Bankruptcy Indiana

Just as I said a year ago in this Indiana bankruptcy blog, bankruptcy and child support issues are joined at the hip. In fact, under the new bankruptcy laws of Indiana, as part of the bankruptcy process, the court trustee must notify state child support enforcement agencies so they can participate in the case.

I provide bankruptcy information in Indiana, and I often remind clients that as a general rule, child support obligations are not going to go away as a result of filing bankruptcy.  Bankruptcy can help, though, in one of two ways:
 

• Under Chapter 13 bankruptcy law in Indiana, bankruptcy buys time to catch up with back child support payments by spreading them out over the course of a three to five year debt repayment plan.
• If other debts can be discharged in bankruptcy, that frees up dollars for the child support.

Now it looks as if the law is about to go even further in terms of making sure parents live up to their child support obligations. Just weeks ago, the Indiana House's Public Policy Committee unanimously approved a bill forcing Indiana casinos to check a database of "deadbeat" parents and refuse to pay out winning to any person on that list who is behind more than $2000 on child support.  In talks the Indiana Casino Association had with state government, it was agreed that the casino was allowed to charge between $15 and $100 for each individual that falls in that category.

The Columbus bankruptcy lawyers who work in the Mark Zuckerberg bankruptcy law offices in that city and I agree: many of our clients are single parents, struggling to support their children. They depend on the support checks to help pay for child care so they can work. Even though the new system will probably be an inconvenience for the casino operators, it's worth trying to keep those child support payments flowing.

I read an interesting view about the new casino legislation (which has not yet been finalized into law) by the editor of a  blog called Pic-A-Group, who suggests barring deadbeat parents from casino gambling altogether, so that they don't gamble away money that needs to go towards child support.

I haven't involved myself in that particular political discussion.  What I have found, though,
as I continue to offer Indiana bankruptcy help, is that most of my clients who are noncustodial parents try very hard to keep up with their obligations.  But with many the victims of downsizing and job layoffs, those parents, despite wanting to help their own children, need help themselves!