CLASP Offensive Threatens Rights to Child Support Enforcement Options

An organization known as the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), and which claims to be interested in helping low income families, has launched a campaign to limit the “options” of custodial parents to collect child support. This campaign is focused on eliminating private child support enforcement as one way for parents to get the help they need to collect their unpaid child support.

Ironically, for many years, CLASP was a leading critic of state and local government child support enforcement agencies and frequently publicized statistics about the government’s failure to help more than half of the families seeking enforcement assistance.

Now, CLASP has decided to target one of the only other realistic enforcement options available to parents---private enforcement agencies! As CLASP itself has reported, most state enforcement programs only collect in 4 out of 10 cases. Many NCCSO members know that private agencies have become a critical option for parents who need someplace other than the government to turn for help. If government does not have the ability to do the job, and private agencies are restricted from helping parents, then where does CLASP think that parents are going to get help collecting their child support?

The bottom line is, the MORE enforcement options parents have, including private enforcement agencies, the more likely they are to get help collecting their child support. Because the National Coalition for Child Support Options works nationwide to protect enforcement options, this battle has become a priority for us!

The government’s incapacity to deal with unpaid child support collections is illustrated by the fact that the amount of unpaid child support in this country now exceeds $90 billion! Private enforcement agencies are a critical part of the solution to this national epidemic that hurts millions of working families each year.

We strongly encourage you, as a custodial parent concerned about protecting your options, to contact CLASP’s financial supporters today and tell them that you are concerned about CLASP’s efforts to limit the options of families in need! We have listed contact information for each of these organizations for your convenience. Please send them letters, e-mails and/or call and urge them to tell CLASP to stop working against your rights to get help collecting child support, including help from private agencies! We would love to know if you contact any of these organizations. Please send us an email if you do!

Click here to view the letter that NCCSO President Susan Williams sent.

Clasp Supporters: