Commission: Boost child support payments from low-income parents

By Mary Garrigan, Journal staff | Saturday, January 03, 2009

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Child support obligations for non-custodial parents will start at $216 per month for even the lowest-income South Dakotans if new guidelines proposed by the Governor's Commission on Child Support are adopted by the 2009 Legislature.

Every four years, after public hearings held throughout the state, child support guidelines and statutes are reviewed by the commission, which issues a report and recommendations to the governor and the Legislature. The laws are used to set child support amounts among divorced, separated and never-married parents and parents in situations that otherwise involve a continued absence of the parent or child from the home, such as incarceration.

This year's report included 10 recommendations, any or all of which would become state law if approved by the 2009 Legislature.

The recommendations include:

y  Increases in the monthly support obligation schedule to better reflect current costs of raising children in South Dakota. Where combined parental incomes are $0 to $1,100, non-custodial parents will owe $216 per month for one child. Under the current schedule, which has been in effect since 2000, non-custodial parents on the bottom rung of the schedule could owe a minimum of $100 per month for one child. Low-income adjustments reflect recent increases in the federal minimum wage, which rises to $7.25 per hour in 2009.

y  Expanding the support schedules to include combined parental incomes as high as $20,000 per month, a change from the current $10,000 per month ceiling on the schedule. Previous law left high-income support obligations up to a judge's discretion, which was not equitable in all cases, according to family law attorney and commission member Linda Lea Viken. "That's where we get into a lot of our arguments," Viken said. "This change is an important benefit to children."

y  Changes that would allow a parent to exclude new income that is not regular or recurring, such as bonuses or overtime pay, when calculating their support obligation.

y  Amending state law to reflect the assumption that even incarcerated parents are capable of paying child support as if they earned minimum wage.

The commission includes custodial and non-custodial parents, family law attorneys, and representatives of the judiciary, the Legislature, and the Department of Social Services.

Diana Broom of Rapid City, a custodial parent who sits on the commission, said the new proposals will help both custodial and non-custodial parents alike.

Custodial parents have not had an increase in child support guidelines for eight years. Changes in how new, secondary income sources are handled should please non-custodial parents, Broom said.

The final report can be viewed at dss.sd.gov/childsupport/docs/report.pdf.