Perhaps the most dramatic change in child support will result from the changes to the law regarding custody – allocation of parental responsibilities effective January 1, 2016. The most dramatic changes will be the result of the fact that the 2016 rewrite seeks to eliminate to the extent possible battles over naming a primary residential parent. The heading to Section 606.10 is important and indicates”Designation of custodian for purposes of other statutes.” It then emphasizes that, “ solely for the purposes of all State and federal statutes that require a designation or determination of custody or a custodian, a parenting plan shall designate the parent who is allocated the majority of parenting time.” It then emphasizes that, “this designation shall not affect parents’ rights and responsibilities under the parenting plan.” When we combine that with the 2014 Illinois Supreme Court Turk decision holding that the non-residential parent may be required to pay support to the custodial parent as well as the 2016 codification of that Turk decision we can see that the law regarding child support will change dramatically starting in 2016. No longer should the guidelines be as blindly followed with narrow exceptions. We can also anticipate that in the near future that Illinois will finally adopt income shares. This paper will first will highlight significant changes to §505 of the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act (IMDMA), and many of the statutory provisions regarding support that are often overlooked.
