ABC News today reported that Lisa Snyder, a Michigan mom, received a letter from the state telling her that she is violating a law by babysitting neighborhood children in her home for a brief time each morning before the school bus picks them up.
Regulators who oversee child care, however, don't see it as charity. Days after the start of the new school year, Snyder received a letter from the Michigan Department of Human Services warning her that if she continued she'd be violating a law aimed at the operators of unlicensed day care centers.
Glenn Sacks' Blog Fathers & Families featured an article authored by Robert Franklin, Esq on September 24th, 2009 that caught my eye. I frequently am contacted by fathers who are concerned about their parental rights in cases where the parents have never married. Franklin wrote about a biological father who opposed adoption of his child but the Texas court named prospective adoptive parents as "managing conservators" [in Michigan's parlance, the primary physical custodial parent]. Four years later, a Texas appellate court is sending the matter back to the trial court for a re-determination whether the biological father should have custody of his child instead of third parties.
Last week, while in court on another matter, I listened to oral argument in a case involving a father whose child has already been adopted -- a father who is hoping to overturn the adoption that had been granted because the mother failed to identify him at the time of the adoption in order to destroy his ability to have custody of the child she did not want, the child for whom she had arranged a private adoption.
Sue Shellenbarger writes in the online Wall Street Journal on September 3, 2009
"Some experts lament that all that keyboard jabber is making our kids
stupid – unable to read nonverbal cues such as facial expressions,
gestures, posture and other silent signals of mood and attitude. Unlike
phones, text messaging doesn’t even allow transmission of tone of voice
or pauses, says Mark Bauerlein, author of a book called The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future."
Meetways is a free online resource that helps people locate a convenient halfway point between
two locations. For parents who meet halfway to exchange children, this is quite an easy tool, offering options for places to meet, using or avoiding major highways, etc.
Gina Calogero sent along this update on the $40,000 custody dispute over Dexter, a dog who was the center of a custody dispute in New Jersey. Ms. Calogero relates as follows:
"On September 23, 2009, after taking testimony in the second trial and reviewing written submissions and hearing oral argument, Judge Tomasello ruled that the couple will share the dog on a five-week rotating basis. Dexter was dropped off at the Houseman residence on Friday Sept. 25th and will be picked up five weeks later. My client Ms. Houseman is thrilled with the decision."
The Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence has promoted a new concept to distinguish mother's protective actions from what abusers do. It is called Domestic Violence by Proxy. You can download a 2 page memo on it from their web site at http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/DVP.html The tiny url is http://tinyurl.com/y8j9uxt
The Memo states that some mothers have
called what their batterer is doing "parental alienation syndrome [PAS]." PAS has fallen into disfavor among a large segment of the APA and the ABA Family Law Section, largely due to discrediting of the work of Dr. Richard Gardener, who coined the term. Thus, according to the memo, the label can be turned against a custodial parent using it.
Two articles caught my eye today. Both concern multi-tasking. As one who usually keeps 6 or 8 programs open at any given time, frustrated because my IT person can't get me more RAM, I have to wonder whether I am farther ahead or farther behind.
My friend and mentor, Dr. Wendy Harpham of Dallas, Texas, author of seven books about getting good care and living as fully as possible as a modern patient, wrote in her Blog On Healthy Survivorship "Healthy Hang-up:"
According to an article in today's Houston Chronicle,
"Driving while using a cell phone incurs a fourfold greater risk of
crashing, equivalent to driving while drunk (with a 0.08 blood-alcohol
level). For texters, the risk is eight times greater. A recent study by
the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, which videotaped truck
drivers over 18 months, showed that texting made them 23 times more
likely to crash or narrowly avoid a crash."
While researching the issue of texting while driving, I saw this public service announcement created in the UK. Believing this is something some parents might find educational (to say the least), I decided to include it in my blog. Imagine my surprise when I was not allowed to upload until I confirmed I am at least 18. Watch it and you'll see why. Then you decide. Is this something your teenagers should see? As a parent, I'd share this with mine. What about you?
Yesterday in Salem, N.J, a judge ordered a former couple to share custody of Dexter, after the pair paid
lawyers $40,000 in their contest for custody. Fox TV reports that one “parent” isn’t happy with a
judge’s custody decision and may appeal.
Judge John Tomasello said Doreen Houseman and Eric Dare, cohabitants who lived together for 13 years but never married and broke up in 2006, must share equal custody of the dog. Dare told reporters he may appeal the decision.
Dexter was earlier declared to be the parties' joint property. Therefore, a suitable custody arrangement had to be determined. That judge said that there were three options: one or the other “parent” could get full custody or a joint visitation agreement can be decided.
Whenever the prosecuting attorney files to establish support on behalf of a child born to an unmarried mother, and medicaid has paid the expenses of the birth and confinement, the court will order that those costs should be reimbursed. This law, MCL 722.712(5) was amended effective October 1, 2004. The amendment, in an effort to promote marriage, allows for those expenses to be abated (erased) if the parents marry.
Another case has been decided by the Michigan court of appeals dealing with a challenge to a life insurance policy payout to the divorced spouse because the former spouse forgot to change his beneficiary after the divorce. In Brown v Wright, the judgment of divorce had the standard statutory provision: "Any of the rights of either party in any policy or contract of life, endowment or any insurance of the other as beneficiary or otherwise, is hereby extinguished unless specifically preserved by this Judgment."
Lawyers USA featured an article in late June about the types of information that can be found in social networking sites, such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. The article correctly states that these sites have opened up a potential treasure trove of legal evidence, especially in divorce cases where a person’s whereabouts, “friends” and employment status are often relevant.
H1N1 Update: First
Vaccine Shipment to Include Live Attenuated Virus
The first batch of 2009 H1N1 influenza vaccine, to be shipped the first week
of October, will likely be in the form of intranasal spray containing the live
attenuated virus, CDC officials said in a press briefing Friday.
The CDC anticipates at least 3.4 million doses of the nasal spray vaccine
being shipped to states that first week. Children younger than 2 years, pregnant
women, and people with underlying conditions such as lung disease and diabetes —
although they are at high risk for H1N1 complications — should not receive
vaccines with the live attenuated virus. Instead, they should wait until
inactivated injectable vaccines become available. Officials said that there may
be some injectable vaccines in the first shipment, but it is not certain.
Most Michigan family lawyers are familiar with the S.M.I.L.E. program [Start Making It Liveable for Everyone]. Most, if not all Michigan counties run S.M.I.L.E. and attendance is often mandatory.
I do a fair number of military divorces and my client is not always available to participate in Michigan in these valuable co-parenting classes. In Grand Traverse, the Friend of the Court has been willing to approve 2 hours of counseling that is focused on co-parenting and issues that arise with children and divorce as a substitute. My clients then send a letter from the counselor describing the content of the counseling sessions to the FOC to get credit. Today I found another option.
LinkedIn is a Social Networking Technology website enabling users to create a profile to summarize their professional accomplishments. Your profile helps you find and be found by former colleagues, clients, and partners. You can add more connections by inviting trusted contacts to join LinkedIn and connect to you.
The Boston Globe said recently in its Business section: "Your network consists of your connections, your connections’ connections, and the people they know, linking you to thousands of qualified professionals." See the Globe's tips for effective use of LinkedIn.
The Parent Leadership in State Government Training Project is sponsoring three two-day training sessions. These will be held in Detroit, Grand Rapids and Gaylord.
Do you have a client or clients who have children with special needs? This is an opportunity for these parents to become trained in advocacy for their children and the other children who are in their communities, schools and day care settings. Here are the details. Please forward this to all parents you think might qualify for and be interested in this training.
"Mom, can I have a sip of your water?" This is a pretty easy question when you're talking to your young child, right?
WRONG!Brigid Schulte, Washington Post Staff Writer wrote on Saturday, September 5, 2009 about how insidious the swine flu is, how susceptible to exposure and potential infection our children are . . . and how we have to worry about such simple things as . . . it's a hot day, your child is thirsty and wants a sip of your water. We tend to think of our young children as sharing the same germs we all share at our house.
According to an Associated Press story posted on September 5, 2009, Richard "Ricky" Chekevdia, who will be 7 on Sept. 14, was in good spirits and healthy after being found Friday by investigators who searched a two-story rural home in Illinois owned by his grandmother. Ricky had been missing for nearly two years. This child was found in a secret room in the grandmother’s house, a room roughly 5 feet by 12 feet and about the height of a washing machine.
The boy's mother, 30-year-old Shannon Wilfong, has been charged with felony child abduction. The grandmother, 51-year-old Diane Dobbs, has been charged with aiding and abetting. Both remained jailed Saturday on, Wilfong held on a $42,500 bond and Dobbs held on $1,000 bond. [Note: AP Photo from the Chekevdia family]
What a great tip from Michael Morse today! It's really aggravating to have to pay to call Information to get a phone number when you're traveling and don't have access to the Internet to look up the number.
Michael says:
If you don’t already know, there are several free numbers you can call to get that residential or business number.
1-800-BING-411. This is Microsoft’s number. In addition to phone numbers, you can also get step by step driving directions and weather information too. [Guess we can throw away the GPS! I just hate it when the automated voice gets crabby the second or third time she says: "Missed your turn. Re . . . CAL . . . culating."]
