
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, March 6, 1990                   TAG: 9003062269
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

DANVILLE MILL BUYOUT PAYS OFF DELINQUENT CHILD SUPPORT

When news stories began to circulate through Danville last year about the proposed buyout of Dan River Mills Inc., officials at the city's Department of Social Services had a different sort of financial acquisition in mind.

Reviewing the company's files, the Social Services' Division of Child Support Enforcement found 96 employees or past employees of Dan River who owed child support.

Under the terms of the buyout, the workers stood to receive lump-sum benefit payments from an employee stock ownership plan.

But before the checks were sent out, Social Services workers obtained court orders withholding the amount owed from the employees' checks - for a total of $109,876.

"Once we got word that the buyout was going to happen, we started pulling cases," said Tim Shelton, support enforcement supervisor in Danville.

A total of 550 cases were reviewed. Of the 96 employees who owed child support, debts ranged from about $300 to as much as $6,000, Shelton said.

"Surprisingly, the responsible parents were relieved to get their debts taken care of," he said.

Although many of the workers had been trying to make their payments on limited incomes, the buyout offered a windfall for Social Services officials.

"Most of these people weren't going to walk into this kind of money on a regular basis," said Peter Berinato, a spokesman for the Department of Social Services main office in Richmond.

"It's just an example of using a little bit of creative ingenuity to get the job done."

by CNB