"Private firms help single parents get what's due"

– Excerpts written by Tamar Lewin, Special to the New York Times.

Austin, Texas -- Casey Hoffman knows plenty about the difficulties of enforcing child-support orders. He used to run Texas' child-support office, and in 1990, the year he left that job, his program was rated the most improved in the nation; indeed, Mr. Hoffman was named the outstanding child-support manager of the year.

But these days, Mr. Hoffman plays a different role as a private entrepreneur in child support, a kind of bounty hunter who tracks down absent parents, makes them pay, and keeps a third of the money he collects.

The very existence of a private company like Mr. Hoffman's Child Support Enforcement*, and about 100 others that have sprung up nationwide in the last five years, is a stark indication of the inadequacy of the state child-support system.

"If they take 33 percent of the money that's supposed to feed the children, what are they taking? Breakfast, lunch or dinner?" asked Geraldine Jensen, the founder of (The Association for Children for Enforcement of Support), which lobbies for stronger child-support laws and teaches parents their legal rights. "It's a symptom of how badly broken the system is that women are turning to private profiteers. It's true, the system doesn't work unless you really push it. But we need to fix the system, not let private companies profit at the expense of kids."

Many women for whom Mr. Hoffman has recovered money disagree, arguing that a third of the money is a reasonable fee for the personal attention and fast results his company provides. "I got child-support money for maybe a year after we separated in 1981, and then it stopped," said Nancy Sissons, 47, of Glen Cove, LI "I filed with Nassau County, but that went on for nine years and I got nothing. Finally they gave up. The woman in the Nassau office told me I might as well forget it. But a girlfriend in Texas told me about Casey Hoffman's company. I was a little bit leery of it, to tell the truth, but I didn't have anything to lose."

What happened next seemed little short of miraculous to Ms. Sissons, who for years had worked two jobs to support her two daughters. "Within three days they called to say they had located him," she said. "He ended up paying $37,000, and after their fee, I got $25,000. That seems reasonable to me. After we got his address, my older daughter wrote to him. And this year, for the first time in 12 years, she got a birthday card from him."

* CSE Child Support Enforcement now offers its services to families as Supportkids.

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