The Child Support Improvement Project: Paternity Establishment, Chapter 1

	CHAPTER I

	THE PATERNITY PROBLEM

	Colorado, like the nation as a whole, has experienced a dramatic rise in the number of births to unmarried women. In 1950, only 3 percent of all births in Colorado occurred out of wedlock.  By 1991 the proportion had increased to 23.6 percent.  Nationally, the rate of non-marital births was 30.1 percent in 1992.
	Although recent evidence shows a rise in out-of-wedlock births among women in their twenties and thirties and with higher levels of educational and occupational attainment (Bachii, 1993), unmarried parentage is still concentrated among the poor and is associated with further impoverishment.  The most disadvantaged demographic group in the U.S. is children of single-parent families (Garfinkel & McLanahan, 1986).  Within this group, children living with never-married mothers are the poorest.  In 1992, 55.8 percent of Colorado families receiving Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) were eligible because of father-absence due to non-marriage (Green Book, 1994: Tables 10-35).
	One factor contributing to their low incomes is the fact that most never-married women fail to become eligible to receive child support.  Nationally, it appears that only about one-quarter of the never-married mothers had established paternity for at least one of their children in 1986. This was corroborated in a 1990 survey of Colorado households where only one-quarter of the unmarried parents had established paternity through legal action (Pearson, Anhalt and Thoennes, 1991).  In fiscal year 1992, paternity had been established in only 27 percent of AFDC households with an absent father due to non-marriage (Green Book, 1994: Tables 10-35).
	As a result of the low rate of paternity establishment, most never-married women never get a child support order.  Census data reveal that only 24 percent of never-married women have a child support order and are legally eligible to receive support.  In contrast, 77 percent of all divorced women have child support orders (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1991). Once a child support order is obtained, never-married women are equally likely to receive payment as their divorced counterparts. Thus, regardless of their marital status, about half of the women with child support orders receive full payment while a quarter receive no payment at all and another quarter only receive partial payment.  However, since average annual child support receipts for never-married women fall below receipts for separated and divorced women, even never-married women with child support fare badly economically.  Taken together, the average never-married woman received only $273 annually in child support compared to $951 for separated women and $1,776 for divorced women (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1991).
	Not surprisingly, poverty rates are extremely high for never-married mothers and their children. In 1989, 54 percent of never-married women with minor-aged children lived below the poverty level.  For divorced mothers with minor children, the percent at or below the poverty level was 27 percent.  For all families with children, the percent at or below the poverty level was 15 percent (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1991).  Further evidence of the disadvantaged status of never-married mothers and their children comes from profiles of participants in the Aid for Families with Dependent Children program.  In 1987, 57 percent of single-parent AFDC children were born out-of-wedlock, while 40 percent came from parents who were divorced or separated (Meyer, 1992a).  Never-married women on AFDC tended to receive assistance the longest.  On average, divorced women received 4.9 years of AFDC while never-married women received AFDC for 9.3 years (Ellwood, 1986).
	Patterns in Colorado track with the national profile. A 1990 survey of Colorado households revealed that more than half of the state's never-married women with minor-aged children lived below the poverty level. Unmarried parents likely to have child support orders had court-ordered paternity.  Only 32 percent of women with birth certificate-acknowledged paternity had child support orders and another 18 percent had informal, written agreements (Pearson, Anhalt & Thoennes, 1991).
	Children born out-of-wedlock experience other deprivations along with financial ones. For example, they have the lowest levels of contact with absent fathers.  In a Baltimore study of teenage childbearing, only about a third of the never-married fathers saw their adolescent children at least once a month.  Evidence from the 1981 National Survey of Children showed even lower levels of contact--21 percent of the black youth and 6 percent of whites between the ages of 11 and 16 whose parents never married had seen their father once a month or more in the past year (Furstenberg and Cherlin, 1991).
	The establishment of paternity in unmarried births is seen as one way to address the deprivations associated with out-of-wedlock parentage.  Among the recognized medical benefits to paternity establishment is knowledge about the father's genetic background, including potential inherited disorders which allow appropriate medical care to be provided, and the possibility of the father being the life-saving donor of bone-marrow, a kidney or other organs in a medical emergency. The emotional and psychological benefits of paternity include the opportunity to identify with the paternal half of a child's ancestral roots, and to know and explore family heritage, culture and religious ties.  Paternity may also lead to the opportunity to establish a parent-child relationship and the exercise of paternal contact and access to the paternal family (Hoover, 1991).
	Among the many social entitlements that ensue from paternity are the ability to realize inheritance proceedings, survivor benefits through social security, and dependent benefits under workman's compensation if the father is injured on the job. If the father is a member of the armed forces, or becomes a member, paternity can lead to monthly dependent benefits, educational benefits and military health care and insurance.
	Finally, paternity establishment may lead to important financial benefits.  Evidence of paternity is needed if the mother wants child support.  Evidence of paternity can also lead to dependent health care coverage if the father's employer has insurance and a share of unemployment compensation if the father is unemployed.  The fact that many unmarried fathers have little or no income when their babies are born does not mean they will always have limited means.  For example, while more than half of teen-aged fathers have zero incomes at the time the paternity petition is filed, less than 20 percent have zero incomes at age 30.  A recent study showed that, on average, income for fathers in paternity actions increased by $4,000 during the three years following the filing of the paternity petition (Meyer, 1992b).
	Despite the benefits of paternity establishment to the child and to society as a whole, performance in paternity establishment has been exceptionally poor.  Paternity cases have historically received low priority in child support agencies (Bernstein 1982; Kohn 1987).  Accordingly, few children of unmarried fathers have paternity established, get child support orders or obtain support.  For example, in 1988, the paternity establishment rate for the nation as a whole stood at 30 percent.  Thirty-two states scored below 30 percent; forty-five scored below 50 percent (Office of Inspector General, 1990).  In April 1987, the General Accounting Office found that 4 of every 10 AFDC children who needed paternity determinations for support orders (41 percent) did not receive them because their cases were never opened, were closed prematurely or remained open but unattended (G.A.O., 1987).
	Paternity researchers are unanimous in concluding that the best time to establish voluntary paternity is at the time the child is born and that the likelihood of establishing paternity declines as children age (Danziger and Nichols-Casebolt, 1988).  The first year of a child's life has been termed "a window of opportunity for establishing paternity" that is not encountered at later stages in the child's life.  Indeed, the most propitious moment for paternity establishment is at the hospital at the time of birth.  For example, a study of unmarried teen-aged parents found that 80 percent thought it was important for the father's name to be on the birth certificate (Wattenberg et al, 1991).  These researchers also found that the opportunities for contact and success that are present at the time of birth quickly fade.  A follow-up study one year after the child's birth, which attempted to conduct interviews with young, unmarried fathers and mothers, was thwarted by disconnected telephones, letters returned "address unknown" and tracking efforts that failed.  As a result of their experiences, these researchers recommend the following steps:

	Make paternity acknowledgement materials routinely available in hospital settings and focus attention on supporting the parents' decision to acknowledge paternity while mother and baby are still in the hospital.
	Make materials (written and oral) in appropriate languages available to both parents which describe the benefits to children that flow from paternity acknowledgement.
	Treat voluntary paternity establishment as an isolated issue and make it separate from issues such as child support, visitation rights and custody.
	Combine paternity establishment with a more comprehensive information program geared to social services, health and other interventions for children, youth and families.
	Maintain existing exceptions in policy and procedure to allow for instances where the legal link of father to child should not be encouraged.

	In recent years there has been a "flurry" of legislative initiatives aimed at obtaining paternity acknowledgements at the time of birth.  One provision of the Family Support Act of 1988 required that states meet specific quantifiable goals for establishing paternity (Maniha, 1992).  More recently, a federal law was enacted requiring that each state develop a simple administrative process for voluntarily acknowledging paternity and create a hospital-based program for voluntary acknowledgements (Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 [P.L. 103-66]).  The state with the longest experience with such efforts is Washington, which passed a law in 1991 requiring that medical records and hospital personnel provide written and oral information about paternity and/or the opportunity for unwed parents to acknowledge paternity.  Preliminary evaluation results regarding the effectiveness of this hospital-based paternity program in Washington are encouraging.  In a period prior to the inception of the in-hospital paternity effort, paternity establishments for out-of-wedlock children aged 4-5 years old occurred in only 17 percent of the cases.  Following the routine use of in-hospital orientations, voluntary paternities rose to 33 percent of all relevant births in Tacoma General, the state's largest community hospital serving a high concentration of unmarried women (Hoover, 1991).  Washington estimates that 40 percent of unmarried births will be accompanied by acknowledgements (Cleveland and Williams, 1992).
	In light of the obvious benefits of paternity, the Colorado Department of Child Support Enforcement applied for and received a Child Support Enforcement improvement grant (91-4-PI-CO-00) in 1991, one component of which was aimed at initiating a pilot paternity demonstration. The multi-year grant involved streamlining the voluntary paternity acknowledgement process in several Denver-area hospitals, and introducing and evaluating the effectiveness of various efforts to disseminate information about paternity in-hospital settings.  Since the award was made, the project has involved the following:

	Introduction of in-hospital paternity acknowledgement at four metro area hospitals.
	Conduct of daily outreach efforts about paternity with unmarried mothers on an individual basis in postpartum settings in four metro area hospitals.
	Simplification of the voluntary paternity acknowledgement process to remove procedural and financial barriers.
	Development and enactment of a statewide law requiring medical institutions to grant unmarried parents an opportunity to complete an affidavit acknowledging paternity.
	Joint discussions of paternity establishment by staff at Colorado's child support and vital records agencies leading to the production of the Handbook for Hospital-Based Paternity Acknowledgement.
	Production and distribution of English and Spanish language materials on paternity and the acknowledgement process.
	Edit of a 7-minute video on paternity acknowledgement to be used with unmarried parents in prenatal and postpartum forums.
	Conduct of training on paternity acknowledgement for various hospital audiences.
	Conduct of a comprehensive evaluation of the in-hospital paternity effort with emphasis on changes in rates of acknowledgement and the characteristics of those who acknowledge versus those who disavow paternity.

	The following chapters describe some of the lessons we have learned in the course of implementing and evaluating Colorado's paternity project.  In Chapter II, we describe the legal, procedural, and administrative factors that came into play in implementing an in-hospital paternity overture in four hospitals in the Denver area.  In Chapter III, we discuss voluntary paternity acknowledgement patterns prior to the initiation of the pilot project.  In Chapter IV, we describe the impact of the in-hospital outreach effort on acknowledgement levels.  In Chapter V, we describe the demographic characteristics of unmarried parents who voluntarily acknowledge.  In Chapter VI, we present the financial correlates and consequences of voluntary paternity acknowledgement.  In Chapter VII, we describe the reasons for paternity acknowledgement and disavowal given by unmarried parents themselves.  Finally, in Chapter VIII we summarize project findings and discuss their implications for policy.