Minnesota's new child support guidelines aim to help more low-income parents afford payments

With too many parents condemned to poverty because of burdensome child support payments, Minnesota has overhauled the rules for how those payments are calculated.

Starting next week, the minimum per-child payment for noncustodial parents will drop and the calculated payments will be lower if the custodial parent has a higher income, among other changes.

"We want people to be successful, and we want people to meet the expectation that's being set for them," said Shaneen Moore, deputy assistant commissioner at the Department of Human Services (DHS). Its child support unit and county offices serve about 220,000 children in Minnesota and collected and distributed more than $550 million in payments in 2021.

The updates are a result of legislation passed in 2021 aimed at substantially easing the financial strain of child support on low-income parents. Those revisions were suggested in a 2019 report by a task force that included DHS officials, attorneys, parents who have received child support and legislators from both political parties.

Rahya Geisler, the grants program coordinator for the state Office of Traffic Safety, wanted to serve on the task force after observing the disparities in the sums her children's fathers were expected to pay despite her own secure financial footing.

Courts set child support based on the state's formula. DHS enforces those orders and provides caseworkers for parents.

"I had an overall positive experience. But some people have this insurmountable debt that's hanging," she said. "Then maybe we should dial it back, make it so they can make their payments."

Geisler recalls meeting with case workers charged with keeping track of parents who owed back support. Several of them said their clients, mostly fathers, had considered taking jobs that paid them under the table in order to lower their monthly payments.

Others reported concerns their child support obligations would keep them in a state of perpetual debt and that their monthly bills forced them to either couch surf or live with roommates, making it nearly impossible to host their children for a visit.

"Our hope is, can this new formula, can it get people out of arrears and keep that number down?" Geisler said.

Task force members said part of the problem with the previous formula is its dependence on 2007 U.S. Department of Agriculture poverty guidelines. Until Dec. 31, 2022, an annual salary of $10,210 meant a noncustodial parent paid the minimum of $50 per month for one child.

Now, parents who earn up to $13,590 qualify to pay the minimum.

The new formula also streamlines the way payments are calculated to support more than one child. Until this year, noncustodial parents paid a minimum of $50 per month to support one and two children, $75 per month to support three or four and $100 per month to support five and six kids.

Now, noncustodial parents pay $50 per month for one child and $10 per additional child up to six. A judge determines child support obligations for more than six children.

The updated tables also ease the burden on parents who don't have custody if their child's primary caregiver earns more than they do.

"We want to make it equitable between the two families," said Moore, the DHS official.

Task force members said the new guidelines should ensure parents can afford their payments and provide their children with everything they need to prosper. Moore and Geisler said they did not know how many parents will benefit from the revised formula.

"It should be about our kids at the end of the day," Geisler said. "It should be about providing them with food and clothes and a roof over their heads."