Can Visitation Be Withheld If One Parent Doesn Pay It?
The courts primary responsibility is to protect the best interest of the child. This means that regardless of child support covered medical expenses, daycare, alimony or any other financially binding items that one parent may owe another parent; this lack of payment cannot be used to keep the child from spending time with the other parent. Children’s rights to have visitation with both parents trumps just about everything but the child’s safety. In fact, this right is so highly regarded that if a parent deliberately withheld visitation it could be seen as jeopardizing the child’s relationship with the other parent and could be used as a “material change of circumstances” to revisit the question of who the custodial parent should be. This bears a bit more investigation to understand why visitation is deemed to be so important. A parent has the right to expect that court ordered, or agreed, child support will be paid on time. This financial transaction of “child support” is often attache
