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Your Views on Child Support Collections

Collections are up 20% nationally, but millions of children still aren't getting the support they need. Take a look at our piece on child support collections and let us know what's on your mind. Here's what some of you thought...

Non-support is a very big problem in US. They say that the collection rate averages 20% in the US. Does that mean that the other 80% of child support is not important? The system and deadbeat parents are failing our children. Our children are our most precious resource. My children's father owes over $40,000 in child support. There were many things that my children needed that the support would have taken care of the needs. Not only did my children not have the money they also didn't have their mother like they would have liked. I was either forced to work more than one job to pay for necessities and buy a few extras like school pictures, field trips, etc. If I wasn't working 2 jobs we were forced on federal assistance. Very few custodial parents want to depend on this for their income. Most are forced to assistance due to needing medical assistance, food stamps, rent assistance. The support agencies and our courts are letting deadbeat parents get away without paying. I know my county agency and the judges were not doing their jobs. Of course I had the comment from one agency employee who stated I should have married some that would have paid child support. When I married, a divorce was not my long-range goal and I believed this man would take care of his children married or divorced. I was wrong about the marriage lasting and him taking care of his children. I am sure it is not a custodial parent's dream to have a child to a deadbeat parent. Yes children need emotional and financially support. Yes to the non-custodial parents that want to be involved, do pay support but have a custodial parent that use the children against you. I feel bad for your children and you. But to the dead beats that use the excuse that they don't see their children (the ones that only have time for their children when it fits into their schedule)or don't even make time. Wake up and pay for your children. My story does have some results. It happened because I finally had an excellent caseworker, a Northern District Federal Prosecutor that listened to my pleas for help when everyone else failed. My case went under the Child Recovery Act of 1992. Come on people make our children more important than taxes. Call or write your Federal Representative asking them to co-sponsor HR#1488. This bill is the Compassion for Children and Child Support Enforcement Act of 1999. This is a federal system that support is collected like taxes. The IRS already has people employment information especially since our states sets systems are a disaster. Also ask your Senator to vote for it when it comes to the Senate sid. Write or Call your Senator and ask them to co-sponsor Senate #1036 The Children First Child Support Reform Act that expands passthrough, expands disregards, and protects children and families. Now has anyone figured out which child or children are in that 80%rate of uncollected child support do not deserve their child support. If you feel that a 20% collection rate is good. Please go tell the children that don't receive support that they don't deserve food, clothing, a good primary education, a roof over their head, and the innocence of a child that shouldn't have to worry about these problems. People wonder what is wrong with some of our youth. Maybe because they can't be just children dreaming of playing, school work, and maybe Santa bringing them something the want for Christmas. Yes in the perfect world a child would live with both parents having both financial and emotional support. But since this is not they way the real world is. Let's fix the support system so children have financial support and hopefully along with that the children get emotional support. Lora Brown - Homeworth, Ohio

My children are owed $12,000 in back support. It is ironic that my credit dept. is at $10,000. I have had to use my credit to buy food and clothes for my children. I am remarried and my husband bares the expenses for my children when their fathers do not. This is so sad! I have a friend whose children are owed $60.000 in back support and has had to sell her home. She and her children are homeless. She works day and night to avoid going on TANIF. She is angry that day by day, she is getting closer and closer to being forced on a welfare system that she wants no part of. All of this has happened because a non-custodial parent has walked out on the responsibilities of taking care of his children. This is child abuse!!! All custodial parents must take a stand for their children's rights. I know that here in Mo., CSE is not doing much to help these children and often exhibit the attitude of resentment when asked for help. We are told to investigate our cases our selves, even when it could be dangerous. Peggy Walker - Missouri

YOU CAN NOT MAKE A PERSON A PARENT, BUT WE CAN MAKE THEM FINANICALLY RESPONSIBILE FOR THE CHILDREN THEY HELPED BRING INTO THE WORLD! I am the single father of two children. My daughter was three, my son two years old when their mother left us (1980). Eight years later I went to the "system" in order to afford health insurance (1988). May, 1995 I got the interstate court hearing and my daughter was already eighteen and my son received payments for just over a year. I am fortunate, my children stayed healty. I am glad it was not a matter of food or shelter, one could get quite cold and hungry in SEVEN years. Until I started meeting so many single mothers having the same problem, I was certain it was because I was a man asking for support. After 24 years, the State Child Support Systems are collecting only 23% of the child support owed to children. The national debt owed to children is growing by millions of dollars each year. How many of these children are going without food, clothing, and shelter? The time for a change in the system is past due. Children are the most valuable resource in America. TAKE A STAND FOR CHILDREN!!!! Jeffrey C. Cumbo, Sr., Danville, VA

CAN WE PLEASE OPEN OUR EYES? I am a single parent of four children, and deal with this issue like many others around our nation. Child support has been an ongoing battle as for as I don't know when. What ceases to amaze me is that we as human beings, adult's, mothers, fathers and as people, can not look beyond ourselves and the dollar signs to realize how our behavior and actions impact the very souls, that are to benefit from our responsibility and from the child support. It's not about which person hurt whom, who did what to the other, it's about our children regardless of how it ended up in a child support issue. The children do not stop existing when one or the other walks away; neither does their very important role and responsibility as parents. Fighting, complaining, walking away, abandoning or ignoring the issue, changes nothing, it only causes greater pain to the children. As adults, it is our actions and examples that set the stage to those very children that will follow in our footsteps and become our future, the same children that will become adults and care for those of us that become to old to care for ourselves. Listen to us complaining and fighting amongst each other, using excuses on something that cannot be explained away, something that is a responsibility regardless of our own personal problems. I SHUDDER AT THE THOUGHT OF A FUTURE FILLED WITH THE SAME CHILDREN WE CHOOSE TO TURN OUR BACK ON IN THEIR TIME OF NEED. PLEASE!!!!!! For all of you out there not paying your child support, reach out to your children and help provide a stable environment and the basic necessities so that they may grow into happier, healthier adults and maybe someday parents. Look beyond yourselves and into your children eyes, so that you can see the pain that they are experiencing, from the neglect and nonsupport of the parent they need so much. DO THE RIGHT THING BE THERE FOR YOUR CHILDREN, SHOW THEM YOUR LOVE IN EVERYWAY IT COUNTS. PAY YOUR CHILD SUPPORT. J.Y. - Visalia,California

I believe that for your on-going series concerning child support issues that it would be appropriate for you to contact a gentleman by the name of M.W. "Doc" McCoy. He is the Managing Director of a private child support enforcement agency located in Fort Worth, Texas. If memory serves me correct, PBS Morning Edition did a piece on him in April or May of 1994 or 1995. The reason I make this recommendation is because of the aggressive styles and innovative measures that Mr. McCoy has adopted concerning child support and the needs and interests of custodial parents not only in the United States but around the world. Mr. McCoy is the only private agency that has the capability of enforcing child support orders throughout the world. As part of his International services, he is not engaged in establishing paternity for non-US mothers overseas who have been impregnated by American citizens. Mr. McCoy has established a controversial web site for custodial parents called MAFIA - Mothers Against Fathers In Arrears which can be accessed at http://www.mafia-usa.com This site is well worth a visit, as well a perusal of the Message Board there. Information concerning Mr. McCoy can also be located at the web site of his agency - Child Support Intervention. Again, Mr. McCoy is a wealth of information concerning child support matters. George R. Lawson

Here in El Paso County, Colorado we have a privatized Child Support Enforcement Agency that is supposed to help with child support collections. They were hired by our County Commissioners, and receive millions of dollars to collect. We are one of six substandard counties in the state, so it is not working. Recent articles in all the state papers have highlighted the dismal failure of our State to do an effective job when it comes to child support enforcement. Over 1 billion dollars in past support is owed to our kids. Not to even mention future payments. Where is the taxpayer outrage over the millions and millions of dollars that have been poured into this system for 25 years? A system that simply DOES NOT WORK! I know of custodial parents who have unrolled half aroll of toilet paper into their purses in public restrooms because you can't buy toilet paper with food stamps. I know of custodial parents who have had to visit food banks to feed their children. We have such a tremendous problem nation wide and I am appalled that more attention is not paid to this issue. Shows like yours will serve to help change the attitudes of the nation. In the same way that drunk driving is no longer acceptable I hope that nonsupport of children will someday be not acceptable. Lee Grubb - Colorado

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