SEALANDER v. SEALANDER

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Docket Number

Case No. 4D00-872.

Attorney(S)

Catherine L. Roselli of The Law Office of Catherine L. Roselli, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, for appellant. No brief filed for appellee.

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Smart Summary

Factual and Procedural Background

The appellant, Former Husband, was ordered to pay $300 per month in child support pursuant to a final dissolution judgment. After voluntarily retiring early, he petitioned for modification of child support, asserting that the child began receiving $500 per month in social security benefits due to his retirement. He argued he should receive a credit against his child support obligation because the social security payments exceeded his monthly obligation. A general master recommended denial of the motion, reasoning that the voluntary retirement did not constitute a substantial change in circumstances. The trial court upheld this recommendation after a hearing, denying the exceptions filed by the Former Husband. The Former Husband appealed the denial of his request for modification or set-off.

Legal Issues Presented

Whether the Former Husband’s voluntary early retirement, which resulted in social security benefits paid to the child, constitutes a substantial change in circumstances warranting modification of child support.
Whether the Former Husband is entitled to a credit against his child support obligation for social security benefits received by the child as a result of his retirement.
Whether the court should recede from the precedent set in Gomez v. Gomez regarding credits for social security benefits in child support calculations.

Arguments of the Parties

The opinion does not contain a detailed account of the parties' legal arguments.

Table of Precedents Cited

Precedent	Rule or Principle Cited For	Application by the Court
Gomez v. Gomez, 736 So.2d 119 (Fla. 4th DCA 1999)	Denied credit against child support for social security benefits paid to the child due to the obligor’s disability; relied on § 61.30(11)(b) which excludes supplemental security income from independent child income.	The court receded from Gomez, noting it failed to distinguish between supplemental security income (SSI) and dependent benefits, a distinction critical to proper child support calculations.
Wallace v. Department of Revenue, 774 So.2d 804 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000)	Clarified the distinction between SSI and social security disability benefits (SSDI), and held that dependent benefits received due to a parent's disability are income attributable to that parent and should offset child support obligations.	The court adopted the reasoning in Wallace to attribute dependent social security benefits to the parent obligor’s income and to credit those benefits against child support obligations.
Williams, 560 So.2d 310 (Fla. 4th DCA)	Established that social security disability benefits and dependent benefits are attributable to the disabled parent’s income for child support calculations.	Referenced as supporting authority for attributing dependent benefits to the parent's income in child support computations.

Court's Reasoning and Analysis

The court began by acknowledging that while the Former Husband’s retirement was voluntary, this factor alone is not dispositive because, unlike most cases, his retirement resulted in an increased benefit to the child through social security payments. The court distinguished between supplemental security income (SSI), which is income of the child and excluded from child support calculations, and dependent benefits received as a result of a parent's retirement or disability, which are attributable to the parent’s income.

The court receded from the Gomez decision because it failed to differentiate between SSI and dependent benefits, a critical distinction under § 61.30(11)(b), which excludes only SSI from consideration as independent child income. The court adopted the Second District’s reasoning in Wallace, which held that dependent benefits accompanying a parent’s social security disability income are income attributable to the parent and should be credited against the child support obligation.

Applying this principle, the court reasoned that social security benefits received by the child due to the Former Husband’s retirement should be credited against his child support obligation. Thus, the trial court erred in denying modification and credit for these benefits.

Holding and Implications

The court reversed and remanded the trial court's denial of the Former Husband’s request for modification of child support.

The direct effect of this decision is that the Former Husband is entitled to a credit against his child support payments for the social security benefits paid to the child as a result of his retirement. The case was remanded for recalculation of child support consistent with this ruling. The court explicitly receded from Gomez v. Gomez, clarifying the treatment of dependent social security benefits in child support calculations. No broader precedent beyond the case’s facts was established.

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ROBERT SEALANDER, Appellant, v. JUDY N. SEALANDER, Appellee.

EN BANC

PER CURIAM.

The Appellant ("Former Husband") appeals the denial of his request for child support modification or set-off, asserting he should have received a credit against his child support payments for social security benefits the child was receiving as a result of the Former Husband's retirement. We agree and therefore reverse and remand.

The Former Husband was required to pay $300 per month in child support pursuant to the final judgment of dissolution. After the Former Husband voluntarily retired early, he filed a petition for modification of child support, arguing that as a result of his early retirement, the Former Wife began receiving $500 per month from social security as child support and that because these payments were more than what he was required to pay, he should receive a credit against his $300 child support obligation. A general master recommended the motion be denied because the Former Husband's voluntary early retirement was not a substantial change in circumstances. The Former Husband filed exceptions to the general master's report; however, the trial court denied the exceptions after a hearing.

Under the facts of this case, although the Former Husband's retirement was voluntary, it is not necessarily dispositive. This is so because, unlike the majority of modification actions based upon voluntary retirement, the retirement in this case resulted in an increased benefit to the child. Therefore, the equities which normally weigh against allowing a party to rely upon voluntary retirement to constitute a substantial change of circumstances do not apply.

In Gomez v. Gomez, 736 So.2d 119 (Fla. 4th DCA 1999), this Court affirmed the denial of a credit against the former husband's child support obligation for social security benefits paid to the child as a result of the former husband's disability. See id. at 120. In affirming, this Court noted that there was no reduction in the former husband's disability income as a result of the social security payments made to the child and relied on section 61.30(11)(b). See id. That section, as amended and renumbered in 1997, states the following:

The court may adjust the minimum child support award, or either or both parents' share of the minimum child support award, based upon the following considerations:

. . .

2. Independent income of the child, not to include moneys received by a child from supplemental security income § 61.30(11)(a)2, Fla. Stat. (2000) (emphasis added). The statute refers only to supplemental security income and we conclude Gomez failed to consider the distinction between supplemental security income and dependent benefits. Recognizing there is a distinction between the two, we now recede from Gomez.

In receding from Gomez, we adopt the reasoning of the Second District in Wallace v. Department of Revenue, 774 So.2d 804 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000). There, the court disagreed with Gomez and explained,

We do not agree that the amendment to section 61.30(11)(b) changed the result in Williams or alters the result in this case. First, Gomez does not distinguish between supplemental security income and social security disability benefits, but appears to use the terms interchangeably. This distinction is important because section 61.30(11)(b) refers only to supplemental security income. SSI is likely to be the only type of benefit a child could receive on his or her own behalf, because of the child's disability. A child is ineligible for SSDI benefits unless he or she has met the contribution requirements through employment. In addition, section 61.30(11)(b) does not refer to dependent benefits at all, whether due to SSI, SSDI, or any other social security benefit.

Second, section 61.30(11)(b) refers specifically to a final adjustment in the child support award because of the income of the child. This statute plays no part in determining what income is attributable to the parent obligor in the calculation of the guideline amount. A child who is disabled may receive supplemental security income in his or her own right. The statute reflects that this income of the child, intended to provide additional support due to the child's special needs, should not serve as a basis to reduce the parents' obligation. On the other hand, when social security disability insurance benefits or supplemental security income is received because of the disability of a parent, those benefits and the dependent benefits that accompany it, are income attributable to the parent. See § 61.30(2)(a); Williams, 560 So.2d at 310. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's child support calculation, which attributed income to [the former husband] in an amount equal to the total of the monthly benefits he and the children receive as a result of his disability. . . .

In sum, when a parent is receiving social security disability income due to a disability and, as a result, his or her children receive dependent benefits, the total benefits received by or on behalf of that parent are attributed to the disabled parent as income in the child support guideline calculation. The dependent benefits are then credited toward the disabled parent's obligation, that is, they are a payment of the obligation on behalf of the disabled parent. If the benefits are less than the support obligation, the disabled parent must pay the difference. If they are more, the benefits pay the obligation in full, but any excess inures to the benefit of the children.

Id. at 806-08.

Although the present case involves social security benefits paid to a child as a result of a parent's retirement rather than a parent's disability, we see no reason that would require treating the two situations differently. As such, we conclude the Former Husband should have received a credit against his $300 child support obligation for benefits paid as child support as a result of his retirement. We reverse and remand for the trial court to recalculate the Former Husband's child support obligation in a manner consistent with this opinion and with an appropriate credit for the benefits paid as child support.

REVERSED AND REMANDED.

WARNER, C.J., DELL, GUNTHER, STONE, POLEN, FARMER, KLEIN, STEVENSON, SHAHOOD, GROSS, TAYLOR, HAZOURI, JJ., concur.