Louisiana Child Support Access and Visitation

The Louisiana Child Support Access and Visitation aim to provide help to parents in understanding the importance of family and children. The parents are taught the importance of children and how they should be treated.
It has been observed that children whose upbringing is done by a single parent are usually sad, have a high rate of dropout and have a poor academic performance, higher rate of attempted suicides and getting pregnant. These children are more emotionally disturb and have low self-esteem as compared to children with strong family bondage and living with both parents. The family bond is important for every child and it helps reduce the unhealthy conduct of the child. That is why the Louisiana Child Support Access and Visitation program allows both parents to become a part of their child’s life through visitation access.
The main objective of the Child Support Access and Visitation is to make the children’s father and mother realize their importance in their children’s life by providing supports and skills. This will help them stay connected in their child’s life. For the program to run smoothly and to make sure the program extends to as many families as possible the Department of Children and Family Services collaborates with several agencies.
The program provides its services by partnering up with diverse communities to meet the parents’ needs to fulfill the program goal. The program works in collaboration with parents to help them reduce the risk of child harassment, bad parenting, the poor academic performance of the child, and any illegal or minor delinquencies.
According to the child support laws in Louisiana both parents are required to support the child and provide financial support. Both parents are equally required to pay for the child’s education, food, clothing, and pay for other basic financial necessities. The parents are also required to pay for the child’s medical as well as dental care.
The court awards the visitation right of the non-custodial parents by determining what is best for the child. The program is available to all parents who can apply for visitation accesses while there have been harassment allegations against them. If a non-custodial parent has been involved in violence against their children, then the court has the right to not provide visitation access to them. In some cases, the access might be provided under supervision. Similarly, if a non-custodial parent has a history of sexual abuse, he or she will not be allowed to visit the child.
The eligible candidates for the program are those whose case is active with the Support Enforcement Services office. The program does not charge any application fee, and anyone can download and submit the application form the Access and Visitation Program’s website. If the non-custodial parents do not cooperate with the program within 20 days their case will be closed, however, the child support case will remain active. The program makes sure that any personal information of the parents and children is kept confidential and only the Access and Visitation Program member dealing with the children’s case can access it.
The Department of Children and Family Services started this program to assists parents in providing financial, emotional, and other support to their kids and provides a stable family environment. Both the parents are educated to participate in the upbringing and grooming of their children.
The DCFS allows parents who are not legal custodians of their children to gain visitation access to their children to be a part of their life by the order of the court. The Child Support Access and Visitation program assigns a lawyer whose job is to reach an agreement between the parents in the court. It should be kept in mind, that the parents are free to hire their lawyer to gain visitation access to their children. The program, however, will not be able to provide any custodial support to the parents.
There is also a possibility that the court orders the separated parents of the child to take parenting workshops or classes. The workshop educates the parents on the children’s developmental needs and the negative effect of parents’ divorce in their life and how to deal with it. The program schedules the classes and makes visitation timings so that both parents are present and can develop a strong parental bond with the child.
To find the application form parents can visit the Department of Children and Human Services website.
You can send your completed application to the Louisiana Support Access and Visitation Program’s office at the following address,
5825 Florida Blvd.
Baton Rouge, LA 70806 (For residents of East Baton Rouge)
1630 Iberville Street, Suite 2800
New Orleans, LA 70112 (For residents of New Orleans)
DCFS Economic Stability
P.O. Box 260031
Baton Rouge, LA 70826
You can also reach the DCFS office by calling the following numbers
1-888-524-3578

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