Forsyth County must do a better job of collecting child-support payments, because when those payments aren’t collected, children can suffer. And, as their parents turn to social-service agencies for help, the costs are eventually passed on to the rest of us.

Forsyth leaves millions of dollars that is owed to custodial parents uncollected each year, Blair Goldstein reported in Sunday’s Journal. The county’s social services department is supposed to step in when a parent has trouble collecting court-ordered support. So far this year, the county DSS has collected just 61 percent of the support payments owed each month. That’s less than the collection goal of 71 percent set by the state. And that makes Forsyth the urban county with the worst collection rate other than Mecklenburg.

That has got to change.

Caregivers in the thousands refuse background check

Thousands of Coloradans who get state aid for providing in-home day care to the children of relatives or friends are refusing to undergo the criminal background checks required by a new state law.

As a result, 70 percent of the people caring for 7,662 children and getting payments under the state’s Child Care Assistance Program in 2006 are expected to be ineligible for additional money, state human-services officials said.

The remaining providers who agree to the background checks will get the payments if they pass.

A proposal moving through the state Legislature would require courts to change how they decide child custody cases. Historically, Minnesota’s courts have awarded physical custody of a child to one divorced parent, typically the mother. But a bill under consideration would require court to presume that children of divorced parents split their time living between both parents.

Minnesota’s courts have long held a preference against divorced parents sharing physical custody of their children.

In 1945, Justice Leroy Matson said children need stability, and it’s difficult to achieve stability when “a young child is shunted back and forth between homes.” Minnesota’s courts continue to cite Matson’s words in child custody cases today.

Two caseworkers entrusted with checking on the safety of children in state custody have been accused of faking reports saying they kept tabs on them.

The two Tampa workers hadn’t seen some of the children in months, state investigators found. When supervisors realized this, they followed up on the neglected cases and learned one boy had been passed on to a relative before he ultimately landed in a juvenile detention facility.

A Department of Children and Families investigative report revealed the allegations.

Attorneys, counselor offer views, advice

Law enforcement officers continue to speculate on why Eric Johnson chose to steer a single-engine Cessna 150 into a house on the outskirts of Virgil I. Grissom Airport Monday morning.

Investigators have determined Johnson was distraught following a recent divorce and heated child custody battle.

Custody disputes are notorious for eliciting extraordinary emotions.

For Dan Frazier of Somersworth, surviving on his $900 monthly disability benefit is a challenge — one made greater by an automatic $100 deduction for child support.

“Sometimes I have to borrow $20 or $30 to make it until the end of the month,” he said. “I live from check to check.”

Many non-custodial parents across the country are in similar or worse circumstances after being ordered to make child support payments that are high relative to their income.

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Many parents and children are in financial difficulty today because parents are not paying the child support ordered by courts. Hiring a private investigator can help parents augment resource-strapped legal systems so that payment can finally be made.

Deadbeat parents cost children a lot of money. In the state of Hawaii alone, more than half a billion dollars represents the amount of delinquent child support payments. According to 2005 statistics, the state is only able to successfully collect 40% of delinquent accounts. The District of Columbia is not much better, collecting only in 37% of cases. Most states have passed laws to get deadbeat parents to pay up — in some states; parents who fall behind on their child support can find their pay checks cut, their credit dinged, or their licenses suspended.

Despite the legal measures, though, parents still report that deadbeat parents do not pay child support. Child advocacy groups point out that some parents move or change identities in order to avoid child support, while others only make a payment or two when threatened with cut pay or loss of a license and then return to non-payment. In many cases, law enforcement and child services simply do not have the resources to find and compel non-paying parents to make payments.

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Apart from leaving a sorry legacy of conflict, ridicule, scorn, lust and misery, Anna Nicole Smith leaves to posterity one other thing: a Byzantine set of legal conflicts that will probably take years to untangle. In fact, if judges and lawyers ever get together to write a book about how not to handle probate, estate and child custody issues, they will probably use the Anna Nicole Smith story as the backbone for the story.

There are so many unresolved legal issues it is hard to know where to begin, or to end, and besides, by the time you read this some of those issues already may be resolved. So instead of focusing upon the things that Smith and Company did wrong, or upon the hundred or so possible scenarios that could play out over the next few years, I thought I would humbly offer a few suggestions on what other families, other couples, can try to do right when it comes to maneuvering through the shoals of family law.

‘Like going on a scavenger hunt when you don’t know what you’re looking for’

Jeff Means spends 10-hour days staring at a TV screen, editing surveillance videotape shot by his investigators.

The Hazel Green private investigator and founder of Sound Mind Investigations has a marker board in his office filled with a long list of ready-to-be-edited surveillance tapes.

Means and his six-person staff are often hired by individuals in the North Alabama area hoping to win child custody or find out if their spouse is cheating.

While the general perception of the fast-growing field of private investigation is that it’s nonstop excitement, local private investigators like Means say that much of the work is tedious.

There are many things that can affect a child’s safety in a custody situation. One of these things is the new friends and partners that a parent may meet after a divorce.

Child custody problems are more prevalent than most people realize. According to 2003 US census findings, 43.7% of mothers with custody and 56.2% of custodial fathers are separated or divorced. This means that many parents are raising their children while separated from their spouse. Statistics show that the majority of people who divorce eventually remarry or at least form new partnerships. Not surprisingly, custodial parents worry about the influence of these new partners on their children.

They may have a reason to worry. Custody arrangements in a divorce are usually based on information that is current at the time of the divorce. However, the circumstances of a person’s life can change dramatically – usually with no corresponding changes to custody arrangements. A parent may meet a new partner who is a bad influence – or is even actively dangerous – to the child the parent is responsible for.
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• Group for Private Investigators
• Group for Process Servers