Dialog; Deadbeat Parents

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry,

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry test test test test test not pay

child support payments, seems to grow exponentially. What effect does parental delinquency have on children? Why can't the legal system force irresponsible parents to pay? Our guests tonight may have some answers. They are Anita Diaz, head of the Vice President of the non -profit Hawaii Advocates for Child Support. Ms. Diaz is a divorcee with a 13 -year -old son. Although she is now receiving some support from her ex -husband, she says that her husband owes $30 ,000 in back child support. Leona Kushi is the Maui branch supervisor of the Child Support Enforcement Office of the Department of the State Attorney General. A graduate of the University of Hawaii and Ms. Kushi has been investigating child support cases for most of the past decade. Gregory Frey is a private attorney, a graduate of Santa Clara University in Willamette University College of Law. Mr. Frey specializes in family law. See, I've pronounced it both ways, Greg, so that I'd get it right. Donna Bepper is a single mother with a 15 -year -old daughter. She's owed $20 ,000 from her

ex -husband, and she doesn't think the child support enforcement agency is doing a very good job. We try to get a father or a mother who's not paying support payments to appear tonight, but understandably, none were anxious to do so. Before we turn to our guests, remember, please, that dialogue thrives on your questions and comments. So please call us at 955 -7878. Collect calls from neighbor islands will be accepted, 955 -7878. Waiting to answer your calls and jot down your questions on little blue cards like this are volunteers from Alpha Delta Kappa side chapter. Our sign language interpreter is Loretta McDonald, dialogue, but not Loretta McDonald is being simulcast this evening on Hawaii Public Radio, K -I -F -O -A -M -1380. Ms. Diaz, how bad is this problem of non -payment of child support, statewide? There are 16 million children in the United States that are old child support. Nine out of every 10 children on welfare are entitled to child support and do not receive same. 18 billion in

unaccumulated unpaid child support are owed to these children. 120 million and delinquent child support is owed to the children here in the state of Hawaii. What's that name? 120 million. Nationwide, 19 % of children receive support per their court orders, 31 % receive partial amounts of child support ordered, and 50 % receive nothing. Mr. Fry, why is it so bad? There are a lot of reasons both those that owe and those that are supposed to be getting the money. I think the basic problem is the number of cases, the lack of resources, and the lack of judges, the lack of agencies to include staff and abilities of the child support and enforcement agency to tackle a problem that is not going to go away. They're simply are not enough judges for what we call post -decreate cases, cases that come forth after the decree is entered. When a decree is entered, people say, wouldn't it be nice if

it will go as written? You get your $450 a month and you get it every month and there's no problem. Fathers traditionally go away, start new families, start new existences, leave jobs, and it is dependent upon having a job in this state to get child support paid. It comes right out of your paycheck, goes to the agency, is cut to the parent that has the kids. What happens traditionally is parents leave, especially in this state, move someplace else, leave a job, and you lose them, contact is gone. The parent says, I need help. There is a backlog of cases both in the court and through the administrative agency that Chis doesn't, and it's too big. It does not have the ability to tackle the problem. It's too big. Donna, how long before your husband became delinquent in his pain? He paid for the first year we were divorced. Then I moved back to Hawaii from the mainland and he'd never made another payment.

He missed for three years, he's about 20 ,000, and he moved back to Hawaii a year ago. And his defense, he is paying now on the current child support that he still is 20 ,000 behind. What about yourself? Myself, my son never received a dime of child support until last year, 1993. His father has worked under the table, he does not file income tax returns, he's worked as recently for United Airlines for three years. He used light as nine different social security numbers, different birthdays, including those of his new children, and he just hops around. One of the major problems then is that the men tend to get into a new relationship immediately in there, or it's twofold, man, it's leaving the old for the new, and when you go to the new, you forget the old. And especially in our state, where you're going from one job to another to try to just stay above water, many times what we call an order for income assignment, which travels with the parent to take the money out of their paycheck,

to go to the agency, and then back to the mom traditionally, in our example, is written specific only to that employer. In my office, for instance, we write what's called generic orders, where we file six or eight or ten of them with the agency, such that when the father leaves job A, that he had with the divorce, we don't have to go back into court, generate another order for ABC store, because he left 7 -11. The mothers or the parents that have the kids are left in gap groups, they're constantly chasing the obligor, the parent that owes the money, and as Anita said, the fathers or the obligors are very clever. They know that tax intercepts at the end of the year could take money that is owed through the year, so they manipulate their tax returns, such that they will get no refund. They leave a job immediately because they know that the order that was

entered was specific to their employer and not generic to any employer, and they know that there's three or four months lag time to eight months lag time. Anita, oh excuse me. Yeah, when you have a court order or by the time that they put the system through the state parent locates system, they run it quarterly and it's usually four to six months, so that gives an individual time to work for six months, and then they can quit and they're on to the next job, meanwhile they've just located them at the old job, so it's a game. How long before you don't you try to get directly in touch with the father and try to plead with him or that doesn't work? In my case it was totally impossible. This man has moved 20 different residences in the last nine years, and he jumps from state to state, and what they do, California has a new law with a rent control that a landlord cannot evict you for the first six months, so what they will do, they will go rent an apartment for two months, write a bad check for the apartment, by the time the court hearings and everything's over with, then they move on to the next apartment, so it's impossible to

catch up with them. You had the same experience? No, well I contacted his family and they said they'd never heard of him, and his employer we could not find. They never heard from him? No, they did not know him, they said they did not know him, and it was just a joke there for a while. When do you get in touch with people like Lyona's office? When does this happen? I called them after the first month, he was late, and they said you have to wait 30 days or 60 days. And so I waited the time, and in the meantime I did have contact with him, and we proceeded with paperwork, I paid $25 filing fee, and three years later they contacted me again, we talked many times through this, and so they finally had located him, but the IRS I found out later had located him a year prior to that and had gotten back taxes he owed, but the child support and force of the office could not locate him. What do you folks do, Lyona, what is the child support enforcement office? What are you supposed to do? Our

objective is to obtain support for the children. We also establish paternity, we also establish child support. We do... I establish paternity, explain that to me. In cases where the parents of the children were not married, then we have to go ahead and go through the legal system to establish paternity legally with a court order. What tests and that sort of thing? That may be necessary, yes. And then once we obtain paternity, we can proceed to establish child support. Once we establish child support, it goes into enforcement mode, which means as long as he continues to pay, we don't do anything as soon as he starts falling delinquent, then that's when we jump in with our enforcement efforts. Gregory Fry said that you folks are understaffed, is that true? Grossly understaffed. Give me an idea of what are you, you're in charge of the Maui office. Unfortunately I don't have statistics

for my county. We have only statewide statistics available and right now I believe there are about 135 ,000 cases that we serve as statewide with a staff of 165 people. And that has remained the same since the 1989 statistical count. Staff has remained at 165, the amount of clients that we service has continuously grown. You have some complaints with this organization? Yes, not with the Maui office. Good. I also work with Representative Duke Baynam and I get all the calls that come to his office to investigate as far as child support cases and all the correspondence. And so I hear all kinds of cases, not only my own, of people who have horror stories about child support. I will speak of my own just because it's firsthand.

One example, four times the court order was lost by the child support enforcement office. This is the court order that follows the investigation. This was the original court order from the divorce. And to get that, because I was divorced on the mainland, to get an original copy of the court order, it took months to even get this and then they lost it four times. So we're talking months and months of delay because I can't find in the filing system. Over and over again we keep hearing from the director of child support enforcement office that we're waiting on this new computer system. And I am, yes, I'm tired of hearing that because I do not think that's the whole problem. I do realize they're understaffed. But there are a lot of problems that are being addressed. Not to mention that your landlord is not going to wait to 1995 for the computer to be installed and you to receive your checks, which I personally believe the computer system will be obsolete by the time it's installed. You have any response to this? Well, I sure hope not because we're putting all of our cookies into that computer system.

I do believe it will be a tremendous help in enforcement as well as establishment and locating absent parents. I don't believe it will be obsolete. I sure hope not, but these ladies definitely have genuine complaints against the agency. However, I believe at the time you had applied for services, we had a different director and the organization was a little bit more haphazard than it is now. Under Norma Dr. Sparks, we have made major improvements and I would hope that since hurt her appointment with the agency, things have gotten a little better. Granted, you may not personally realize that, but it has from my standpoint. I see, oh, I'm sorry. My concern is we just had a presidential election a year ago or so. You're able to get results across country in a matter of seconds on votes and so forth like that. And yet, it takes years to get information

that was ordered years ago onto a computer system. Me, I'm fed up with waiting. I'm tired of being told, be patient. I have been patient for 13 years. To follow up on that, I receive calls literally daily from people that are old child support that tell me, I simply can't wait any longer. I've borrowed money from my family, friends, everybody I can. I cannot believe that when I'm owed $20 ,000, $30 ,000 in support, that I have to come to U -GRAG and pay money to get money. But I'm going to do it because the agency simply is not user friendly. I ask him what he mean by that. Well, for instance, I have a client that I was just talking to today telling her that I was coming on board for this show. She says, tell my story quickly. She was a woman who was trying to stop child support payments because the time has ended. She writes them a letter. They sent her an 18 -page

application that she must fill out in order to get the ball rolling. 16 of those pages are not relevant to her particular circumstance. In other words, the kids are no longer in school and they're over 18 years old. Therefore, by the decree, it should end. She has spent months going back and forth on this application while her child support continues to roll, not to roll, and she is in a rears. And she's getting letters from another facet of the agency saying, you owe money. You are a deadbeat parent. Well, Leona, you have to respond to that as your agency not user friendly. And are you sending out 18 -page forms? I must assume in your client's case that they were not clients of the agency. That would prompt that application form to have been mailed to them. Primarily because the federal government would not reimburse the agency for any expenditures on the case unless we

had assigned application form. Unfortunately, for termination action, we do need that lengthy application form completed. Even if you are corrected, some of this stuff is irrelevant, and I do agree with that. But we have just one standard application form for these applicants. We are trying to change that to modify it to each particular individual's needs. However, at this time, that's what we have. Well, to follow up quickly on what you say, this is exactly what my client who's now washed her hands of the agency and come to me to say, get me in court, which I can do in about 10 days, and get it terminated. Granted, she's going to have to pay me some money to do that, but I can get it about that efficiently. When she called the agency to say, what gives with this application, she was told, as you just said, it's the only form we have. Sorry. She took a day off work to go down to the courthouse to get the docket sheet.

All of the orders spent money on the Xeroxing charges and the rest of that, even though most of that acknowledged later was not necessary. My only point is, there's got to be a way to streamline it, and that actually takes business away from me. I mean, as I say to myself, keep it up, because that keeps people like me that do nothing but this kind of work, fully employed. The Child Support Enforcement Agency, in some regards, is a Guaranteed Employment Act for family law attorneys. Excuse me. It's amazing, because if you owe money on a car, or if you have a mortgage on a house, you miss three payments, they four clothes on you. You miss your payments on your car, someone comes and repossesses your car. C -S -C -A, you don't pay child support, you can go up to $120 ,000 before they'll actually step in and do something, and yet, you know, they say, all this miracle computer is going to do this, is going to do that. But yet, in the meantime, what are they doing

while we're waiting for the computer to be installed? I'd like to address the user friendliness of the agency. A couple years ago, enormous sparks was there at that time. Duke Benjamin, I made an appointment to go down and talk to her about the problems in the agency that we'd received in his office. We have three o 'clock appointment. Well, the office closes at three o 'clock. So we got there, the door was locked. There's a glass panel beside the door. The secretary was in there, there was a police officer in the office, and another person was standing there. We pounded on that glass for five minutes before they would open the door, and we had a appointment with the director of the agency. And that's the kind of reaction we get, and I was with the state representative doing this. What is a parent who is a working mom, high school graduate maybe, doesn't have the resources and doesn't have the knowledge of the system. What are they going to do when they go down and run into problems like this? Someone calls a couple of questions along this vein. The figures are calculated, and the way the figures are calculated need re -evaluation. Parents, too many parents, don't pay

because they're asked to pay too much in child support. Do you think that's true? Child support is based on guideline. I mean, it's based on whatever the income, it's not decided by CSEA, it's decided strictly by guideline. Yep, by the judges, right? No, the judge makes the ultimate decision, and sometimes in trials you are actually fighting over the amount of child support, but what you're really fighting over is what is the definition of gross income. Child support in the state of Hawaii is calculated by the gross income of mom and dad. Both parents factor in, in other words, if they both make exactly $2 ,000 a month, they're 50 % responsible for the children, and will roughly pay the average. The problem that most people see is they refuse to retool their lifestyle after a divorce. It is based upon gross, not net, but gross income of mom and dad. So a parent will typically come to me and say, I've got a rent of $1 ,500. I'm driving around on a

nice new car I just purchased, and that's $700. And the taxes are taken out, I don't have the money to pay the child support. Typically, child support is between $350 per month per child on the average. It can go way up, way down, depending on the income. That gross amount. Leon, someone call her a file in application with your agency. She's been asking many questions about her current husband and lifestyle. What has her current lifestyle have to do with her child support? Gee, that's interesting. I can't imagine, I know we do have on the application form a portion where it does ask for spouses information. However, that should not factor into any kind of establishment mode. At this point in time, we would just take whatever income that she would have. I think, though, that we might want to know how she's supporting herself if she's not working. Well, you're going to say something, but I was just going to follow briefly to say that many times parents come to me who are paying support and say,

I want it lowered because my ex -wife just married a very rich man. One's a big company, makes lots of money, and I have to tell them it's not his children. You are obligated and will always be obligated, no matter who your ex -wife marries. Therefore, from my perspective, and I think the current law is, it doesn't matter what the new spouse or the new involvement makes by way of money. I think a lot of that, too, is just excuses for our reaching because we've had some members in our organization whose former spouse was ordered to pay $30 a month and they will not pay it. They are in arrears. That's the minimum that's required if you're a street person or completely incapable of working or simply not working. You can, if you hire an attorney, however, and in fact, the administrative process also does this. If you have a person who says, I'm not working $30 me, you can argue that you were working for 12 months preceding. Your average pay

was $2 ,000 a month. We want the court or the agency to what we call impute. That amount based upon the preceding 12 months, 12 months, two years and the court commonly and I understand that the agency will, too, commonly impute that income. But you have to ask for it. If you don't, they're going to get out at $30 a month. Donna Bepperen in Anita, why bother with fathers if they are deadbeats? Why not forget about them and go on with your own lives? I have personally gone on with my life, okay? I've been working and supporting myself throughout my entire life. But that is besides the point. You bring a child into this world. You have a responsibility to that child. You have an obligation to that child. To that child turns 18 years old. And I'm sorry, I don't buy that. If you father a child or if you're the mother of a child, you have to take care of that child in the story. This, in some of the reading I was doing, he was talking about the problems of no fault divorce and that no fault divorce has been a problem in this growing child support crisis that we seem

to be in, that people don't put as much time into trying to keep marriages together. And we've had a couple of calls of that nature, why not try to keep the mother and father should work hard and make marriage work so children won't suffer? But what good is it going to do if it's an abusive situation that the parents are not happy together and ultimately the children are going to suffer seeing the parents fight all the time and the anxiety in the household? Any mental health professional that regularly works with children will tell you it's similar to trying to quit smoking. You find the nearest dog and kick it. If you've got two battling spouses, every day it flows down and children are a heck of a lot smarter than we as parents give them credit for, it is much worse to stay together than to dissolve. Any thoughts on it? Yes, back to the getting on with the life. I have two, I've gotten on my life very successful but I have a 15 year old daughter and I want her to see that you do have responsibilities in life and you have to live up to these responsibilities. If you do something like have a

child, do you have a responsibility to that child and you follow through with it? We've had a couple of calls however in which the obvious apparently from someone who has been on the short end of this says you folks it was decided you would have custody. If you're supposed to have custody and the other parent is deemed not a good parent then raise a kid, pay for it. Well it wasn't a case of being deemed a good parent and it was a case of an irresponsible father that did not want responsibility for his child. The child was given to me, I'm glad to raise my child and again I say it is beside the point it's irrelevant if you bring a child into this world you have a responsibility to that child. Dan I would follow up and say that in Hawaii again it's based upon both income of mom and dad. Therefore the obligor in our example not always hit on the fathers but we do have the custodial mothers here so the fathers are not paying full boat price. They're contributing to the raising of a child. I think these mothers in Indian custodial parents will tell you it costs far more money on a monthly

basis to raise a child than they are getting in child support even if they were getting the full compliment month to month. It's simply a contribution. Also I keep hearing not here but I keep hearing the custody and child support and visitation I'll tie it up together and one has nothing to do with the other but isn't that sometimes useful as an excuse? Absolutely. But I don't get visitation rights so why should I be paying the majority of the people I have talked to in my case I know of my husband can see my daughter anytime he wants to. If he wants to see her he calls they talk on the phone there's never been a question of him seeing her. But you know if I were in this situation and I was asking to put up $450 a month and some I don't know I had a terrible visitation rights and I wanted to see my kids crying. I think I'd be trying to get back. But does that get you over with the human nature here aren't we? Yeah but does that mean the child has to go to bed hungry or the child has to do without a place to live because you and the mother can't get along I mean the child has nothing

to do with the adult relationship we are talking about responsibility for another human being until they turn 18 years old and you know if the parents can't get along that's fine and dandy that has nothing to do with that child that child has to eat he has to have clothing he has to have shelter you know and you have a responsibility you have to take care of your children. I need to let's turn it around for one second here let's turn it around the other way I get so many clients that owe money that tell me yeah I owe money but my ex -wife or my ex -husband is not able to transcend our personal differences even though we've been divorced for years she will regularly tell me pay the money or don't see the kid now these two women are taking the appropriate approach it's apples and oranges but I'm here to tell you that that's not what I commonly hear what I commonly hear is yeah I owe some money but would you pay if you never saw your daughter

grow up would you pay if I could if you were refused to give a birthday present to her but again you're victimizing the child what has the child happened the custodial parent there is victimizing the child because she or he is upset that the non custodial parent is not living up so what happened they're greeting each other alive that's right and I agree with that the parents know that you know being jerks about it but still the child individual child that did not ask to come into this world you have to provide for that child I mean it is no excuse not to provide for your children there's emotional providing and there's financial providing and many times to take the other side for a moment many times the custodial parent because he or she is not getting that financial will destroy the emotional I can't tell you how many kids run away from their custodial parents when they're able to do so because they are tired of hearing how much of a deadbeat parent the other side is and that other side becomes a Christmas parent the

few times that the non custodial mom or dad sees the kids lavish presents let's go to the ballgame let's do all these neat things and the kids get a little fed up I'm glad to see that the parents that are here tonight don't do that well you know again you're talking about lavish gifts okay I mean I've seen situations where they will lavish gifts but they won't contribute $10 for the upbringing of their kid and I mean it's ludicrous it doesn't make any sense true let Luna this is a basic question how do we get child support started this caller's ex -husband was ordered by the court to pay but he has not made any payments and he cannot be located oh bad scenario if she had made the attempt to locate him herself then she should come to the agency because we have much more resources available to us in order to locate him if she is not presently our client she needs to apply for our services and indicate what her court order is whether it's here in Hawaii or in another state she will need to provide us with a copy of that order and

once we locate him we would be able to enforce the order for her because we've been so hard on the owner and her agency let me read this comment child support enforcement agency in Honolulu did an excellent job for the caller previously she paid $3 ,000 to a lawyer who couldn't get payment for her from her husband but CSEA succeeded there you go fry KGT requires that we take a break here to advertise upcoming programs but we'll be back in 60 seconds yes I can see by the early light the peril of the night is gone and far across a distant range I see the road to there are probably as many ways of looking at America as there are people who

live here and while someone else's views might seem too rational or too emotional or too spiritual all our personal all are different and all are part of the mosaic of American life which is ours to put together peace by peace day by day welcome back to a dialogue on deadbeat parents I'm Dan Boylan and those handsome people are members of the zi chapter of alpha delta kappa they don't have those telephones growing out of their ears but we're having a good program tonight and you can call them and talk to us by dialing 955 -787 -8 and taking questions or come and they'll be taking questions and comments for our guests neighbor islanders may call Collette what does Duke Bainham and others who are concerned about this program want legislatively well they've introduced a

number of bills the most wanted poster has been brought up several times and this is where they make a poster of the ten most wanted of most delinquent parents in the state usually these are twenty thirty eighty thousand dollars behind in payments and they place these posters in prominent places hoping that the embarrassment will make the people make up their child support payments there's been a lot of comments a lot of controversy but it has been used successfully in a lot of other states and the people do not want to see that there uh there was some talk in the legislature this time that the embarrassment may cause suicides and different things but I truthfully I'd rather see the person responsible be embarrassed than see someone's children be embarrassed because they can't go on field trips to school they don't have the clothes that the other kids have they don't have enough food to eat how about the embarrassment of being on welfare because you cannot get your child support and the embarrassment of having to call over over town to get a doctor to come see you or your sick child or having to use food stamps to go purchase groceries to me that's more embarrassing

than being on a ten most wanted poster and by being on the ten most wanted poster that is the person who is responsible the one that's not paying is this going to pay I'm not sure uh apparently the bill died in legislature Senator Ray Gralty killed it but uh apparently CSEA has had the authority and the ability to do this but they did not consider it one of their priorities why not Leon it has to do with resources right now we're already stretched out as thinly as possible in terms of just doing what we can do presently if you add in the most wanted poster although I agree it is effective because we did it on a Maui man on a national level and we were very successful with it um if we had to take away some of the present resources in personnel to address the most wanted poster even though it seems very simple and a matter of just well get his picture get the amount that he owes and just slap

it together there's a lot more behind that we need to certify how much he actually owes contact the uh custodial parent for one thing to see if she would agree to allowing this to publication to go through and we just unfortunately we just don't have enough people you know we uh one of the provisions in that ten most wanted bill was for the individual to be in excess of one year in a rears in child support and it's no way you can sit here and tell me that you could make an accident for one year or that your name is not in the computer you have not paid child support for a year if you have paid your child support you certainly go down there with your receipts or you have proof that you paid your child support but you cannot convince me that a period of one year is an unreasonable time to expect somebody to clear it up before their picture gets put on a poster and secondly I understand that poster only costs like a penny a poster to print I think it'd be a good idea Leon it is a good idea I mean if they were going to put my picture up there somewhere and say I wouldn't take care of my kids I'd be so embarrassed I'd find a checker rob a bank now there we go that's a good idea uh

it is it's a very good idea and I I totally agree with it however again um the certification process would also involve the custodial parent only because there are times where um the parents make outside agreements they pay each other or they agree to pay tuition for the school or the nursery school or whatever outside agreements they make therefore even though we may be showing a delinquency for over a year on our system we would need to go through the proper notices to both parents and that is time consuming then if he does come in with receipts that's additional resources taken away from the agency to follow up with the custodial parent is this true well see we're talking about individuals that do not file tax returns we're talking about individuals that work under the table we're not talking about people that have sat down and agreed to work something out between themself we are not concerned about people that are temporarily disabled due to a situation beyond their control we are talking about individuals who deliberately do not pay child support who do not file taxes we

have not filed tax returns in years and yet work every day we have a member here who is owed eighty thousand dollars and the former spouse lives right here in town his parents on one of the biggest business operations here in town and CSEA has done nothing because those are really just haven't hit a hundred and twenty thousand dollars this is ridiculous what do you mean why wouldn't you it has to reach that much before that's the threshold according to normal sparks a hundred and twenty thousand dollars before they will start prosecution through the attorney general's office yes we have one attorney general that's assigned to handle the entire state of Hawaii and because his resources are limited obviously because there's only one of him we have to set a monetary amount no wait a minute Leonan do you mean to tell me those a hundred and thirty five thousand cases that were mentioned earlier don't kick in until they're in a rear is a hundred and twenty thousand dollars no that's they will kick in for other enforcement methods such as income withholding tax offset even leans on properties that

if the person has a record if the person's working under the table and if someone this woman has caught CSEA and told where the next show is going to be where the man is going to be working and they they do nothing father is paying child support for child who now lives in northeastern US he just wants to express how hard it is to support a child he no longer sees that's what you hear over and over again all the time what happens especially in a state like ours where people once they dissolve quite regularly will one or both will leave the island and move elsewhere where the cost of living may be cheaper they do not envision that when they enter into their decree therefore things that are important to parents like visitation transportation costs things that will keep the bonding going after your several miles away are not incorporated in the decree mom and child in in in this colors example trot off to Florida someplace else and the decree does not address it mom says

take me to court dad says I don't have the money to do it and literally it's divided and they do not see each other and I do hear it often that's not an excuse for not paying but it certainly is an emotional impact that people have to understand there was a comment made about it is better to dissolve a family but don't they realize I think this is to you and you don't that how damaging good divorce can be on the child wouldn't it be better to work it out more families could probably stay together if they try no not always my degrees in psychology and abusive situation whether it's arguing verbal abuse or physical abuse I think is much more damaging to a child than to live with two parents who are relatively happy single maybe not economically as stable but at least the fighting isn't there and the child doesn't have to hear that every night why aren't to father mothers or fathers who receive child support held accountable for money they receive this is a pretty common complaint

isn't it yes I hear that often I'll follow up a moment on that and this just talked about some of these outside agreements where the decree might say 450 through withholding the father in our examples here isn't working any longer or under the table as Amida said and he'll shoot 300 here 400 there 500 whenever he's got some money over the mom and there's no accountability to the agency which keeps kicking it's a rearage over and over and I represent a lot of obligor parents who come in and say she says she just filed on me through an attorney and says I owe 10 ,000 in the last three years I've paid her 6 ,000 straight pay you know I bang my head because I say the agency doesn't know that unless she's going to come to court and say yeah I'll execute what we call an acknowledgement of receipt so that we can send it to the agency to say yes I did get

direct payments so that they may reduce the a rearage I end up in trial very often fighting over did you or did you not send money and how much was sent and will that be credited towards an a rearage I think what this question was talking about was the parent pays 500 dollars a month and the custodial parent has nice clothes they have a new car and I think that's what this is addressing but when going through the child support office you have to fill out both parents have to fill out forms saying how much the expenses are and how much the child's part of those expenses are and so it should be covered so that it does show that the child support is going for child support not luxuries for the custodial parent and I would question why an individual knowing that they have just come out of a real ugly situation would go and hand cash to another individual later on where they can turn around and say well you didn't pay it I would question the motive behind it why the person would not go down to CSEA or send a certified money order to CSEA so it can be on the record that

they in fact did pay that a single father with custody of children for four years has not received support from ex white who was ordered by the courts to pay program seems sexist there we got that he would like viewers to know there are a lot of single fathers out there not receiving support from wives as well how many what's the percentage in my practice I probably represent currently of some 120 clients that are seeking custody in existing divorce cases about 35 % fathers seeking and probably will gain custody of their children um you know I'm taking a back by that number 120 thousand dollars before one prosecutor go start going after people correct why why is why is there seems to such a huge problem why are there so few prosecutors assigned to them I'm not able to answer that question

because this is something that comes from um that my director as well as Robert Marx was the attorney general however I do know because we do have just that one there and you know to to compensate for um his efforts I guess not compensate but to justify his going after these deadbeat parents who have such larger delinquencies the monetary amount had to be set in order for us to then say okay now we can refer this up to him for his attention I have something to say on that I think I know the reason why it is nothing done at 120 thousand dollars we met with the state attorney general mr. Marx back in April 7th of 1993 and he told us point blank that quote the child support enforcement was not a big part of his agency because there are so many departments under uh the attorney general's office so I think that's probably the reason why it's at 120 thousand dollars well when you have one one attorney general in the attorney general that does handle this mr. scoffial is very good

at what he does I have had cases with him where I represented the party that owed the money he's very good at what he does but he is one person right in one little hole in the wall up there at the attorney general's office and it just I don't know how many years he's got guaranteed employment for as long as he wants it because he is so backlogged this system seems so out of control I mean what what what basically for posters you know seem all right but they do seem like posters band -aids well what are the fundamental changes that are needed here we have just provided some legislation through the women's caucus that would tie professional licenses drivers licenses and motor vehicle registrations into child support if you owe one year's child support you would not be able to renew your licenses several states now jail deadbeats the state of Texas Ohio and Florida jails deadbeats New Jersey conducts early morning raids and hauled deadbeats off to jail

the state of California reports deadbeats to TRW and other credit bureaus so they cannot get credit they also have a cable access program that shows the photos of the deadbeat parents and the amount of money they owe the state of Florida and 25 other states have the 10 most wanted posters and yet while it may not solve the whole problem it is a step in the right direction because child non -payment of child support is a crime we also have 18 USC section 228 which involves interstate cases if a person owes child support in the rears of one year or five thousand dollars the U .S. attorney will now get involved with it the FBI will not get involved with it and start picking these guys up sorry the problem however is if you jail a deadbeat parent you're not going to get any money out of that parent because our system our system in Hawaii I'm not speaking naturally but our system in Hawaii is dependent upon employment if you don't have the obligatory parent employed and making some money

you simply are not going to get the support payment but you could have that person and a jail and on a work furlough program with all the proceeds they earned from work furlough going to their child support I mean you're not getting the money anyway if the person is going to quit a good job and they're not going to work and they're breaking the laws working under the table put them in jail Leon what do you think you should be done fundamental change we probably need better legislation and laws enabling this type of enforcement action than Anita's proposing to take place here in Hawaii that sounds good to you well it's not something I think that the agency itself would be involved with in because our job is not to punish years is to collect money yes however if they are in fact breaking the law if we did have such a legislation and perhaps then a referral service could be set up our system excuse me could be set up to where we could refer it for prosecution with the laws behind

us right now since we don't have that we're not able to do I'd like to I'd like to bring up one thing that we need to understand that generally the parent we're speaking of now is a parent who has the ability to pay that is not paying there are parents that I represent that legitimately lose their jobs right and must because they can't do it quick enough for instance in the agency come to me borrow mom and dad's money and say get me reduced they follow the rules they come in they say I used to make ten thousand dollars a month I now make two thousand dollars a month I wish I could provide more but I'm entitled under our law to pay what I'm to pay and and we don't want to lose focus that I think the ones were really dead beating here are those that have an ability and simply ignore that ability right I agree with that if a person is hurt or in a temporary loss of job it should be reduced until the point of job because there's no other way I'm concerned about is the person that is working on an 18 hour adult 18 dollar an hour job and we'll leave this

state go to the state in Nevada and work for seven dollars and fifty cents to avoid paying child support what do you do with somebody like that all right now that prosecution for interstate type cases where they leave from state to state is that program is just starting up and we don't yet have in place procedures and how to refer that to this federal prosecuting office but once we do we will start pursuing those types of cases all they have to do is refer to case over to the U .S. Attorney's Office if it's five thousand in a year or a year right yeah it's I mean it from what I understand there have been no cases referred over there and they're ready to help us the U .S. Attorney's Office Mr. Inoki they want to help us but nothing's being sent over there from CSEA just like the thing with the credit reporting bureau we had met with CSEA and asked why cases are not being referred to TransUnion over here and nothing's happening well what if this were what if our percentages were reversed and and it was mostly a man who who had custody you think the

legislature and others would be more responsive in in establishing laws that made collection easier could I put that in a way that would sound less sexist what if it was a state I'm not sexist I mean I've never been accused of that I've known you for a long time sorry but what if it were the state that was owed this money rather than an individual single parent and you don't think the state would go after this money that's owed them rather than trying to go after a single or for a single person I'm that's rhetorical question right it's all it's is there a support group this is yes we are called Hawaii advocates for child support enforcement we are local organization here we used to be affiliated with the association for children for enforcement support but we felt as a group we could do more to help people with here in the islands the only you're somebody's charging you with something here the only seems to be unwilling to do anything it's just like the bureaucracy in this state is your organization to be your credit

yes yes and no like any other state agency we have to operate under our own policies and procedures and because of our shortages and staff we have to prioritize and unfortunately we're not able to hit a hundred percent of the types of cases that we should be hitting and hopefully and I know you've heard this before Anita but we are banking on the new computer system that would assist us in this and there were and it should be up and running by next year can I say something according to a legislative auditor's read 1993 report the CSEA had a profit of two million seven hundred six thousand seven hundred and sixty six dollars and you mean to tell me they can't print a penny poster out of some of that profit this was after everything this is their profit we don't know your card goes right back to the state oh this is one of those general fun things you guys don't get it it

goes into the state funding now if they let us keep it that might help and and and what does your bill say does it address this that was precisely what somebody said that in a question that the finances of your agencies are to show a profit and why can't if there's only one guy handling all these cases in the attorney general's office why don't they get more people to work get more jobs for a wise lawyers I guess make sense it's some of that profit that would go into the general fund might be used to hire a few attorneys so that health school feel could have three or four other watchdog bulldogs to go after these people I don't you know I'm not involved in that part of it I don't know how that works but it seems to make good sense to me take some of that money hire a few people I think once they start enforcing it and they have people start forcing it more people pay voluntarily because they know they're going to get caught right now they know they may not get caught and probably won't get caught for years and years you can renew your driver's

license or if you are a physician and you cannot renew your license to practice medicine you're going to find a way to come up with that money this has been done in other states yes it has this has done in the state of California if you old child support in the careers of one month then you cannot renew your licenses and it's been effective I imagine that it has been effected the situation the solution to deadbeat parents would be to turn over to the the collection to a private agency collection agency which would take a percentage of what they collect there are two agencies currently up and running in the state of Hawaii that do just that and they take a percentage they take a percentage I think my friend my parents sent this in many private enterprise do it many parents are now turning to that and saying if I have to give 33 % or whatever the percentage is hey as Anita said they're paying nothing before let me keep my 70 you can take 30 and my agencies do not take any of this mess about well I'm not working they go out there and they investigate they do a thorough job child here's an interesting question the lawyer may have an answer

child is now 18 years old does not live with her father works makes good money she does not want man mom to pay child support to her dad does she still have to pay child not under the current Hawaii law current Hawaii law indicates that if a child tough to call a child at 18 but if a if a child at 18 is no longer in school full -time to find as 12 units or more at any type of higher education that could be trade school or college then it terminates from 18 to 23 if the child is in school full -time 12 units or more it continues the problem is many degrees will say and in addition you've got to pay half of the educational expense so some of these obligors are being forced to pay not only the child support but the educational expense current Hawaii law would say that ends the real problem is try to get that terminated simply because it says it it doesn't end and that brings back the client who's now come to me because she's been jacking around for three months and hasn't been able to get it terminated you know

how many people are there who over the 120 thousand in back things I don't have those statistics this came in from a deadbeat from fellow who's not a deadbeat dead tired of deadbeat fathers getting harassed there are fathers out there who do pay and yet are denied access to their children true there's the here we go with the access through all the time fathers responsible should be allowed to have the children I go back back into court all the time what's called post decree modification of custody one of the criteria that the court will look at under what's called change of circumstances a custodial parent refuses to honor reasonably a visitation schedule for no apparent reason that can be done and is regularly done well we're finding out too that there are a lot of men that are going back into court to get custody to get out of paying child support too so that's not a proper thing I regularly will not take a case if I sense that that's what's going on and hopefully the court will see that because the parent doesn't have the custodial abilities simply says I can raise my kid how do you do that I don't know

I'm a mr mom who has kids to get them out of a bad situation and would like to know what is the percentage of men who have kids who are actually getting support from their ex -wives do we have any numbers on that I don't have any figures on that one I don't have any statistics we don't have real good figures do we we're gonna have to work in better figures court asked parent to pay an unrealistically high figure for support based on parents gross income not on the actual take home net causes payment causes the person not to pay that's the person you were that's what I brought up earlier that does happen and you may go you may go in under our current law and ask for a different number on what we call exceptional circumstances the guideline says you pay $850 a month you may petition to court under exceptional circumstances to recognize that the number should be 850 but for exceptional circumstances we will bring it down I need to tell you however that that does not happen very often someone wants to know about your bill and needed what happened to that bill which would make a professional responsible for paying child

support if they don't live up to this responsibility they can't renew their license okay that's still alive and it's still pending it I do believe it's coming up for hearing again I forget what committee it is but it is still alive Leon you your agency is now being sued 700 or 750 ,000 dollars by the feds because you're not living up to the to what you're supposed to be doing is that right we're not being sued the federal government has come in and audited our program and found many shortcomings and because of the shortcomings we are not being well they're they're assessing the penalties to the state of Hawaii in a monetary amount and what do you have to do in order to not pay that penalty or do we have they have a they have a time frame in which we have to come into compliance with the federal mandates and during that time frame we have to prove to them that we are attempting to correct or take corrective action with our programming how is the amount

to be paid determined you'd say guideline child support guideline worksheet it's a rather complicated formula but generally the gross income is a mom and dad I would really like to throw all these cards up in the air to show you how many we've had and obviously we couldn't get to all of them and I apologize very very much but we've run out of time to our guests thank you very much Leon and I actually have a couple of cards here telling about good things that happen with your agency to our guests thanks for giving us your the heart of your Friday evenings next week we'll be we're repeating a show on tourism moderated by Leslie Welcox you won't be able to call in DBEDT's Moopy Hanuman and the Waikiki Improvement Associations Christina Kemmer were and will be among the guests for all of us at Hawaii Public Television thank you for watching dialogue. Good night. I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I don't know what to say, I

don't know what to say The views expressed on this program do not necessarily reflect the views of the Hawaii Public Broadcasting Authority or the staff of this station. Questions or comments about the program may be addressed to News and Public Affairs Department, 2350 Doll Street, Honolulu, Hawaii, 96822. Thank you.