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IMA POLICY MANUAL
PART V: PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS AND SANCTIONS
CHAPTER 2: CHILD SUPPORT REQUIREMENTS
GOOD CAUSE FOR NON-COOPERATION 2.6
| ALL |
CSED determines non-cooperation for all situations of non-cooperation with child and medical support requirements and informs IMA which then applies the appropriate sanction, if the recipient is determined to have failed to cooperate without good cause. An applicant/recipient may, at any time, claim good cause for non-cooperation with CSED with respect to determining paternity and obtaining medical/child support from the absent parent of a dependent child. CSED will determine good cause for non-cooperation, bearing in mind the best interests of the child, which include minimizing the child's exposure to family violence.
The custodial parent is considered to have good cause for not cooperating with child and medical support requirements when:
- Efforts to cooperate are reasonably anticipated to result in physical, sexual, or emotional harm to:
- The child for whom assistance is sought;
- The applicant/recipient;
- A household member of the applicant/recipient; or
- An immediate family member of the applicant/recipient (i.e., spouse, parent, sibling,
child);
- circumstances are identified that would make cooperation or actions resulting from cooperation detrimental to the child for whom assistance is claimed including one or more of the following:
- the child was conceived as a result of rape or incest,
- legal proceedings for the adoption of the child are pending before a court, or
- the applicant/recipient is receiving counseling from a public or licensed private social agency to decide if the child should be released for adoption.
Good cause may not be claimed for failure to turn in support payments to CSED.
If CSED determines that the applicant/recipient has good cause for non-cooperation, all action on paternity and child/medical support will be suspended until the applicant/recipient requests resumption or CSED determines good cause no longer exists, whichever is sooner.
Until CSED makes a finding concerning an applicant/recipient's good cause claim, the applicant/recipient's eligibility will be determined without regards to the child/medical support cooperation requirement and no sanctions will be imposed provided that:
- The applicant/recipient has made timely corroboration of the good cause claim, and
- CSED has failed to determine whether good cause exists within the time period permitted to process TANF applications and redetermination.
If the claim for good cause is denied for paternity and child support, the applicant/recipient must be given notice in writing and must then comply with the requirement or face sanctions imposed by IMA. |
| ALL |
CSED determines when an individual has failed to comply with child support requirements without good cause. If a parent receiving both TANF and MA fails to comply with child support requirements without good cause, both the TANF and MA sanctions are imposed.
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| MA |
If it is determined that the head of the unit refuses to cooperate with CSED without good cause, then s/he is ineligible for MA. The dependent child's MA benefits are not affected. If, however, the noncompliant adult is eligible for MA based on age or disability (as opposed to being eligible for MA because of his/her status as caretaker of the dependent child), then MA eligibility continues, but the designation of the adult's case must change to SR. QM is not affected by the child support requirement.
Once the adult cooperates, benefits are restored effective the first month following the date of cooperation.
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| TANF |
If it is determined that a parent refuses to cooperate with child support enforcement without good cause, the group's TANF benefits shall be reduced by 25 percent. Sanctions for failing to cooperate with child support requirements cannot be imposed on caretakers other than parents, even if the caretaker is included in the assistance unit. Child support sanctions also cannot be imposed on cases in which the parent is “out” of the unit (such as an SSI parent) or disqualified due to alienage.
Once the parent cooperates, benefits are restored effective the first month following the date of cooperation.
If an adult recipient fails to comply with both TANF work and child support requirements, the larger of the two sanctions is imposed. If the adult complies with one of the requirements, the other sanction should be imposed.
The benefit reduction amount counts as unearned income in the Food Stamp Program. This ensures that FS benefits do not increase when a TANF sanction is imposed. |
| MA |
If a group is ineligible for MA in the AR or AX program types due to an increase in child support, the group is eligible for four months of TMA. If the group's income still exceeds 200 percent of the FPL after the four-month period the group is no longer eligible for MA (see Section 1.3: Transitional Medicaid Assistance (TMA) in Part VII). If the group's income is below 200 percent of the FPL after the four-month period, the group should be recertified for MA. The group would no longer be eligible for TMA, but rather would be eligible for Medicaid under the AR or AX program types.
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| TANF |
If support is collected and is less than the grant, it is retained by CSED to defray the costs of providing assistance to the group. After two consecutive months of collections that are greater than the current TANF grant, the TANF case is closed, and the child support is sent directly to the family. All support collected by CSED in excess of the TANF grant must be returned to the family and counted as unearned income (see Section 4.9: Child Support in Part VI).
| Ms. Watkins has two children by the same father, Sam Cole. Ms. Watkins has assisted CSED in locating Mr. Cole who allowed a paternity test to be administered which proved him to be the father of both children. Mr. Cole pays $75 per month in child support for both children. Since this is less than the current TANF grant provided to Ms. Watkins, CSED retains the entire $75 paid by Mr. Cole.
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Example 2 |
| Ms. Minton has one child, Samantha. CSED located John Wright, the man who Ms. Minton claimed was the father. When he was contacted by CSED, Mr. Wright agreed to take a blood test to determine paternity. The test showed that Mr. Wright was in fact Samantha's father, and he was ordered by the court to pay child support. After several months of erratic support payments, Mr. Wright got a new, better paying job, and in May, he began to pay the proper amount of child support. After full payment was made for two consecutive months (May and June), it was determined by CSED that the child support paid by Mr. Wright exceeded Ms. Minton's TANF grant. At this point, Ms. Minton's TANF case was closed, and child support paid by Mr. Wright is sent from CSED to Ms. Minton. | |
| ALL |
Within 20 days after claiming good cause, the applicant/recipient must provide CSED with information needed to determine good cause. CSED will allow more time for the applicant/recipient to provide the requested information only if it is determined that more than 20 days is needed.
An applicant/recipient who claims good cause for non-cooperation in establishing paternity, child support, or medical support has the burden of establishing good cause by:
- specifying the circumstances that the applicant/recipient believes establishes good cause for not cooperating,
- providing sufficient information to establish the claim, and
- corroborating at least one good cause circumstance with:
- a birth certificate or medical, mental health, or law enforcement record which indicates the child was conceived as a result of rape or incest;
- a court document or other record which indicates that legal proceedings for adoption are pending in court;
- physical evidence or court, medical, criminal, CSFA, social services, psychological, law enforcement, or clerical records which indicate that the alleged father might inflict physical, mental, sexual, or emotional harm on the child, applicant/recipient, household member, or immediate family member;
- a written statement from a medical health professional concerning the emotional health of the child, applicant/recipient, household member, or immediate family member;
- a medical record that indicates the emotional health history and reflects the emotional health status of the applicant/recipient or child ;
- a written statement from CSFA or a licensed private social service agency that the customer is being assisted to resolve the issue of placing the child for adoption; or
- a sworn written statement from an individual, including the applicant/recipient, whose knowledge can provide the basis for a good cause claim.
The applicant/recipient may request assistance obtaining verification from CSED. |
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