Collections From Deadbeat Parents

Re “Report Assails County Over Deadbeat Parents,” May 1:

As a former district attorney for the Bureau of Family Support, of my six years with the bureau, the last year proved to be the most difficult to live through. Soon after the much-lauded, very costly and supposedly state-of-the-art new computer system came online, it was painfully obvious that it was seriously flawed.

Now those persons directly responsible for that system have just received promotions, earning well in excess of $100,000 per year plus valuable perks.

The damage that has been done to the well-being of many people caught up in this morass, including the children and the custodial parents whose child support is not collected or misdirected, and the parents ordered to pay support whose credit is wrongfully damaged or whose paychecks are wrongfully seized, is immeasurable and unconscionable.

Let the ones responsible for this be exposed, and do not let them take credit for the increased collections that the Franchise Tax Board is actually responsible for.

JACQUELINE MYERS

Sherman Oaks

* Until superficial assessments such as those contained in your May 2 editorial are set aside, no meaningful progress will be made in dealing with the problem of support for children of separated and divorced parents. Your lead sentences say it all, “Millions of deadbeat dads are getting off scot-free in California. Their children are owed a total of $5 billion.”

In reality, this vast sum is owed to the custodians of these children--the overwhelming majority of whom are women. Children do not directly receive these funds. Under our present system for child support, women are not held accountable for support funds. They are free to divert them and often remain personally dependent on these payments for years after divorce.

Children will remain the losers in this game until society is prepared to judge the behavior and motives of individuals seeking divorce and child support. The superficial assessment expressed by your editorial is a reflection of the bias in our present family law (and a growing compliance bureaucracy), which criminalizes the very people it must engage.

JIM REARDON

San Juan Capistrano