Child Support Enforcement Pushed by U.S. Senators

Parents who fail to pay child support would have a harder time doing so, under an act reintroduced this week by U.S. Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

The "Strengthen and Vitalize Enforcement of Child Support (SAVE Child Support) Act" would give states the tools they need to collect from parents who aren't paying up.

"(This bill) will strengthen existing child support enforcement laws by giving states more tools to enforce interstate child support orders, making existing enforcement procedures more uniform, and cracking down on the deceptive practices of private child support collection agencies," Menendez said.

Under the bill, each state will have access to a child support lien registry so that liens placed against property because of overdue child support can be easily identified. The bill also strengthens the procedures by which non-custodial parents can have certain licenses and other IDs revoked when they don't fully abide by their child support orders.

In Fiscal Year 2011, according to the Health and Human Services Office of Child Support Enforcement, nearly 11.5 million cases had child support arrears due.