Legal Question in Family Law in California
It's not that she has the right to schedule on my time. The court order states under (legal custody rights and resposibilities) that the mother shall select all schools, health care and extracurricular ativities. On several occations she has set them up for a spring camp or summer camp or signs them up for a swim club or vollyball club and it always ends up that they will be doing that on some of my weekends. Last year she even took them to Europe for 3 weeks over fathers day weekend. The order states that that is my weekend.
In a nutshell I was and still am on unemployment when we last went to court in June of this year. At the time I was appeling my unemployment and was not recieving and monies. The judge put in the order that i was to be making 2/3 minimum wage to pay child support even though I was not working or collecting unemployment. In july I won my appeal with unemployment. Of course when she found out she ask child support to reassess. The Judge said that my support was based on acual phyical time with the girls. I told her about the above activities and she said it does not matter. The court order states that I get my girls the 2nd and 4th weekends of each month. I also get them 1 week during summer and Christmas along with half of thanksgiving week.
Based on the court order I should have them about 17 to 19 percent of the time. However based on accual time because of there activities it is about 7 percent.
What can I do about this?
Thanks
2 Answers from Attorneys
The visitation schedule needs to be adjusted. Possibly through some type of mediation. Unfortunately your support obligations and visitation opportunities do not fit together as neatly as the judge may have indicated. Visitation and custody schedules usually changed based on the ages of the children and needs of the parents. Good luck with this.
Ms. Macklin is correct. The defect is in your highly unusual custody order. You need to request a modification of the custody order that provides more clear limits on the other parent's interference with your custodial time. Furthermore, the mother is clearly abusing the existing order. The right to choose school, health care and extracurricular activities does not mean she can take them off on vacation on your time or send them away to camp. Swim or volleyball if it is a school team would be an extracurricular activity, but not an outside sports program under the proper use of that term.
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