Some Colorado deadbeat parents appear to care more about bagging an elk or hooking a trout than they do about their kids.
They are paying up on court- ordered child support only when faced with losing their hunting and fishing licenses.
Since 2004, more than 2,200 hunters and fishermen have forked over $1.3 million in court-ordered support payments to get a Colorado outdoor license.
But 4,000 others refused, and the state denied them a permit to hunt or fish here.
Collections could increase this year as more than 6,000 additional deadbeat fathers and mothers may face a choice: pay up or keep the rod and gun at home.
“It’s been a very effective method of collecting outstanding child support, in some ways more so than suspending a driver’s license,” said Colorado’s child support enforcement director, John Bernhart.
Although the state has been allowed to suspend recreation and professional licenses since 1997 for nonpayment of child support, the method wasn’t used until 2004, when computers used by state agencies could communicate.
Colorado’s deadbeat recreationalists aren’t alone. In Maine in 2001, 20 hunters ponied up $103,000 in child support – with one hunter paying $32,000 – after winning coveted lottery-issued permits to hunt moose.
The hunting and fishing license program made up just a small piece of the $280 million in back child support Colorado collected last year.
The state’s Division of Child Support Enforcement, a part of the Department of Human Services, tracks more than 140,000 cases of court-ordered support for about 210,000 children.
More than 40 percent of the cases are in arrears. A total of about $1.1 billion is owed, officials said. About 17,600 cases are chronically delinquent.
The collection program targets parents who are at least six months behind in their support payments.
Colorado uses a variety of methods to prod parents to pay what’s due their children, such as driver’s license suspensions, payroll garnishment, even interception of lottery winnings.
Last year, the state suspended 17,360 driver’s licenses for nonpayment of child support. It’s typically an effective collection method.
But apparently not as effective as yanking hunting and fishing licenses.
In 2004, 41 percent of the hunters and fishers threatened with suspension paid up, compared with 32 percent of those facing driver’s license suspension.
“Anything that works is what we look for, and some things work better on some people than others,” Bernhart said. “And for some people, they are most affected by any challenge to their leisure activities,” he said.
When the state began tagging outdoor licenses, it also reached into professional licenses, although they have accounted for a minority of suspensions.
Last year, the Department of Regulatory Agencies suspended 136 professional licenses. Of those, 107 were reinstated after their holders paid more than $97,000 in child support.
The list of professionals who had licenses suspended included a nurse’s aide in Greeley, a plumber in Fort Collins, a cosmetologist in Lakewood, an engineer in Colorado Springs and a veterinarian in Englewood.
This year, the state already has suspended 117 professional licenses.
“It really indicates that one’s priorities are a bit skewed,” said Kay Cullen, communications director of the National Child Support Enforcement Association, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group. “It’s a very sad commentary when a parent pays their obligation only when their hunting license is to be stripped away.”
Staff writer David Migoya can be reached at 303-820-1506 or dmigoya@denverpost.com.
