At divorce Jack and Cindie Alter entered into a marital settlement agreement that had Jack paying child support, and that provided child support was "absolutely non-modifiable downward." Three years after signing the agreement Jack went to court seeking a downward modification of his child support. The trial court modified the child support downward. Cindie appealed.
The Court of Appeal upheld the trial court's decision, presenting its holding in beautifully clear language: "The trial court always has the power to modify an existing child support order, either upward or downward, notwithstanding the parties’ agreement to the contrary."
This holding is important because until this case came out there was no clear authority on the issue. Practitioners always recognized that there could be no prohibition on upward modifications of child support; downward was not so clear. In fact, there was strong sentiment from many practitioners that the type of language Jack and Cindie had agreed to would be enforced. The Alter case gets everyone on the same page.
Of course, the Court's analysis is a lot more complicated than can be expressed here. The Court's analysis and holding make sense to me, but I am interested in the debate it will stir amongst family law experts.
Click here to read the entirety of the Court's opinion.
Please be sure to visit www.hardinglaw.com, the website for the law firm of Harding & Associates, for more information on California family law.
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