Legal Question in Family Law in Washington

Re: forcing noncustodial parent to sign passport

For minors under age 16, for the first passport, both parents needs to appear in person at a passport application office (could be a post office, library, courthouse, etc.) and personally sign the paperwork in front of the person accepting the application.

If the minors are 16 or 17, both parents do not need to appear and sign in person.

As for your more immediate question, yes, a court can order the non-custodial parent to cooperate and appear at a certain place, time, and date to sign a passport application in front of a passport acceptance officer.

Keep in mind, that you should make sure the Parenting Plan ("PP")allows for you to travel outside the U.S. otherwise you are going to need a notarized letter of permission from the other parent, consenting to your travel. This is a sticky issue, and the permission issue arises out of scenarios when some parents seek to kidnap their children and take them abroad making it more difficult to track them.

As for whether the non-custodial parent's inability to follow the visitation portion of the PP, and whether that affects their rights, in short, the answer is yes, it CAN affect their rights, should you seek to modify the PP to reduce the other parent's time, on the basis that they do not see the children as prescribed in the PP.

I hope this helps somewhat. If you need more help or would like an in depth consultation, please feel free to contact me anytime.