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Supervised visitation monitors face little oversight
By: SCOTT MARSHALL - Staff Writer | ∞
NORTH COUNTY ---- It is a sports-themed room nestled in a building in San Diego, with books, a television set, a small sofa and a table with two chairs a meant to appeal to a child spending time with his dad or mom. But the room is not designed for families to be alone together.
There is also a chair for a supervised visitation monitor who sits nearby to observe such visits, ostensibly to make sure the child is safe. Monitors also sometimes write reports that could affect future custody and visitation decisions in sometimes bitter custody battles that play out in the Superior Court's family court.
The monitors, however, face virtually no oversight, and parents or attorneys with complaints about them have few options.
Some court officials and others say they lack the authority and ability to take any action when parents or attorneys complain about the monitors, and that more oversight and regulation is needed.
Karen Oehme, program director of the Clearinghouse on Supervised Visitation at Florida State University, said communities "continue to grapple" with what standards and skills supervised visitation monitors should have, and state lawmakers ultimately will have to make any changes.
"I think certification and monitoring of supervised visitation programs is definitely the future of supervised visitation," Oehme said. "The thing is, it takes money. It will be a state-by-state issue and will be done legislatively."
A local, outspoken critic of the family courts, however, said increased oversight and regulation will not help and that supervised visitation should be scrapped altogether except in cases of documented abuse.
"I think we ought to explode the myth of oversight," said Bonnie Russell, 55, of Del Mar, who started the Web site www.familylawcourts.com during her own custody battle and believes more government involvement is not the answer. "There's not enough budget for real oversight, but more importantly, there's not enough interest."
State adopts criteria
Superior Court judges generally order supervised visitation for noncustodial parents in divorces that involve allegations of substance abuse by parents, child abuse, domestic violence, parents "venting" to kids about their estranged spouses, or parents sending messages to each other through a child, said Superior Court Judge William Howatt, the supervising judge for the family court in San Diego County.
Supervised visitation monitors can be "nonprofessional" ---- family members or friends on which both sides agree who are not paid ---- or "professional," paid monitors. Paid monitors generally charge between $16.50 an hour to $70 an hour, some monitors said. The rate sometimes is based on parents' income.
California adopted criteria in 1998 that all supervised visitation monitors must satisfy, but no regulatory agency exists for the monitors, a state court official said.
Patricia Chavez-Fallon, the director of the Superior Court's Family Court Services in San Diego County, said people who want to be paid monitors submit documentation to the court showing they have attended a training class and meet the other state standards, which essentially require that monitors be 21 or older and free of any legal trouble in the previous 10 years. Chavez-Fallon then adds them to an alphabetical list of supervised visitation monitors that the court provides.
The state standards, however, do not specify how much training someone should receive, and state and local officials do not certify or authorize specific agencies to do the training, officials said.
The list of monitors from the Superior Court includes a disclaimer that the court "does not select, evaluate, endorse or supervise" those on the list and that they "have not been screened" regarding law enforcement, children's services bureau or personal history.
Howatt said that providing the list may give the appearance that the court sanctions or approves the monitors, but it does not. The court's role is just to determine whether the monitors meet the qualifications in the state standards, Howatt said.
"Do I like that system? No," Howatt said. "Do I have the funds and staff to maintain the system I'd like to have? No."
Nevertheless, what monitors write about their observations during supervised visits affects decisions judges make, but how much of an effect they have depends on the questions at issue in each case, Howatt said.
"The reports are important," Howatt said. "Do I get a lot of good, solid reports? No. Do I get letters, impressions? Yes. It is consistently inconsistent."
Some complain about monitors
The court has received complaints about monitors, mostly related to how flexible a monitor is regarding the supervised parent's wishes about where visits will occur or travel, Karen Dalton, a Superior Court spokeswoman, said in an e-mail.
Chavez-Fallon said through Dalton that she has received a total of 11 complaints from 10 people involving six monitors since February 2003. The court does not track how often supervised visitation is ordered. The family court handles roughly 20,000 divorce cases a year, Howatt said.
Marion Froehlich, a North County family law attorney, said she wrote a letter to the Superior Court's Family Court Services department more than a year ago to complain about a monitor who went to court with one of the parents and attempted to attend a mediation with one of the parents. The monitor remains on the court's list, Froehlich said.
Supervised visitation monitors are supposed to be neutral.
A supervised visitation monitor whose company has trained most of the monitors in the county and has encountered some problems of her own said her company has received complaints about monitors in San Diego County, including allegations that a monitor slept as a child met with a parent 200 yards away and that a monitor hired someone who was not trained to help supervise visits.
Susan Griffin, 52, the volunteer executive director and co-founder of a company that provides supervised visitation monitoring and has trained roughly 80 percent of the 46 monitors in the county who have received training, said her business receives two or three calls a month from parents complaining about other monitors.
Officials at Griffin's company, Hannah's House at Real Solutions Center for Children, said that if someone completes the 40-hour training course the company offers at a cost of $600, Hannah's House is required to give them a certificate that they received training regardless of how much information they retain or what the trainer's impression of that person is.
Griffin said she tells complaining parents there is no mechanism to deal with their complaints but that she encourages them to write to Chavez-Fallon. However, Griffin said she is unaware of anyone being removed from the court's list of monitors as a result of complaints.
Dalton said in an e-mail that the court has no legal authority to act on complaints about the supervised visitation monitors and cannot remove monitors from the list.
The court once removed a monitor from the list, but found it did not have the authority to do so. As a result, the monitor was put back on the list, Dalton said.
Chavez-Fallon said unhappy parents can go to a different monitor if they have a complaint.
"They are the employer," Chavez-Fallon said of parents. "The supervised visitation monitor is their employee. They just fire them and go to somebody else."
Making that change is not that easy, however, with parents incurring court costs and attorneys fees to go back to court to get a new visitation order if the parents cannot agree on a new monitor, some familiar with the process said.
Hannah's House faces trouble
Providing an estimated 5,000 hours of supervised visits per year, Hannah's House at Real Solutions Center for Children, is believed to be the largest supervised visitation provider in the county, officials there said.
However, Hannah's House and Griffin have encountered some problems of their own in recent years as well.
For example, Griffin, who has a bachelor's degree in behavioral science from National University and a master's degree in psychology from California Coast University, ran afoul of the state Board of Psychology, which cited her and fined her $2,500 in 2004 for practicing psychology without a license in connection with work she did in two cases about five years ago.
Griffin does not hold a license to practice psychology, according to a search of the state board's Web site.
Griffin said one incident involved a children's group that Hannah's House runs. The board took issue with how Griffin handled a situation with two siblings, but Griffin said she believes she handled it "appropriately."
Griffin said the second incident involved a case in which the family court had ordered a psychological evaluation, but Griffin said she thought it was supposed to be a different evaluation called a parenting assessment. Griffin said she was not qualified to do a psychological evaluation and would not have done it if she'd known that is what the court ordered.
The Board of Psychology also reviewed two cases in which Griffin supervised visits and found no problems with them, Griffin said.
Judge Howatt and Chavez-Fallon of Family Court Services said they were unaware of the action the psychology board took against Griffin last year.
"If she has been reviewed and disciplined by an agency or group that supervises her, I'm assuming there was something wrong and that discipline has resolved the issue," Howatt said.
Howatt and Chavez-Fallon also said supervised visitation monitors are not required to have any training in mental health nor do they have to be psychologists.
Griffin's company also is paying back the county money from contracts it had four years ago to provide supervised visitation services. The company, known then as Real Solutions Center for Children, terminated the contracts in 2001. Griffin's business has paid the county $37,000 of the $74,000 it owes from those contracts and continues to make monthly payments, said Jack Pellegrino, the director of agency contract support for the county's health and human services agency.
Before the contracts ended, the county investigated complaints alleging in part that the premises where Griffin's company were located at the time were unsafe and unsanitary and that "fiscal irregularities" existed. The county's report on its investigation stated that there were "no major substantiated findings."
The county concluded, however, that the business's location at the time was unsafe because a play area for children was not fenced, was in a parking lot and was within 5 feet of exposed metal and rusty nails. Griffin's supervised visitation business has moved to a new location since then.
The county also concluded the former location was unsanitary because of animal droppings on the upholstered furniture in the office. Griffin said a bird cage was hung near the corner of a sofa and somehow one of the bird's droppings fell on the corner. The county came to inspect the facility on a Sunday and saw the dropping before employees had a chance to clean it up, Griffin said.
Griffin said her company asked to end the contracts with the county because "we bit off more than we could chew," and the contracts did not provide enough money in the budget for the personnel Griffin's business needed to handle all of the supervised visitation responsibilities required in the contracts. Griffin said her business was able to document all of its money, but it was unable to do it in the way the contracts required.
Today, Hannah's House, with an operating budget of $200,000 a year, obtains all of its funding from private foundations and private donors, said Travis Bushard, 23, the organization's development director.
Hannah's House, provides explanations for some of the criticism it has received in the "frequently asked questions" section on its web site, www.hannahs-house.org.
More oversight needed
Griffin said she believes supervised visitation is an "evolving process" and that the next step "has got to be regulation."
Russell, the Del Mar-based outspoken critic of the family court system, said, however, that supervised visitation should "cease" because it's an added burden on supervised parents, no oversight exists, and judges treat reports from monitors like they have "therapeutic value" when they do not.
Russell, who was ordered to have supervised visits with her daughter before eventually being ordered to have no contact with the girl, said it is "obscene" that parents have to pay to see their children, in addition to child support, and that paid monitors are not needed to make sure children are safe.
"You're either OK to see your kid or your not," Russell said.
Sometimes supervised visitation reveals that no problems exist and supervision is not necessary, but it is a needed tool as the courts consider what is happening in a case, said Bushard, the development director at Hannah's House.
"If affordable visitation goes away, if supervised visitation goes away, there will be no mechanism for the judge to ensure the safety and welfare of the child while things get sorted out," Bushard said.
Howatt said supervised visitation is one tool the court uses and is necessary.
"I want to make sure the child is in a safe environment," Howatt said. "The only way to do that is to have an independent intermediary there."
Contact staff writer Scott Marshall at (760) 631-6623 or smarshall@nctimes.com. To comment, go to nctimes.com.
Vince wrote on Jan 16, 2006 8:16 AM:Their is no such thing as a independent intermediary. The supervisor are known as rakes for rakeing in the money in the divorce industry. They have no interest in seeing that the conflict ends. They are known to prolong the conflicts in order for all those involve to drain the parents of their retainer. There is a saying in the divorce industry that court ordered "counseling" goes on forever. The same with court order supervised visitation. These "supervisors" write subjective reports based on their own biased unqalified opinions based on their own religious moral/values. And There is no recourse for the parents. Often the parents are sent to the Court Mediators favorite supervisors who will write a report based on the outcome the the Court Mediator wants. The children are not any safer and are further alianated from the non-custodial parents. Please look up Stop Injustice Now on the web and learn more about Court order counseling and supervised visitation.
Kim wrote on Jan 18, 2006 4:48 AM:I am the former co-founder and owner of an off-site supervised visitation service company in New York...out of Westechester County. And unfortunately, I could not agree more with this article. In fact, it is due to the complete incompetence and lack of oversight, understanding of divorce dynamics and family interation of my young married partners, that I distanced myself from the company. Although, I have a law degree, run a small business on Divorce as well as a chapter of a National Not-for Profit agency whose specialty is complicated divorces for some 15 years...my parnters were neophytes in the divorce industry. Nonetheless, the Court continues to recommend distraught parents to an incompetent agency. But they are just one of many. The supervisiors pay no attention to manipulation, gamenship of some of the parents. The children who regurgitate the sentiments of one parent verbatim, all in an effort to gain an advantage in the divorce,whether it be in the custody or equitable distribution arena. The few supervised agencies that exist, at least in NY, are unregulated, unmonitered and unskilled. Many of the supervisors are volunteers. Some of have been know to carry weapons. None, of them that I am aware have extensive training in Domestic Violence or abuse. And yet, Judges eager to find some solution to the need for supervision, just abdicate their role and allow the supervising agency.....whose training they do not know, whose background they do not know, to set schedules, and oversee the supervision. They do not take into consideration, the transference, manipulation or downright lies that the supervised parent may exhibit, or are able to tell if the custodial parent is playing a game. In the meantime, the environment that these minor children are subjected to, often, cold, damp basements in Chuches, is atrocious and any parent worth his or her salt would never expose their beloved child to this, yet, the Court allows such treatment of children. Supervision is unfortunately, a necessary evil where there is abuse of the partner, child or addictive behavior. But as with many of the issues with the matrimonial system, a complete overhaul most be done, with proper training in chld care, family dynamics, abuse issues, DV, addiction, and finally the ability to fade into the background and not influence the parent child exchange. It must be done legislatively and be taken seriously. But as usual, it is about families, and it/we are the last interest of the government. A large corporation takes priority over what is the backbone of society, the ever present family.
patricia wrote on Jan 31, 2006 8:26 AM:Interesting subject, in oklahoma it seems the child visitation person has the right to cancel visits as they see fit and report to the judge what ever they think is the right or wrong things a parent does in training or protecting their child from convicted felons and drug user and that it is ok for the children to be around convicts and drug users. Also the parents being supervised should have the right to ask the children questions about the custodial parent while the visit is going on and take notes on it. ???????????Is something wrong here?
Custodial Parent wrote on Aug 9, 2007 10:54 AM:I agree and disagree with this article and would like to see more articles written to expose the court and supervised visitation for what they are; advocates of abuse. I agree with the statement in this article of you are either safe to be around your child or you are not. If you are the perpetrator of domestic abuse, drug abuse, or physical abuse of any kind and sexual abuse you should not be an influence in the life of a child. Whether you are supervised by a monitor or court. The cycle of violence in America will just continue if you do not stop the cycle by stopping the visitations altogether. Moreover, our children as they get older can make the choice themselves to see the other parent when they are at an age to have a voice and the ability to use their cellular phones to call and say I need to be picked up Mom or Dad is not acting right. And at that point they would be old enough to say I am up the street at this spot pick me up. Therefore, we need more articles, news and media to shine the light into this dark area of family court before, our children grow up to be supervised by another monitor in other words lets stop the cycle and cut the visitation before our children continue the cycle of violence. That in my opinion is the only way that the system will benefit them.
Kimberly wrote on Sep 29, 2007 2:31 AM:As a parent who has been placed on supervised visitation, had the Court remove it and now faces having it put back on again, I strongly agree with this article. My life has been a roller-coaster of on-off-on--off again supervised visitation due to a vindictive parent who plays games continually. In my case, I have a modest income and my ex-husband has more money than "god". I've found that money has alot to do with it. My case has lasted nearly 6 consecutive years and the legal expenses are outrageous with no end in sight. Supervised visitation is a money generating endeavor and used frequently by unethical attorneys for the benefit of vindictive clients. Of course, I do agree that the program is necessary when abuse is present. However, my supervisor was poorly trained and ran to court to testify every chance she got (she was paid to come to court). The money train never stops!!
Linda wrote on Oct 28, 2007 9:30 AM:I thank god for the Supervised Visitation Monitor we had. I am a Custodial Parent whom was very leary of my children being in the presence of their father. We are both on a reuniting force and work toward what is in the best interest of our children due to the monitor. It seemed that she was the only neutral party in our case. Now we communicate and participate in a healthy way involving our children.
ann wrote on Nov 29, 2007 6:29 PM:my son is on supervised visits because he shot hisself. I want him on there as long as he needs to be but I don't think he would harm his child. he was drinking when he did this. there has to be some start and end. I just don't when it is or who decides.
Ann wrote on Nov 29, 2007 6:32 PM:my son is on supervised visits because he shot himself. I want him on there as long as he needs to be but I don't think he would harm his child. he was drinking when he did this. there has to be some start and end. I just don't when it is or who decides.
SupervisedParent wrote on Dec 6, 2007 10:08 PM:I have supervised visitation because my exwife and I have a "extreme differing parenting style." The kids are on a lot of doctor prescribed drugs to be easier to control, and consequently are thin, suicidal, and depressed. It is odd to me how a parent that has committed no crime can be denied visitation - How can the court decide who should not be a parent, when God has selected? Especially when the kids are not doing well under one parent's care! My court-appointed supervisor quit in the middle of my case on the day that my children said that they wanted to see me every Friday - my exwife works for the court.
Rick wrote on Apr 5, 2008 12:27 PM:I went through several monitors, who were irresponsbible and incompetent. One too, my money and did not show up at all and of course the Court will do nothing. It's a horrible system and should be abolished. Do it right or don't do it at all.
Marilyn wrote on Apr 19, 2008 12:43 AM:I am on supervised visits via vindictive other. I have great respect for the visitation centers. I was a PTA mom before, one speeding ticket in 1989 to my record, perfect credit and pulled over 50k yearly while being a stay at home mom. I taught a weekly art class voluntarily at my son's school. Now, my daughter started, and is mostly through, Kindergarten without her Mom. Not once have I gone to her classroom. Now, I live in a motorhome, made 18k in 2007, pay hourly to see my children, my credit in tatters, a DVRO conviction and a criminal arrest (charges were dismissed though). Before our society had 'supervised visitation' they had nothing. You just didn't get to see your kids. Each and every monitor I have known are real people who are, like you and me, impressionable. It is your job to put on your best show. That's right, June Cleaver... Move over. They don't make the decisions and I have plenty of reports to prove it. Judges make decisions and the s.v. report means not much to them. If your discontinued it should, but it didn't for me. If your on s.v. and it's because of a vindictive other then it is the other and judge whom have failed. The other because he/she owes it to the other parent to be decent. The Judge because it is his job to find facts and fiction. Love your monitors and the centers. Help them and do your part. Most of all treat them like your hero because they protect our most important jewels from the real bad guys/gals while maintaining another of lifes jewels: the parent child relationship.
Cara wrote on May 1, 2008 5:23 PM:The supervised visitation monitor course run by Hannah's House is useless. My niece attended it and it involved just hanging out there a few times. For $600, she came away with a certificate which stated she had 40 hours of training, (it was nowhere near that), and nothing else. By contrast, I attended a 15 hour training class at Santa Monica College last weekend. The teacher was great and I learned a lot. For a total of $259, I received not only the tuition and certificate, but 2 binders full of information, forms etc. I was also advised to register with "TrustLine" an organization that verifies the background of anyone involved in child care. Until there is some kind of government registration process, all monitors should be registered with TrustLine - it's all we have right now. If you are considering becoming a monitor, you will have to go out of San Diego County to find decent training at the present time. Hopefully that will change soon. Forget Hannah's House. In my opinion, they should be shut down.
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