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Changes Requested to the Kansas Child Support Guidelines by Kansas Parents Authors: Brian Mull Randall Helling Engin Sabuncu Rachel Gordinier Marty J. Houdeshell Frank G. Herrera Sarah Helton Justin W. Willson Supporters: Brandon Baker Martha Presley Michael Presley Shawn Presley Brandon Mull May 27, 2011
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Forward: This letter provides the authors' and supporters' collaborative views and opinions of the current child support guidelines and provides potential shortcomings of the latest proposed changes offered by the by the Kansas child support committee. Changes are requested because they are in the best interest of the child(ren).
Table of Contents
I. Introduction ...2
II. Financial Motivation .................................................................................................3
II.1 Changes Requested .........................................................................................3
III. Clothing and the Sharing Thereof .........................................................................3
III.1 Requested Changes .........................................................................................4
IV. "Extraordinary” Activity Costs................................................................................5
IV.1 Requested Changes .........................................................................................6
V. Alternating Expenses ...............................................................................................6
V.1 Requested Changes .........................................................................................6
VI. Parenting Time Adjustments - As An Extension of the Shared Formula................7
VI.1 Requested Changes .........................................................................................8
VII. Shared Custody Expense Sharing Plan................................................................8
VII.1 Requested Changes......................................................................................8
VIII. Committee Membership........................................................................................9
VIII.1 Requested Response ....................................................................................9
IX. Conclusions...10
I. Introduction
Many of the authors have already provided information to the Kansas child support committee at one point or another regarding the current child support guidelines. Some requested changes appear to have been accepted, others have apparently either not been addressed or the meeting minutes do not reflect a clear decision/opinion on such changes. The authors of this document all have particular areas of concern with the guidelines, but are all of the same opinion that some child support orders are exceedingly unfair to one parent and as a result are unfair to the child(ren). This is viewed as a failure of the guidelines to create fairness and balance. Opinions come from both men and women who have both paid and received child support in Kansas. The consensus is that changes are needed and Kansas parents have requested changes in great detail, and with supporting data, this review session. The most significant issues with the current guidelines are not the actual child support tables, they deal more directly with the application of the tabled values to families in a fair and correct manner. Since Kansas does not promote a cost sharing method, the current income shares method must employ a robust and clear set of adjustments which accurately account for different families and scenarios.
All committee members and all parents dealing with child support should fully understand the gravity of a court appearance. While it may be another day at the office for the legal counsel and judges involved, the impacts to the family are extreme. While adults may be able to cope with the stress of a court hearing or trial, children are affected by these situations for years or even a lifetime. A single motion to increase
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child support by $100 can drag out for years! Meanwhile stress on the family is increased, children feel guilty and rebel, school is affected, and parents are more at odds than ever. Any reduction to the stress of a separated family will help all of us. Child support fairness does much more than just balance family finances.
II. Financial Motivation
Financial motivation has been a major driver in child support actions not only in Kansas, but nation-wide. When one parent is awarded child support which far exceeds the needs of the child, and there is no responsibility to account for spending, this, of course, creates financial motivation to enter the court room frequently to increase the award as much as possible. Currently a parent can agree to share direct expenses and pay for half of them, or disagree to share expenses, and have them completely funded by the other parent, and then some. If one method provides for drastically increased tax-exempt income, nearly anyone can see the financial disincentive to co-parent, work together, and each pay for half because there is financial gain to be had. A result of such imbalance in the child support adjustments for parenting time is that the parent paying support seeks reimbursement from the other parent when he/she is required to finance their child(ren)'s expenses in addition to paying child support. While child support awards can be ordered through the Kansas courts for free, reimbursement for expenses will cost most individuals, at the very least, a sizeable legal counsel retainer fee. The outcome of which is uncertain because the guidelines do not explicitly state that a parent is entitled to reimbursement upon the responsible parent's failure to pay for all direct expenses, and that the other parent be put in charge of providing the direct expenses. Unfortunately most payors never seek reimbursement from the other parent because legal expenses are too high. Since the guidelines don't provide fairness in this regard, one parent is left paying for everything twice.
II.1
Financial motivation needs to be removed from the guidelines. There are four changes requested to aide in this effort -
Changes Requested
1.) Drastically increase the parenting time adjustment to converge with the shared custody time adjustment. There is no difference in a parent having 49% parenting time and one having 50% parenting time. This method is explained in further detail later.
2.) Include spouse's income when one spouse's income has the potential of being much higher or one parent is obviously underemployed.
3.) Follow suit with orders for spousal maintenance and omit the correction for financial disparity after 5 years or when the parent becomes married. This encourages both parents to be responsible and support their children and giving them a deadline to achieve this level of responsibility.
III. Clothing and the Sharing Thereof
The issue of the child(ren)'s clothing at each household is a topic that has been brought to the committee's attention by numerous individuals for years. It is assumed by the committee that one parent simply provides all clothing, and sends clothing to the other
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parent’s household. This is an issue for both shared custodial parents as well as parents with 35% to 49% parenting time, but is easier to understand in shared custody cases. The advising economist has proposed a solution for shared custody cases which would account for the fact that parents already provide their own clothing. An adjustment of 2% would be subtracted from the proposed 13%/15%/18% percentages which then become 11%/13%/16%, respectively. Clothing is already being provided by both parents in nearly all cases anyway. Why are paying parents still going to be saddled with this additional cost? This needs fixed. None of the authors or supporters have spoken with any parent paying child support who does not purchase clothing for their child(ren) and simply depends on the payee to provide everything – it us unreasonable. It would be expected that for shared custody situations, both parents would provide the same amount and quality of clothing because the guidelines already correct for financial disparity so equal funds are available to both families. Both would also wash the same amount of clothing, and both would need to purchase new clothing at the same rate as the child(ren) grow. It is unreasonable to assume one parent will purchase all clothing and provide to the other parent. This absolutely does not happen with real families and it can and will create more litigation because one parent will be required to seek reimbursement from the other on a regular basis. This creates more family problems because the family will have to enter the court room on a regular basis which will then lead to even further problems. Based on the meeting minutes, the current proposal appears to be that one shared custodial parent provides clothing to both households.
1.) Does the committee honestly believe this will occur?
2.) Does the committee honestly believe the same quality of clothing will reach the payor's home?
3.) Children frequently ruin clothing and have accidents. What happens when clothing needs replaced? Should one parent file a Request For Clothing (RFC) form? Most likely that parent will go purchase their own clothing anyway.
4.) Would it be reasonable to pay legal counsel to file an RFC to obtain a new $200 coat because it was lost at school? Probably not.
5.) What happens when one parent files too many RFC's?
Many of the authors have shared custody and none of them have ever received any permanent clothing from the other parent at any time. All report large issues with clothing transfers. All simply pay for clothing twice to ensure adequate and appropriate clothing. This is unfair to the parents and children and further alienates the payor.
III.1
In the case of shared custody, the guidelines should mandate that since financial disparity is being adjusted for, both parents have equivalent funds to purchase clothing and therefore both parents are responsible to provide their own clothing.:
Requested Changes
1.) Both parents provide own clothing
2.) Percentages are reduced by 2% (now, 11%/13%/16%)
In cases of between 35% and 49% parenting time, the total clothing of 4% (2% x 2) should be simply multiplied by the parenting time percentage and applied as a credit to
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the child support award. Example - if a parent only has 40% parenting time, the adjustment would be 40% x 4% = 1.6%. You can see that this formula makes sense and converges with the shared custody formula. **Note: in a following section, parenting time adjustments are discussed. If the proposed parenting time adjustment method is adopted (which includes offset for clothing of 2%), this method is automatically incorporated into that method - simple.
IV. "Extraordinary” Activity Costs
The idea of adding “extraordinary” activity costs to the basic child support will create a few problems for parents; these are discussed below. Problem #1 - the income shares model attempts to award child support assuming the family is intact (except for the dissolution burden). As intact family income increases, children are afforded more opportunities to participate in more expensive activities, such as competitive sports. This feature is already built into the income shares model. Why are we again adding more expenses to the basic child support amount? As income increases, children do not eat more, child care costs do not increase or decrease, and enrollment in a typical public school is identical. Time also does not stand still for higher income families - there is still only limited time during the week to participate in activities. Yet the child support award goes up? The additional monies account for the fact that higher income promotes more opportunity. Problem #2 - child support already accounts for sports and activities and there is no proposed definition of "extraordinary." Lack of definition has and will continue to promote deviations from the guidelines because everyone will interpret this differently. Problem #3 - substantiation of costs will have to be provided. To avoid dishonesty, any expense additional to "standard" activity costs should be fully documented with the child support worksheet. Problem #4 - extraordinary expenses must be agreed upon by both parents. If the committee is going to require these expenses, the word "agreed" should be added to the language. Otherwise one parent will gain control over "extraordinary" activities. Example 1 Shared Custody Case – Mom has 5% income, Dad has 95%, combined annual gross = $15,000. An intact family in this income bracket would most likely not be able to afford competitive baseball, soccer, football, and basketball all in the same year. However, if the guidelines are written that these costs are additional what will happen is the child(ren) will have even more opportunities than an intact family, and at Dad’s expense. Mom would most likely not be required by the court to become employed, the child(ren) would be enrolled in many different competitive sports, and Dad would continue to finance 95% of all activities even though the intact family wouldn’t have been able to afford it. This creates additional financial burden on Dad and leaves him no decision in the matter.
Example 2 - Spring soccer at the YMCA costs $72 for an 8th grader including the uniform. Competitive SCSA soccer enrollment is $56. Uniforms are typically donated or will cost $30. In this case, just because the child is enrolled in "competitive" sports
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does not mean the costs are any higher. The guidelines should only account for additional
IV.1 cost above a reasonable amount. Most children enroll in noncompetitive and competitive sports - this is "ordinary". Extraordinary costs should always weigh in all annual activities. If a family chooses to race go-carts all year, that should be weighed against a fully involved athlete participating in competitive sports year-round. The costs may be equivalent. Extraordinary means "out of the ordinary." Ordinary typically includes sports year-round. If a child isn't participating in sports, the money is probably paying for some other activity or isn't being spent on the child at all.
1. Child support already accounts for the fact that higher income families have more financial capability to enroll in more expensive activities. If the committee decides to include this term, the word "extraordinary" should be thoroughly defined to avoid confusion and deviations from the guidelines. It is intuitive that "ordinary" expenses are already included in the basic child support amount.
Requested Changes
2. If extraordinary expenses are to be included, the amount which is deemed "ordinary" should be subtracted so that the payor is only required to pay the difference
3. Any extraordinary expenses must be agreed upon by both parents . Otherwise the payor will pay for activities twice. In the case of sports, the YMCA should be used as a benchmark.
V. Alternating Expenses
Alternating expenses on an annual basis applies, primarily, to shared custodial parents. In this case, both parents would alternate paying for direct expenses for their child(ren) on an annual basis. This issue was also discussed at committee meetings, but no clear decision was made in regards to if it would be implemented, and if not, why? The advising economist commented that the alternation of expenses could be accomplished and that the party with the lowest income was not necessarily the parent entitled to pay for direct expenses. The simple fact that the lower income parent becomes the parent in charge of expenses encourages one parent to become or remain the lower wage earner simply to gain or maintain parental control (what about the spouse's income that's not accounted for?). If both parents are required
V.1 to alternate paying for direct expenses, neither parent has any financial motivation to seek a child support adjustment.
Force shared custodial parents to alternate paying for expenses on an annual basis if they will not agree to share them. This is the only fair way to approach one parent's unwillingness to
Requested Changes
share. Two separate child support worksheets should be prepared. The first worksheet assumes one parent pays for direct expenses, the second sheet assumes the other parent pays for direct expenses. The parents should then alternate payment for these costs and the court trustee should initiate a revised income withholding order every year for these parents. If expenses are not alternated, it is likely the court will experience even higher traffic to hear motions to reimburse expenses.
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VI. Parenting Time Adjustments - As An Extension of the Shared Formula
Parenting time adjustments should be modified drastically. Many of the authors have already stated that the method of adjustment currently encourages parents to seek custody purely because of the drastic increase or decrease in child support. As parenting time approaches 50%, the parenting time adjustment should converge on the shared parenting time adjustment. The currently proposed method to calculate child support for shared residential parents is as follows: 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶(𝐴𝐴%−𝐵𝐵%)2+𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶(𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷%) (1)
Where,CS = child support obligation determined from tables based on combined monthly income A% = Parent A (higher wage earner) % of combined gross income B% = Parent B (lower wage earner) % of combined gross income DE% = Percentage determined to be allocated to direct expenses The concern with the above proposal is that direct expenses are accounted for in term A, and then again in term B. Values of 13%, 15%, and 18% have been proposed to represent the amount of money each family spends purely on direct expenses for the child(ren). These percentages have already been divided by two for application to a shared custody family. Therefore, 26%, 30%, and 36%, are the respective percentages spent on direct expenses. From a mathematical perspective, it can be demonstrated that direct expenses are not divided by two, they are actually being divided based on the income proportionate share. Thereby, a parent making a higher wage will pay for a greater percentage of direct expenses. If this is the intent, the guidelines language should state that this is the case to avoid confusion. Even though both parents pay for direct expenses equally, term A essentially ensures the higher income parent pays more toward direct expenses. Term A accounts for financial disparity (including that for direct expenses), Term B accounts for the fact that both parents will provide equal direct expenses. The following equations are proposed for application to other parenting time arrangements. The bold term has been added so that each parent "equally" provides for direct expenses.
𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶(𝐴𝐴%−𝐵𝐵%)(𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃%)(𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏%−𝑫𝑫𝑫𝑫%)+𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶(𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷%)(𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃%) (2) OR
𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶{(𝐴𝐴%−𝐵𝐵%)(𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃%)(𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏%−𝑫𝑫𝑫𝑫%)+(𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷%)(𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃%)} (3) OR
𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶(𝑃𝑃𝑃𝑃%){(𝐴𝐴%−𝐵𝐵%)(𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏𝟏%−𝑫𝑫𝑫𝑫%)+(𝐷𝐷𝐷𝐷%)} (4) Where,CS = child support amount determined from the tabled values A = income proportionate share (IPS) for parent A (%)
term a
term b
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B = IPS for parent B (%) DE = total % determined to be allocated to direct expenses (24%, 30%, 36%) PT% = Percentage parenting time (50% for shared custody) Equations 2, 3, and 4, above, are equivalent and are different forms of the same solution. All provide the following:
1. direct expenses and indirect expenses have been decoupled so that each can be addressed separately. This is important when one parent is providing direct expenses already, but makes a higher wage. In such a case, the equations allow for a fair adjustment.
2. Percentage parenting time has been entered into this equation to demonstrate a simple application and extension of the share custody formula to other parenting time situations. This method provides a straight forward parenting time adjustment for parenting time percentages other than 50%/50%, while ensuring a reasonable and mathematically substantiated adjustment.
The premise behind the presented equations are that direct expenses are provided equally
VI.1 by both parents.
The above equations are requested to be adopted in application to other parenting time arrangements other than shared custody. Since 49% parenting time is essentially identical to 50% parenting time, the mathematical formulas should reflect this. Both formulas should converge to a single solution (the shared custody formula). The guidelines should provide full substantiation of the 5%/10% and 15% adjustments if they are going to be used for the next four years. Where do these numbers come from?
Requested Changes
VII. Shared Custody Expense Sharing Plan
In review of the latest meeting minutes, it appears the committee has proposed removal of the direct expense sharing plan entirely. Some families share direct expenses already and may have been doing so for many years. There is no reason to remove the current plan. Simply asking the question if both parents agree to share direct expenses is adequate to determine which plan is used. It is a yes or no question. Some parents may already be paying for school costs, paying for certain sports and activities, providing car fuel and insurance, etc. Upsetting plans like this by implementing a new plan will likely cause further litigation and will result in unfairness. If parents are already sharing expenses, they should use the expense sharing plan and the guidelines should state this verbatim.
VII.1
1. The current direct expenses sharing plan for shared custodial parents should be left in the guidelines for those parents who already share direct expenses.
Requested Changes
2. Language should be added to the expense sharing plan to the effect that if parents already use this plan, or are already sharing expenses, the expense sharing plan should be used.
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3. Remove language from section III.B.7 "In most cases, parents who share their children’s time equally or nearly equally should consider requesting a parenting time adjustment provided for in Section IV. E. 2 rather than use the shared expense formula." Judges and attorneys have interpreted this line as requiring
VIII. Irregular and Performance-Based Bonuses that all shared custody cases use the parenting time adjustment.
The guidelines currently offer no guidance to correctly account for irregularly paid performance bonuses in child support awards. Therefore each judge does it differently, and some methods are fairer than others. The guidelines should offer clear guidance in this regard to avoid inconsistencies and deviations from the guidelines. What does "irregular" mean? A 15% bonus based on company performance one year may change to 3% the following year, which is a change of circumstances. Does irregular pertain to the amount received? If so, what amount is used? Methods have been employed in some districts which attempt to calculate what percentage of a parent's income is being paid to child support. The major flaw with this approach is the nonlinear nature of the guidelines, and also the inherent inclusion of expenses such as child care, insurance, and travel expenses, which will make this method fail.
VIII.1
Due to the number of methods which have been used and proposed to account for bonuses, and the time constraints on the committee to review a revised method, this document proposes the following:
Requested Changes
1. If bonuses received are less than 10% of the gross income bonuses should not be included in child support calculations
2. If bonuses received are greater than 10% of the gross income and bonuses are received on a regular basis (3 regular periods or more), the last received bonus should be included as gross income to determine the child support amount.
IX. Committee Membership
All of the authors have been willing to provide insight, analysis, and case-specific examples to aid the committee in promoting greater fairness in the guidelines. Some of the authors are also interested in becoming members of the advisory committee to provide a better conduit between the committee and Kansas parents. The committee appears to currently include only one parent member who is not an attorney, judge, or involved in some other way with child support enforcement - David Gregory. While Mr. Gregory's name appears in the guidelines, from review of all meeting minutes this session, it appears Mr. Gregory has not attended any meetings, nor has he had any input on any committee meetings this review session. The only regular Kansas parent input has been through letters to the committee and a couple attendances by parents. Kansas residents want more parent representation on the committee.
IX.1
The authors kindly request a response be issued by the committee to the following questions:
Requested Response
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1.) What are the statutory factors governing committee composition? This would address questions like; how many members are allowed, how many attorneys are allowed, how many parents are allowed?
2.) Why has it been communicated to inquirers that only one noncustodial parent representative may exist on the committee? Where does this requirement come from?
3.) What are the requirements for Kansas residents to join the Kansas child support guidelines advisory committee?
4.) How can a Kansas resident apply to become a committee member?
The questions above and the responses to the questions by the committee should be posted on the formal child support website under the FAQ section.
X. Conclusions
The changes requested in this letter have been agreed upon by all authors, supporters, and contributors. It is understood that public input is to be queried via YouTube this session and that changes to the guidelines will need to be made swiftly in order to be incorporated into the Supreme Court report and public information. Some changes requested here have been requested for years. The authors respectfully request incorporation of all requested changes. It is noted that some authors' education and expertise is in advanced mathematics. That being said, the goal of this document is not to discount the validity of the economist's data, but rather to provide more detailed application of such information in a manner which is more consistent with actual family spending in Kansas rather than "typical" national data. The authors acknowledge that many issues involve mathematics, however others simply involve law, legal language, and reasonable judgment. The collaborative author's expertise is equally adept in this regard and the authors would kindly offer suggested revisions to the guidelines if it would help expedite revision of the guidelines. Thank you for your time and consideration.