Child Support Enforcement Division Study

PREFACE

The Chicago Council of Lawyers, The Fund For Justice and the Illinois Task Force on Child Support conducted this project to improve the child support enforcement system in Illinois. This report and its recommendations are offered with the aim of helping the Cook County State's Attorney's Office ("SAO") improve the quality of its participation in Title IV-D child support enforcement proceedings. The information in this study is the result of courtroom observations by project staff and nearly 90 interviews with litigants in child-support suits, Assistant State's Attorneys ("ASAs") in the Child Support Enforcement Division of the SAO, staff in the Child Support Enforcement Division of the DuPage County SAO, judges, and experts on child-support issues. The study was conducted in two stages over a three-year period beginning in November 1992.

The first stage began with a meeting with representatives of the SAO. After receiving the SAO's cooperation, project staff made observations of child support proceedings in selected courtrooms throughout Cook County. Project staff distributed flyers at each courtroom observation site to those persons having a child-support case with the SAO. The flyer invited those having a child support case to talk with one of our project staff persons about how the SAO was treating the case. Each of the dozens of persons responding to our flyer was interviewed using a standard set of questions. We interviewed selected judges familiar with child-support issues, and all judges involved with child-support enforcement in Cook County. We then interviewed, by phone, experts on child-support issues throughout the country, and nearly all ASAs in the SAO's Child Support Enforcement Division. We also interviewed representatives of selected child support programs in jurisdictions outside Cook County. In each instance, we used a standard set of questions and solicited recommendations for program ideas that should be tried, and for ones that should be avoided, in Cook County.

The first stage of this project was completed in September 1993. As this stage was completed, we prepared a draft report summarizing our findings. We noted that the Child Support Enforcement Division suffered from numerous problems, but that the SAO was contemplating a number of reforms. We continued to monitor the SAO to evaluate the efficacy of those proposed reforms.

Our study's second stage formally began in May 1994, when project staff met with the administration of the Child Support Enforcement Division. We again interviewed judges and hearing officers involved with child-support proceedings. Project staff observed judicial proceedings and we met with members of ACES (Association of Children and Enforcement of Support), an advocacy group in the area of child support. We interviewed staff from the DuPage County SAO Child Support Enforcement Division concerning their policies and procedures. Finally, project staff interviewed all Assistant Cook County State's Attorneys in the Child Support Enforcement Division who had joined the Division since the end of the project's first stage, again using a standard set of questions.

The data collection within the second phase of our study concluded in September 1994. We concluded that some improvements had been made within the previous two years. In February 1993, State's Attorney O'Malley had appointed a new management team to head the Child Support Enforcement Division. The Division began seeking attorneys dedicated to specializing in child support enforcement. The State's Attorney's Office also implemented for the first time a substantial training program for Assistant State's Attorneys in the Child Support Division.

In October 1994 when we concluded our interviews and investigation, the State's Attorney's Office was about to implement a reorganization plan that dealt with some of the concerns that had been raised during the course of our investigation. The main example of this was a team organizational structure which was to improve the responsiveness and the effectiveness of the Division.

The SAO has now implemented its reorganization plan. At the end of 1995, we submitted to the SAO the findings of our investigation and the SAO provided to us a written response. We have attached to this report the SAO's responses to our findings.

In the spirit of continued constructive change, we believe it is time for all parties involved in the child support enforcement system to come to the table to develop together the standards and procedures that will make child support collection more effective and successful in Illinois. There are several parties involved in the child support system who all contribute to its success or failure. These include the State's Attorney's Office, the Illinois Department of Public Aid, the Cook County Clerk's Office, the Cook County Sheriff's Office, judges, lawyers, and non-lawyer advocates. With the leadership of a respected facilitator, each of these parties needs to contribute to a plan for continued improvement that will work for everyone involved. Towards this end, the Council will be sponsoring a series of panel discussions with all of the parties involved in child support collection and enforcement to continue the progress that has already been made.

Our study concludes that the Cook County State's Attorney's Office has within the last two years made substantial improvements in its Child Support Enforcement Division. But the system remains in need of further reform. Our study first sets out an overview of the existing procedures for enforcing child-support payments in Cook County under the IV-D system. We then discuss our findings, offering our analysis of areas in need of improvement, with specific recommendations for improvement. As we mentioned, we have included the SAO's responses to our report, where relevant.

The Chicago Council of Lawyers and its Fund For Justice undertook this study and will be sponsoring the child support panel discussions as part of our Government Effectiveness Program. The Illinois Task Force on Child Support is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to improving the child-support enforcement system.

We wish to thank project staff persons Susan Cox, Sara Frederick, Courtney Holohan, Paula Ketcham, and Kathleen O'Donnell for their excellent work in helping to design and implement this project.

Joan S. Colen, Project Director

Malcolm C. Rich, Executive Director, Chicago Council of Lawyers and The Fund For Justice

Marion Wanless, Past Executive Director, Illinois Task Force on Child Support

Sheila Woods, Executive Director, Illinois Task Force on Child Support

INTRODUCTION

The enforcement of a non-custodial parent's obligation to make child-support payments might initially be thought a matter of private concern in which the government should not be involved as a litigant. But 20 years ago the federal government came to the not-so-startling conclusion that there is a direct relationship between a custodial parent's need for welfare assistance and her inability to collect child support. The result is the so-called "IV-D" system, a federal mandate requiring state welfare agencies to provide custodial parents with a mechanism to establish and collect child-support payments. But the IV-D system is not strictly a service to custodial parents. Rather, it attempts to collect child-support payments as a means of either repaying Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) or weaning custodial parents off AFDC entirely.

Both of these goals have merit. As administered in Cook County, however, the IV-D system creates conflicts and waste that detract from its benefits.

The problem stems, in part, from the fact that the IV-D system is a mongrel within state government. The Illinois Department of Public Aid ("IDPA") has a federal mandate to protect its budget by promoting enforcement of child-support payments and, if necessary, by establishing paternity. But IDPA lacks the legal staff to undertake those responsibilities. It therefore contracts with state legal agencies to provide representation. In Cook County, IDPA contracts

with the State's Attorney's Office ("SAO") to be its hired counsel. Thus, when the SAO appears in court on paternity and child-support matters, it does so not pursuant to its statutory authority as lawyer for Cook County but as paid outside counsel to IDPA. One might question whether that is a proper role for the SAO to play. In another of our reports, we have suggested that the Attorney General should represent all state agencies for reasons of efficiency and consistency. In this report, we focus on how well the current system is working and on ways in which it should be changed assuming, as is likely, that the SAO will continue to be the IV-D lawyers in Cook County.

Many of the problems we have identified stem from the SAO's unique role in child-support matters. First, because child-support proceedings fall outside the SAO's mainstream work, the SAO's Child Support Enforcement Division (CSED) was traditionally viewed by most Assistant State's Attorneys as a bottom-of-the-barrel assignment to be avoided if possible or escaped at the earliest opportunity. Since 1993, however, the SAO has been seeking more attorneys with a commitment to child support enforcement. Morale in the Division has apparently improved since we began our study in 1992. We hope this trend continues.

Second, in IV-D matters the SAO is not its own master. It must work with and depend on IDPA for support and direction. We found that the relationship between IDPA and the SAO is problematic, creating inefficiency and waste. IDPA does not provide adequate information to the SAO, and the SAO does not fully utilize the information it does get. While we believe most of these problems can be solved, they arise from, and may persist because of, the two agencies' unusual relationship.

Third, the IV-D system creates enormous confusion over the significant question: who is the client? Literally, the SAO is under contract to IDPA to represent its interests. Yet in the courtroom, the "client" seeking to establish paternity and obtain child support seems more naturally to be the custodial parent.

Our study shows that most Assistant State's Attorneys find their role ambiguous if not confusing, but recent legislation establishes that the SAO represents only IDPA in child-support proceedings. If an adjudication of paternity is made during a child support proceeding, a father then has the right to request visitation or even child custody. But, by statute, the SAO can only act in paternity and child-support issues. It can play no role in custody or visitation disputes. Thus IDPA and the SAO often start a fight they cannot finish, leaving the custodial parent in limbo. Even under existing law, the SAO must do more to explain and clarify its role to the custodial parents, most of whom think the SAO is their attorney. In addition, someone must represent custodial parents in the custody and visitation disputes that often arise once the SAO commences child-support proceedings. More needs to be done to make attorneys available to handle these disputes -- through either increases in private sector pro bono involvement or through public funding for outside counsel.

Other states appear to do a better job in establishing paternity more quickly, in investigating the non-custodial parent's income, and in setting child-support payments through more streamlined procedures. But we can do better with the resources at hand if the agencies involved will continue to work more smoothly together and view the job with more respect. Welfare as we know it may soon be radically changed and diminished. That puts a far greater emphasis on the need to ensure that non-custodial parents perform their support responsibilities. During the course of our study, we have seen improvement. Now is the time to finish the job.

C. Steven Tomashefsky, President, Chicago Council of Lawyers

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