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Carol Bealor is the director at the Cass County Friend of the Court.

On March 18, the Michigan Supreme Court issued Administrative Order 2020-2 that required all trial courts to limit access to courtrooms and other spaces to no more than 10 persons, including staff, and to practice social distancing and limit court activity to only essential functions.  On March 18, the Cass County Law and Courts Building was closed to the public by order of the Chief Judge.

March 23, Gov. Whitmer issued a Stay Home Stay Safe executive order to suppress the spread of COVID-19 by requiring residents to stay in their home or place of residence (subject to some exceptions outlined in the order) from March 24, until April 13. 

With all of these orders coming out, many parents with parenting time orders are left with questions such as: (1) Do I still exchange my child with the other parent for parenting time during the “Stay Home Stay Safe” order and (2) if the Courts are closed to the public, how do I get help if I have an issue regarding parenting time?

Under Whitmer’s “Stay Home Stay Safe” order, individuals can travel as required by a court order to transport children to facilitate custody and parenting time exchanges. This means that you can travel to exchange children with the other parent. The terms of your parenting time order are not changed by the “Stay Home Stay Safe” order. This means that both parents are expected to follow the custody and parenting time provisions of existing orders.

Of course, as things are changing daily with the COVID-19 pandemic, the FOC strongly encourages parents to work together to determine if it is appropriate to exchange their children out for parenting time or if other arrangements need to be made to facilitate children having remote contact with a parent who normally visits with the child. There are many ways to remotely have contact for parenting time such as telephone, FaceTime, Zoom or other electronic means of communication to facilitate parenting time in a manner that keeps everyone involved safer. Parents can always agree to modify parenting time in the best interest of their children and can always agree to a future make-up parenting time schedule if parenting time is missed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

While the Cass County Law and Courts Building is closed to the public, the Cass County Courts are still providing essential services, including Friend of the Court services. The Friend of the Court is open. You can obtain information on the Friend of the Court’s website at: casscourtsmi.org/foc. You can also email questions to the FOC at foc@cassco.org or if you’d rather call the FOC, the FOC office can be reached by calling (269) 445-4436.

FOC Staff cannot give you legal advice regarding parenting time issues, but the FOC can assist you with locating forms and resources for handling parenting time related issues. You may also wish to visit the website: michiganlegalhelp.org which is for people handling their legal problems without lawyers.

If you have questions about the FOC that you think would be helpful to address in future columns, please send them to the FOC email address: foc@cassco.org.