INDIANAPOLIS - A pitch to increase Indiana's child support collections marked the only departure by Gov. Mitch Daniels from his theme of property tax reform during his State of the State address to Indiana lawmakers Tuesday.
The governor called on the General Assembly to assist in boosting the amount of child support payments collected by creating a faster and less adversarial way of getting both parents on board as to how much can be paid.
"Our progress has been encouraging, but when 45 cents of every court-ordered payment dollar still goes unpaid, and each cent represents more than $5 million straight to single parents struggling to give children a decent upbringing, more tools are necessary," the governor said.
State Sen. Brent Steele, R-Bedford, has introduced the governor's plan as Senate Bill 105, which is awaiting action in the Senate Rules Committee. Indiana currently has $2.44 billion in court-ordered child support arrearages that remain unpaid.
The bill calls for a pilot program that would let parents take an intermediary step, rather than fighting over child support in a courtroom.
An administrative approach
Instead, parents would go before an administrative law judge with the idea that the hearing process might be more efficient and result in better compliance than a traditional child support case in court.
Pursuing an administrative process instead of a judicial one would be optional; parents still could request contested hearings before a judge, and prosecutors still could charge nonpaying parents for criminal nonsupport.
The Vanderburgh County Prosecutor's Office enforces child support orders referred to it.
"I'm for anything that is going to increase child support without any other increases," Prosecutor Stan Levco said Tuesday night in reaction to the governor's speech.
Levco's main concern is cost. It's unclear what his office's financial responsibilities would be in operating the program with an administrative law judge. Right now, two-thirds of the funding for collecting delinquent child support comes from the federal government, he said.
Collecting can be difficult
Levco said collecting child support is challenging in areas such as Evansville.
"In all the big counties, the collections can be less than the state average."
A pilot program could start with three test counties to see how the program would work in practice. Levco said he would like to hear more about the proposal before committing to Vanderburgh being one of those test counties.
"I'm (serving) a large county; I assume I'd consider it," he said. "I wouldn't just dismiss it outright; I'd certainly want to hear more about it if we were one of the potential ones to do it."