Get tough for benefit of taxpayers

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 The decision by state officials to get tough on companies that write bad checks for child support is necessary and welcome.
Taxpayers shouldn't have to cover the bad checks for companies. Neither should taxpayers get stuck with extra cost for getting the delinquent employers to make their checks good.

State Treasurer Ron Ross said last week that the state generally has about $1 million worth of bounced child-support checks. Ross said he was surprised to learn that about a third of that amount amounted from checks issued by employers.

The deadbeat companies are those that are responsible for collecting child support from employee wages and sending it to the state.

The bad-check problem is a side effect of the state takeover of child support three years ago, because of new federal requirements. Prior to that, clerks of district courts would simply hold checks until they cleared the banks. But that practice is no longer legal.

The only fortunate aspect of the situation today is that the bounced checks are not affecting children. The state continues to credit the paying parent and continues to send money to the custodial parent.

But in the meantime, state government and taxpayers end up holding the bag.

Employers are a big part of the child-support operation, which handles about $235.67 million a year. Employers handle about 51 percent of that amount by withholding money from paychecks.

Even though banks notify the companies that they have issued insufficient-funds checks, only about 20 percent of the companies contact the Child Support Payment Center to resolve the problem, according to state officials.

Some of the companies apparently write the bad checks because of cash-flow problems, state officials said.

The state plans to get more aggressive.

Ross recently signed a contract with an Iowa company to enhance collection efforts. In addition, the state attorney general soon may begin filing lawsuits to collect the money from bad checks.

The lawsuits also would have the effect of publicizing the names of the bad-check companies.

More than 300 companies str on the bad-check list.

Some of the companies might have been placed on that list because of honest misunderstandings.

But companies cannot be allowed to simply ignore warnings about bad checks. State government should go after deadbeat child-support companies just as vigorously as it goes after deadbeat parents.