Georgia, like much of the nation, has worked hard to build systems that compel fathers’ financial responsibility. Yet the research keeps telling us what families already know. When courts and agencies help fathers secure safe, structured parenting time, children gain stability, parents reduce conflict, and child support outcomes improve. 

Parenting time is not a sentimental add-on to the “real” work of family court. It is the architecture that holds the whole structure up.

By Kenneth Braswell, CEO, Fathers Incorporated

“Focus on making memories, not just spending money. What your children really want is you, your time, your presence.” Offered by Judge LaTisha Wright-Hill in partnership with Fathers Incorporated (FI), these words land like a gavel on the heart because they name what our family courts wrestle with every day: the difference between enforcement and engagement, the distance between payment and parent.

Georgia, like much of the nation, has worked hard to build systems that compel fathers’ financial responsibility. Yet the research keeps telling us what families already know. When courts and agencies help fathers secure safe, structured parenting time, children gain stability, parents reduce conflict, and child support outcomes improve. 

Parenting time is not a sentimental add-on to the “real” work of family court. It is the architecture that holds the whole structure up. 

A recent fatherhood policy report from the Fatherhood Research and Practice Network (FRPN) shows why this matters now. Their findings describe parenting time and child support as “inextricably connected,” citing research showing that noncustodial fathers with parenting time are more likely to pay child support, while the absence of parenting time can contribute to nonpayment. One study cited in the FRPN review found that in 2015, 72% of nonresident fathers had no legal visitation agreement, leaving contact with their children informal, inconsistent, and vulnerable to conflict. If family court is the place where stability should be built, these numbers read like a blueprint for instability.

The policy gap is not accidental. Federal Title IV-D child support services do not include parenting time, and the largest, most consistent funding stream for child support agencies is not designed to pay for the relationship-building supports that help parents craft durable parenting plans. Another FRPN finding sharpens the point: The majority of child support orders for unmarried parents are established “without consideration of parenting time,” which means we often build the financial order first and try to patch the family arrangement later. The result is predictable. Parents resent the process. Fathers disengage. Mothers carry the burden alone. Children absorb the consequences.

Georgia’s own policy profile underscores the stakes. In FRPN’s state-by-state assessment of parenting time adjustments in child support guidelines, Georgia receives an “F” and is described as having no formula to adjust support based on parenting time. When the system treats time as irrelevant, it should not surprise us that parents treat the system as unfair.

Even more telling is how Georgia invests the resources specifically intended to help families reach parenting time agreements. FRPN’s scan of Access and Visitation spending shows that Georgia allocated 0% to mediation and 0% to parenting plan development, while directing 56.6% to parent education and 9.2% to supervised visitation or neutral drop-off. Education matters, but education without agreement is like teaching someone to drive while never handing them the keys. Family courts and policymakers should look hard at that allocation, because mediation and parenting plan development convert conflict into structure.

That brings us to the human reality behind the percentages. FI’s Georgia legitimation brief offers a sobering figure: As of the end of 2020, 558,742 children in Georgia had been born without a legal father since 2010.

This isn’t a question of whether fathers exist. It’s a question of whether the law recognizes them. FI states it plainly: “There is no such thing as a fatherless child… The question isn’t if he exists. The question is where he exists.”

In most of the country, paternity and legitimation are addressed together, but in Georgia, they are treated as separate legal actions. A father may establish paternity and support his child financially, yet still lack legal rights until he completes a separate legitimation process.

FI illustrates how high the stakes can be with a scenario that feels extreme until you realize it is legally plausible: A father who has supported his child through child support for years cannot make medical decisions until he takes additional legal action for legitimation. The emotional consequence of this is captured in a father’s voice from that same Georgia legitimation brief: “If we know that’s my baby and my name is on the birth certificate, why do I have to go through the legitimization process… Makes me pay more money that we barely have.” 

Family court hears versions of this frustration every day, sometimes expressed as anger, sometimes as withdrawal, sometimes as silence. The real danger is what happens when families stop believing the court can produce a fair outcome.

Courts already have evidence of what can help. FRPN’s review points to evaluations showing that parenting time mediation or facilitation can increase agreement-making, improve child support payments and parent-child contact, and reduce conflict. Courts are not only adjudicators. They are designers of process. When process is designed to produce agreements, families do better than when process is designed only to punish noncompliance.

Georgia also has a proven local example of a court-centered pathway that treats accountability and relationship as partners, not enemies. The Fathers Incorporated 2024 Impact Report describes a partnership with Clayton County Juvenile Court’s Abandonment Court, which offers fathers an alternative to arrest for child support nonpayment, through fatherhood education and support.

One father, Devonte Perkins, describes what this kind of court-linked intervention can change: “This class opened my eyes. It took my mind off all the external stuff, and it got a chip off my shoulder. It helped me get rid of that grudge and anger.” When a court’s response helps a father lay down anger, the beneficiaries are not only the father. The beneficiaries are the children who will receive his steadier presence.

Presence, however, must always be safe. FI’s Beyond Silence and Violence brief makes a point that family court professionals recognize instinctively: Child well-being, family stability, and positive parental involvement are diminished when domestic violence affects a family. Responsible fatherhood work and court practice must share one bedrock principle: Parenting time should be structured in ways that protect victims, prevent harm, and support healthy, nurturing participation in family life.

The measure is not contact at any cost. The measure is safe, consistent, child-centered connection.

Necessary Family Court Reforms in Georgia

So what does this mean for family court policy and practice in Georgia?

1. Pair child support and parenting plans. / Georgia family courts must treat parenting time as a compliance strategy, not a concession. FRPN’s findings make the case that time and payment move together. When fathers have a clear, enforceable path to parenting time, they are more likely to support their children financially. Courts can align financial orders with parenting plans, rather than building one without the other.
2. Invest in mediation and parenting plan development. / Georgia must invest in services that transform conflict into agreement. The state’s current spending pattern for Access and Visitation leaves mediation and parenting plan development unfunded. This is a fixable policy choice. Mediation does not erase disputes. It gives disputes an architecture so children are not forced to live inside them.
3. Reform legitimation. / FI believes there’s wisdom in streamlining legal standing for fathers so the court can address the real problem. Georgia’s separate legitimation process delays clarity and can discourage engagement. We recommend legitimation reforms that would determine legitimation at the same time paternity is established and allow fathers with established paternity to request parenting time and custody.
4. Offer navigation. / Georgia must make court-connected navigation normal, not exceptional. Through Gentle Warriors Academy and its “Fatherhood Is Brotherhood” work, FI teaches fathers about legitimation, offers free legitimation services, and publishes resources like “Legitimation in the State of Georgia: A Comprehensive Guide for Unmarried Fathers” and a “Navigating Family Court” guide. Courts can strengthen outcomes by referring fathers early to credible navigators, legal providers, and mediation supports before frustration hardens into disengagement.
5. Understand what families are seeking. / FI’s fatherhood program experience shows that fathers consistently seek help with legitimation, child support, parenting time, and family legal services. This is not a request for shortcuts. It is a request for a pathway.

How Fathers Can Secure Parenting Time

The pathway to parenting time can begin with practical steps that many unmarried fathers can take today.

• Establish paternity as early as possible, then learn whether legitimation is required for legal rights in your state. In Georgia, for example, paternity does not automatically create legitimation, and legitimation must be pursued through separate legal action.
• File for legitimation and request parenting time. Once a legitimation petition is filed and granted by a judge, a father can spend time with his children without being denied access by the child’s other legal guardian.
• Use mediation or parenting plan services when possible. FRPN describes Access and Visitation as a primary funding stream for services such as mediation, supervised visitation, and parenting education, and it notes that courts are a major referral source for these services.
• Build a record of consistent engagement. Courts look for patterns that support a child’s stability: attending parenting classes, showing up, communicating respectfully, and following temporary orders.
• Seek navigation support from trusted local providers. Fatherhood programs like FI’s Gentle Warriors Academy connect fathers to legal providers, mediation services, and pro bono attorneys as part of helping fathers navigate the justice system.

Family court cannot solve every family conflict. Yet courts can choose what kind of outcomes their processes make most likely. A system that enforces payments without building parenting time invites resentment and disengagement. A system that builds safe parenting time alongside accountability invites stability.

Judge Wright-Hill’s words are not a slogan. They are a policy thesis. The goal is not only that children receive support. The goal is that children receive their parent.