support programs with access to the Federal Parent Locator Service and other enforcement tools and grant programs currently available to state child support programs, as well as sustained support for model tribal computer systems;
• Modifying the threshold at which states become subject to performance penalty based upon their paternity establishment percentage to better reflect state performance;
• Requiring each state’s use of procedures to review and adjust child support debt owed to the state, and to discourage accumulation of unpaid child support debt during incarceration;
• Revising title IV-D to consolidate and clarify various data matching, safeguarding and disclosure authorities.

HEALTHY MARRIAGE and RESPONSIBLE FATHERHOOD GRANTS

The FY 2012 budget proposes continued funding of $150 million to support Healthy Marriages and Responsible Fatherhood to be administered by HHS’ Office of Family Assistance within the Administration for Children and Families. These funds will be split equally among Healthy Marriage and Responsible Fatherhood activities. Under the law:

• Healthy Marriage funds may be used for a number of services including pre-marital education; marriage enhancement programs; divorce reduction programs; marriage mentoring programs; and marriage education, marriage skills, and relationship skills programs, that may include parenting skills, financial management, conflict resolution, and job and career advancement.
• The $75 million in Responsible Fatherhood funds may be used for fatherhood activities intended to promote or sustain marriage, responsible parenting, economic stability, and media campaigns that reach families with important messages about responsible fatherhood.

I have just been informed that I will be honored by NPCL with their prestigious Charles E. Ballard Pioneer Award for 25 years of service through CRC to children and families Ballard was longtime president of the Institute for Responsible Fatherhood and Family Revitalization. He was known for sending married couples to live in housing projects to show the people living there that marriage could work. The award will be given at an awards lunch on Thursday June 9. I will accept this award on behalf of the thousands of children and families that CRC has helped over the years.

NPCL, headed by Dr. Jeffery Johnson, is one of the leading organizations in the country working primarily with low-income minority fathers, to get them off the streets, away from crime and drugs, to jobs and job training, and to function as good parents to their children. Groups such as NPCL are increasingly aware that they must partner with groups that work towards providing fair custody arrangements and access (visitation), including the use of transfer of children and supervised access centers.

At the conference, you will gain insights into fatherhood programs around the country that you may not be aware of.

I will be on a panel Wednesday June 8 at 3:15 p.m.discussing the $75 million in fatherhood grants that were authorized and funded by Congress. Regulations outlining the application process are expected to be issued by HHS (The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) in June, right about the time of the conference.

Learn more at the NPCL website about the International Fatherhood Conference.

David L. Levy

Board Member, Children's Rights Council

Parental alienation occurs when a parent bad-mouths or alienates the child from the other  parent, and gets the child to join in the attack.  Experts learn to recognize the difference between poor parenting skills and parental alienation, as reasons why the child may not want to spend time with a parent.  Parental alienation occurs when a child will often forget good times he or she had with the alienated parent, will often also accuse other relatives of abuse, will be “eager” to make the attack (truly abused children are often reluctant to make accusations), and will sound jut like the alienating parent in how the child describes the alienation. 

Parental alienation can be committed by either the father or the mother; it is a gender-neutral issue.  Parental alienation is an impediment to joint custody, and to any other cooperative arrangement in the raising of children whose parents are separated, divorced, or never-married. 

                                                 x x x x x x x x x

DVD:  Dr. Richard Warshak has done it again!  The author of "Divorce Poison: How to Protect Your Family From Bad-Mouthing and Brainwashing", now in its 24th printing, has produced a terrific DVD entitled "Welcome Back, Pluto, Understanding, Preventing, and Overcoming Parental Alienation."  The video, which has been watched by various parents and children together, has already produced positive results among some of those children.   I have watched the video, and Dr. Richard Sauber (a forensic psychologist) and I (an attorney) have joined together to write a positive review of the DVD which will appear in the American Journal of Family Therapy (JFT), which Dr. Sauber edits.   

Look up "Welcome Back, Pluto," named for the celestial body that was “removed” from planet status by scientists in 2006.  What Warshak means is that even though an attempt may be made to remove a parent from the child’s life, there is a “way back” for that parent.  Copies are $28.99 including shipping.   On the internet, look up “Warshak” or “Welcome Back, Pluto.” 

                                                  x x x x x x x x x

After a hiatus, I have been welcomed back onto the Children’s Rights Council’s Board of Trustees.   I have offered to help CRC with fundraising.   



A House Subcommittee held a hearing Thursday June 17 on Fatherhood.  Chairman Jim McDermott (D-WA) of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support explained that the $150 million a year-for-five years fatherhood grants ($750 million total, most of which went to marriage preparation) expire this September 30.  As Congress looks to re-authorization, the Committee wanted to assess the grants awarded so far and to discuss the importance of fatherhood.  

It was clear during the hearing (and in lead-ups to the hearing), that marriage will no longer be the focus of any new grants.  The Obama Administration, Rep. Lanny Davis (D-IL), sponsor of a bill on fatherhood, and advocates for low-income fathers, who will receive most of any new grants, want the money to be for fatherhood regardless of its form -- especially for never-married fathers.  The testifiers could find no direct correlation between the existing grants and any increase in marriage due to the grants.

The hearing emphasized jobs and the ability of fathers to pay their financial child support if they have jobs, and then being better able to connect them to their families.

Committee member John Lewis (D-GA), a hero of the Civil Rights Movement, asked Ralph Smith of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the largest family foundation in America, why the foundation has been funding fatherhood initiatives for the past 10 years.  Smith said that the importance of fathers to children could not be over-estimated.  Smith urged that Congress "stop the clock" on child support when a father is in jail, calling the argument that jail is "voluntary unemployment" an "oxymoron."  Smith also said that non-custodial fathers who pay child support should be eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit, currently available essentially only to low-income custodial mothers.

 
Ron Mincy of Columbia University, considered the academic "guru" of the never-married movement, said that when he was with the Ford Foundation prior to Columbia, he was able to secure funding for organizations that reached out to low-income fathers.  He said that about 80 percent of never-married fathers are involved with the mother at the time of the child's birth, and America must do more to ensure that those fathers remain involved in children's lives.

Judge Milton Lee Jr. of the District of Columbia discussed the "fathering court" that graduates up to 40 fathers a year with jobs and relationship training.  After the 2-hour hearing, he told me that even though Washington, D.C. has a presumption for joint custody (physical and legal), co-parenting and shared parenting are just an afterthought because of America's legal emphasis on paying child support.  He said that Congress needs to change the emphasis for America so that co-parenting (joint custody) receive more attention   

Other testifiers included David Hensel of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS),.Mark Perry of the American Enterprise Institute, Kirk Harris of the National Fatherhood Leaders Group in Chicago, and Nathaniel Rauschendorfer, Parenting Services Program Manager, Catholic Charities of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

Unless TV cameras are present, usually only one or two members of any Congressional committee show up for a hearing, but at one time, there were five subcommittee members present for this fatherhood hearing.

 
Written statements may be submitted for the record.  Go to "House Ways and Means Committee," and click on "Recent Hearings -- Hearing to Review Responsible Fatherhood Programs."  You can listen to the hearing (probably by next week) and obtain instructions on how to submit up to 10 pages of testimony by July 1, 2010.   The more testimony that is submitted, the better.  "Divorce" was mentioned only once during the hearing, by Chairman McDermott, who, although he is a medical doctor, referred to the many upsetting cases of divorce he is aware of.  Explain in your testimony why low-income divorced fathers also need a mix of services to help them be better parents to their children. 

June 8, 2010

A Long Island, N.Y., judge has sentenced a woman to six weekends in jail for repeatedly undermining her ex-husband's relationship with their two daughters.

Supreme Court Justice Robert A. Ross in Nassau County ruled that the mother, Lauren R., willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating the elementary school-age children from her ex-husband, Ted R.

    Ross held Ms. R. in civil contempt and ordered her to report to the Nassau County Correctional Facility every other weekend this summer.

    Her term was to have begun on Friday, but was temporarily stayed pending appeal by a judge from the Appellate Division, 2nd Department, on Thursday.

    "The evidence before me demonstrates a pattern of willful and calculated violations of the clear and express dictates of the parties' Stipulation of Settlement," Ross wrote in Lauren R. v. Ted R., 203699-02.

     "The extensive record is replete with instances of attempts to undermine the relationship between the children and their father and replace him with her new husband, manipulation of defendant's parenting access, utter and unfettered vilification of the defendant to the children, false reporting of sexual misconduct without any semblance of 'good faith,' and her imposition upon the children to fear her tirades and punishment if they embrace the relationship they want to have with their father."

    The extraordinary hearing to determine whether Ms. R. should be held in contempt for violating the couple's stipulation of settlement began in May 2009 and stretched over 23 days of hearings over the next nine months.

    During the hearing, Mr. R. testified to dozens of occasions in which his ex-wife either interfered with his visitation rights or purposefully alienated the children from him.
    The judge described about a dozen such incidents or patterns in his eight-page decision.

    In the winter of 2007, for example, Ms. R. prevented Mr. R. from seeing his daughters for six weeks, Ross wrote.

    "I observed the plaintiff smirk in the courtroom as defendant emotionally related how he was deprived of spending Hanukkah with his children, and was relegated to lighting a menorah and watching his daughters open their grandparents' presents in the back of his truck at the base of plaintiff's driveway," the judge wrote.

    Mr. R. also testified that Ms. R. consistently scheduled theater outings and social activities with her children so that they would conflict with his visitation, thereby putting him in the position of either consenting to a missed visit or risking disappointing his daughters.

    The "crescendo" of Ms. R.'s contempt involved false accusations of sexual abuse against Mr. R., the judge wrote.

    "Allegations that defendant had injured the child were found to be baseless and, by making such allegations, plaintiff needlessly subjected the child to an investigation by Child Protective Services, placing her own interests above those of the child," Ross wrote. "This report was not made in 'good faith' -- rather, the investigating agency warned the mother not to re-utilize the allegations and her children in her custodial litigation with the defendant."

    In addition to the contempt finding and the temporarily stayed jail sentence, Ross ordered a hearing to consider a change of custody and to hear Mr. R.'s application for more than $134,000 in attorney fees. Those hearings were postponed pending Ms. R.'s appeal.

    Ms. R.'s attorney, Kieth I. Rieger of Barrocas & Rieger in Garden City, N.Y., praised Ross, but criticized the decision, likening it to last week's missed umpire call that cost a Detroit Tigers pitcher a perfect game.

    "I think all of us make mistakes, and I think he's just made a good-faith, honest mistake in his assessment of this case," Rieger said. "That's why there's an Appellate Division. I think he just did not accurately assess my client."

    Stanley Hirsch, also of Garden City, represented Mr. R.

    "I'm very hopeful that this case will be some type of warning to those who don't have the children's best interests at heart when they conduct themselves with their spouses," Hirsch said. "It has great significance to my client, but I think it has a terrific overall impact on people who are going through a divorce and not getting along and involving the children in their disputes."

 

Added note from custody consultant David L. Levy, J.D.

Either parent is capable of alienating the child from the other parent.  The parent with custody of the child is generally in a stronger position to cause alienation, because that parent has the child the majority of the time, and thus more opportunity to alienate the child from the other parent.   Researchers have pointed out that if one starts with the child's "best interests," one must determine whether the child is the victim of sexual or physical abuse, or possibly poor parenting skills, as a reason why the child does not want contact with a parent. Absent that, alienation may be a factor.

David L. Levy, J.D can provide further information on this topic to parents and fellow attorneys. 

This was accomplished by revising the Maryland child support guideline – the formula that determines how much non-custodial parents must pay.  State officials noted that the guideline had not been revised in Maryland in 22 years.

Yet income through wages and inflation have increased about fifty percent since 1988.  So if a parent was earning, say, $20,000 twenty-two years ago, he would now be earning about $35,000.  That parent is paying support at the $35,000 rate, not the $20,000 rate. 

Delegate Ben Kramer (D-Montgomery County) said during a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee March 18 that he had compared what parents pay under the existing guideline.  He said parents in Virginia and Maryland pay only about seven dollars difference, and both pay more than parents in New York, where the standard of living is higher.

Furthermore, testimony was provided by Mike McCormick of the American Coalition of Fathers and Families (ACFC) that the Virginia legislature rejected a big increase in the Virginia guideline a few years ago. 

In this uncertain economic age, I testified, as did others, that this was no time to be increasing the child support guideline for Maryland, under which the increase of up to 27 percent will take place. 

Yet Maryland state officials in the Department of Human Resources (DHR) pushed hard for this increase, as did bill sponsors Senator Brian Frosh and Delegate Jeff Waldstreicher (both Montgomery County Democrats).  

Why this big increase?   Concern for custodial parents and children is a factor; of course. We all know that parents must financially and emotionally support their children.  

Another factor, however, is the apparent belief that transfer of money from one parent to another parent is more important than transferring the child.  Keep in mind that Maryland is one of only 12 states that does not have a presumption for either legal or physical joint custody.  

An amendment to the guideline bill by Delegate Jill Carter (D-Baltimore) would have provided a presumption for joint custody.  Her amendment failed.

Everyone in Maryland is represented by three state delegates and one state senator and the entire state legislature is up for re-election this Fall.  Learn who your delegates and senators are   Call the legislature at 301-858-3000 and they will tell you who represents you in Annapolis.   Get involved in the campaign. 

Get involved politically no matter what state you live in. 

Many books tell you people how to “win” sole custody, on the assumption that a child only needs one parent, but Mr. Palermo takes a broader view.  He has written a short (56 pages), informative, and easy to read booklet on how to “win” joint custody, so that your child will have two active parents in his or her life. Mr. Palermo, who is CRC’s chapter head in Boston, has more than 20 years of litigation and trial expertise.  He has been working his craft in a state known for making it very difficult for a parent to obtain physical joint custody  --  generally defined as between a third to half of the time with the child on a year-round basis. As Mr. Palermo notes, the standard court order in today’s divorce and custody actions is legal custody to both parents (almost meaningless), physical custody to one parent, and the non-custodial parent visits with the kids during every other weekend, and for a dinner or two during the week.  “This is not acceptable or right if you are an active, engaged, committed, dedicated, loving, parent,” he rightly notes.

Mr. Palermo tries to win more for his clients, and he does not give up.  With this book, he tries to help others.  The book was written in 2006, and CRC apologizes for not reviewing the book before now. The book covers certain aspects of expert witnesses, getting the right trial lawyer, preparing your evidence and yourself for a hearing and trial, appellate considerations, the cost of litigating as best you can, considerations as to the important basis for your case, and other factors which every parent will want to know. Mr. Palermo, in the spirit of CRC, urges readers to ”…try to keep the family together for your and your children’s sake.  Although sometimes difficult and always requiring constant work and effort, the family relationship with both parents together as best they can be, raising and nurturing their children, is the best situation of all.” Reflecting his colorful personality,  Palermo makes humorous comparisons to his having grown up in the boating world, refers to literary figures like Herman Melville, and references to the “dark side.”  Significantly, he provides examples of divorced parents who raised their children the right way, by being available to and supportive of them.  

Copies are available from Nick Palermo,  Nick Palermo, Esq., president
CRC of Boston
c/o Law Office of Nicholas Palermo
60 State Street, 7th Floor
Boston, MA 02109