Arizona Governor Signs Legislation Modifying Best Interests of the Child

Professor Fabricius’ research and his work on family law has been written about by Fathers and Families’ Robert Franklin.

 http://www.fathersandfamilies.org/2011/05/29/arizona-state-researcher-at- equal-parenting-time-the-quality-of-the-father-child-relationship-was-at-its-highest/

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed into law SB 1127, legislation that updates current Arizona statute to modify the factors a court must consider when determining what is in the best interest of a child. The ultimate goal is to limit one-sided decisions and to encourage as much shared parent-child time as possible for the positive development of the child.

William Fabricius

The legislation is the result of the work of the Arizona Domestic Relations Committee chaired by William Fabricius, an associate professor of psychology at Arizona State University.

SB 1127 is the Committee’s second bill. It was sponsored by Senator Sylvia Allen and Senator Linda Gray. I

t states that the courts shall maximize parenting time between the two parents and order shared legal decision-making. In 2010, the Committee’s first bill was signed into law that said that it is in the children’s best interest for parents to share legal decision making and for both parents to have frequent, meaningful, substantial and continual parenting time.

“It gives the court and the public a clear statement that if there is no evidence to the contrary, the courts will maximize the parenting time between the two households. 

That should remove the perception of bias and should result in Arizona children having more equitable time with both their parents after divorce,” Fabricius said.

As a child psychologist, Fabricius saw the need to study the effects of divorce on children 12 years ago. Arizona children from divorced families who were studied from seventh to tenth grade from 2003 to 2006 revealed that 50 percent of children at every age wanted to spend more time with their fathers.

“If children spend less than substantial time with both parents, this is a huge long-term public health issue. It sets up this chronic stress response that initiates stress-related health problems including susceptibility to cancer and early mortality. These weren’t just our findings. 

This is supported by long-term health studies that link parent-child relationships and later health,” he said.

Provisions of SB 1127 include:

• Replaces in statue legal custody with legal decision-making, and physical custody or parental visitation with parenting time.
• Modifies the child’s best interests as follows:
• Adds the past, present and potential future relationship between the parent and child.
• Includes whether one parent intentionally mislead the court to cause an unnecessary delay, to increase the cost of litigation or to persuade the court to give a legal decision-making or parenting time preference to that parent.
• Specifies the child must be of suitable age and maturity for the court to consider the child’s wishes as a factor.
• Removes which parent has provided primary care of the child and the wishes of the child’s parent.
• Requires a court, in a contested legal decision-making or parenting time case, to make specific findings on the record about all relevant factors and the reasons for which the decision is in the best interests of the child.
• Specifies that an order for sole legal decision-making does not allow a parent to alter unilaterally a court-ordered parenting time plan.
• States a parent who is not granted sole or joint legal decision-making is entitled to reasonable parenting time to ensure that the child has substantial, frequent, meaningful and continuing contact with the parent unless a court finds that parenting time would endanger the child’s physical, mental, moral, or emotional health.

Other research that polled the Arizona public showed that people from all walks of life strongly support equal parenting time and laws that support equal time, but they believe that the courts are biased toward mothers.

 “The public belief that the courts are biased is going to affect the decisions that divorcing parents make,” Fabricius said.