THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, May 28, 1996 TAG: 9605280052
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MATTHEW BOWERS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 100 lines
Get behind on your child-support payments and the freedom of the open road could fade to a memory.
Virginia's Department of Motor Vehicles has begun suspending the driver's licenses of deadbeat parents under a new law passed last year.
``This is just one more in that bag of tools we have,'' said Carol A. Vanderspiegel, regional administrator for the state Division of Child Support Enforcement.
It must be a good incentive: More than 27,000 other parents, warned of the new law, have chipped in new payments.
Virginia was among the first 10 states to implement such a sanction; 13 now do, with others considering it, according to the Association for Children for the Enforcement of Support in Toledo, Ohio, the nation's largest child-support advocacy group.
The new penalty comes at a time of intense national debate over how best to reduce welfare rolls, with unpaid child support blamed for many families' financial problems. And activists concerned with the well-being of America's children have joined long-frustrated custodial parents in calling for tougher enforcement of child-support orders.
The new law in Virginia is straightforward. The state can suspend or revoke a driver's license if the holder hasn't paid court- or state-ordered child-support payments for 90 days or longer, or owes back payments of $5,000 or more.
Since license suspensions under the law began in January, 37 Virginians have lost driving privileges. Two of them were in Virginia Beach, five in Norfolk and six in Suffolk, with none so far in Chesapeake or Portsmouth, according to the Department of Motor Vehicles. There are 4.8 million licensed drivers in Virginia.
The DMV isn't brought in until after a series of warnings to delinquent parents fails to elicit responses. The law is for ``the real diehard who just won't give in,'' said Janet E. Smoot, assistant administrator in customer-service delivery for the DMV who coordinated setting up the sanction process with the Division of Child Support Enforcement.
Child-support officials in October mailed about 146,000 two-page informational and warning letters to noncustodial parents on their books, not all of whom were delinquent, telling them about the new law, said Vanderspiegel.
After that first notice, about 27,800 parents who owed money started paying, bringing in $12 million in new payments through April, she said.
``That's OK,'' she said. ``It's not that we really want to suspend people's driver's licenses, but we want to get people's attention and start the collections. And that part is working really well.''
By the end of November, the first of about 10,000 certified letters labeled ``Notice of Intent to Suspend'' were sent to delinquent parents who didn't respond after the first notice, beginning with those with the highest amounts owed or longest time with no payments, Vanderspiegel said.
Parents receiving notices could request court hearings to fight the suspensions, or make arrangements with the Division of Child Support Enforcement to start paying. The names of those who didn't respond were sent to the DMV and their licenses were suspended.
Most did respond. The last letters went out in March and, through April, $700,000 more was collected because of those notices.
Vanderspiegel expects the collections to grow now that the system is in place, but recognizes this sanction's limitations: There have to be known addresses and valid driver's licenses for the nonpaying parents.
That means the sanction won't reach everyone. Across Virginia at the beginning of May, there were about 387,000 open child-support cases involving about 512,000 children owed $808 million in back support payments. The Division of Child Support Enforcement expects to collect about $245 million this fiscal year.
In addition to the 37 parents whose driver's licenses have been suspended, nine other cases are pending in Virginia - including two in Virginia Beach - and three Virginia drivers started paying what they owed after the DMV told them their licenses were suspended, said Jeanne L. Chenault, the DMV's public-relations coordinator.
If delinquent parents start paying to save their licenses but then stop again, the Division of Child Support Enforcement doesn't have to restart the notice procedure, but can immediately ask the DMV to suspend the licenses, Vanderspiegel said.
Driving on a suspended license in Virginia is punishable by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine for the first offense, and a year in jail and a $2,500 fine for each subsequent conviction, plus further license suspension and impoundment of the driver's car.
Geraldine A. Jensen, founder and head of the Association for Children for the Enforcement of Support, applauded any new deterrents to nonpayment of child support that helps get needed money to children.
``It's a good tool to have,'' Jensen said.
``The best way to collect support is through income withholding . . . . The driver's-license revocation is just another way to get to them, to say, `This is serious - you aren't going to have the privilege to drive if you don't support your children.' ''
Others don't think the new sanction goes far enough. Lisa M. Petry, former local coordinator for the child support association, would rather see officials concentrate on developing uniform, more-aggressive collection laws across the country, aided by tougher courts and a society that will consider delinquent parents guilty of child neglect.
``There are a lot of people driving around with suspended licenses, anyway,'' Petry said. ``It's sad, but I really don't think it's going to help that much.
``It's overwhelming.''
KEYWORDS: CHILD SUPPORT DMV by CNB