New Law Will Let Deployed Nebraska Parents Pick Someone to Perform Custodial Duties
LINCOLN Danelle Nelson has completed six deployments during 15 years in the Nebraska Air National Guard.
The 36-year-old technical sergeant from Kearney recently told Nebraska lawmakers that she doubts she would consider a seventh.
In tearful testimony, she blamed the stress she felt on being a divorced military parent who could not transfer to another adult the visitation rights to her two children.
As a result, she said, her kids lost regular contact with her side of the family and she found it more difficult to maintain communication with them during her two months overseas.
Id probably hang it up without putting in my 20 years because I wont do that to my children again, she testified before the Judiciary Committee.
Her account helped speed the passage of a bill this session that is intended to help divorced or unmarried military parents obtain a court-ordered connection to their children before being deployed. Gov. Pete Ricketts signed Legislative Bill 219 into law late last week.
Nebraska has now joined six states that have adopted whats called the Uniform Deployed Parents Custody and Visitation Act.
State Sen. Sue Crawford of Bellevue, who sponsored the legislation, said the U.S. Department of Defense has endorsed laws for deployed parents as one the key steps states can take to improve the well-being of military families. Maj. Gen. Daryl Bohac, adjutant general of the Nebraska National Guard, also supported passage of the law.
Without a predictable plan in place, these messy types of issues can impact morale, preparedness and focus on the mission at hand, Crawford said.
Under the act, parents facing deployment can ask a court to grant their child-custody responsibilities to a nonparent. The step-in could be a step-parent, a grandparent or a friend who has an established relationship with the child.
The nonparents role would be to maintain the service members custodial rights and help the child stay in contact with the deployed parent as well as with extended family members, throughout the duration of the deployment.
Judges retain the discretion to decide whether to grant the request and can do so only after determining it is in the best interest of the child. The law allows biological parents to work out their own plans involving a nonparent.
The agreements end when the service member returns from deployment. They cannot be used to extend permanent custodial rights to the nonparent.
Crawford said the Department of Veterans Affairs estimates that most of the current 1.4 million children with a military parent have seen their parent deploy to Afghanistan or Iraq. Studies have shown that such children are at greater risk of depression, aggressive behavior and teen substance abuse during deployments.
So Crawford argued that the deployed parents law can help children better cope with a deployment by allowing them to draw support from extended family members undergoing the same emotional experience.
The law also contains language to prevent any change in the permanent custody plan while the service member is deployed. There have been cases nationally of such actions, said Terry Morrow of the Uniform Law Commission, a Chicago-based organization composed of attorneys, judges and law professors who draft model legislation that they think should be passed in all states.
The same bill passed in Nebraska has been introduced this year in two other states and the District of Columbia.
The deployed parent legislation, written in 2012, is a priority for the commission because military members can face a confusing array of state laws when trying to work through child custody disputes. In addition to providing a common legal framework for all states, the legislation seeks to protect military members from being put at a disadvantage simply because they answer the call to duty, Morrow said.
You hear stories of service members choosing to leave the service because of the future effect on custody and visitation, Morrow said.
The Nebraska State Bar Association and the child-advocacy groups Voices for Children and the Children and Family Coalition of Nebraska also supported the bill. No one testified against it during a Jan. 23 public hearing.
Nelson, a member of the 155th Air Refueling Wing, said being able to designate a nonparent would have made her last deployment better.
Nelson has custody rights to her 9-year-old daughter and 6-year-old son that include visitation two nights per week and every other weekend. On other days, the children stay with her ex-husband, who lives about 50 miles away from her in Grand Island.
Before the deployment began, she said, she asked a judge to allow her childrens step-grandmother to pick up the kids for visitation. The judge said he couldnt grant her request and suggested that she needed to work it out with her ex-husband.
Her ex-husband agreed to allow Nelsons parents to do the weekly exchanges, but not her new in-laws. The problem, Nelson said, is her parents own a ranch in North Dakota, a nine-hour drive from Kearney. During Nelsons deployment, her mother made the trip twice to spend time with the children.
Although Nelson said her ex-husband allowed her to talk to the children during the deployment, he did not permit Internet video conversations.
Nancy Johnson, a Hastings attorney who represents the ex-husband, said the court has ordered Nelsons current husband not to be present when the children are picked up or dropped off. She otherwise said she does not object to the deployed parent law.
Through his attorney, the ex-husband declined to comment.
Nelson said she wanted her children to keep their routine while she was gone. At her home in Kearney, they have their pets, a close relationship with her new family and access to Skype, she said.
Nelson hopes that the new law helps other military members and their children get through the difficulty that is a deployment.
Because we put on a uniform, our children should not be hurt, they should be protected, she said.
Tags: Veterans News
