Background:
When I sought to raise the issue of the computation of presumptive (guideline) child support after my son, Dan, was emancipated, Magistrate Sanford (a man for whom I have a great deal of respect) indicated that the issue would be best addressed legislatively. Because I was the Director of the Columbus Chapter of Parents And Children for Equality (PACE), I was been appointed to serve on the 2005 Ohio Child Support Guideline Council. As a member of this group, I have advocated reform of the Ohio Revised Code to remove the confusion over this issue. On this page, I have documents and a PowerPoint presentation that I created in an attempt to convince the Guideline Council that change is needed here.
My service on the Ohio Child Support Guidelines Council was very time-consuming and, ultimately one of the most frustrating experiences I've had. I found that the Council seemed much more interested in simply raising the child support tables and had no interest in working to ensure that child support policy didn't have an adverse effect on the promotion of shared parenting. Ultimately, the Council proposed enormous increases in the child support tables (see the Ohio CS Guidelines page for details) with no significant consideration for shared parenting. The Council completely ignored my arguments for correcting the problem of determining guideline (presumptive/non-deviated) child support in shared parenting cases where both parents were custodial and residential parents.
The documents below may be useful in helping you to explain the issues to your legislators. We have found that some legislators are quite sympathetic to our concerns.