Late last month, the Task Force to Study Legal Disputes Involving the Care and Custody of Minor Children met to create recommendations on how to modify the child custody system in Connecticut. After opening the task force up to a public hearing, the members of the panel voted on which recommendations to send to lawmakers. One of the proposals that did not make the final cut, however, was one that would create a legal presumption that parents should receive equal or nearly equal parenting time with their children. The current legal presumption is that joint custody is in the best interests of a child if the parents can agree on joint custody.
For some parents, however, this means that one parent could have substantially more parenting time with a child than the other. Even if the parents are both responsible, caring and free of substance abuse, one parent would be cheated on time with his or her children.
For other parents, however, having a more creative child custody agreement is necessary. When divorcing parents stay in the same city or relatively near each other, it may be possible to share the children during the week and weekend, but if one parent lives in Westport and the other lives on the opposite end of the state, there is no way to really have equal parenting time.
It was not just equal parenting time that was discussed, however. One of the bigger topics was the role of child guardians in the child custody process and their fee structure.
