Court: District Court of Appeal of Florida; April 29, 2016; Florida; State Appellate Court
D.M.J. (the Father) appeals several orders from the trial court following a final judgment of paternity, arguing that the court did not adequately consider the child's best interests. The final judgment, rendered in July 2011, included a mediation agreement and a parenting plan with a rotating time-sharing schedule, stipulating that education matters would be revisited when the child became eligible for kindergarten. In August 2015, A.J.T. (the Mother) petitioned to modify the parenting plan, claiming a substantial change in circumstances due to the Father's move approximately 25 miles away, impacting the logistics of child exchanges. The Mother proposed a plan increasing her time with the child from 183 to 305 nights and sought to be the primary decision-maker regarding the child's education and healthcare.
After an evidentiary hearing, the court granted the Mother's petition, approving her parenting plan and designating Hillsborough School A as the child's school. The Father filed a motion for rehearing, which resulted in an amended order, but he later appealed this decision, asserting that the Mother misrepresented her zoning for the school and had unilaterally enrolled the child in a different school. The appellate court affirmed the denial of a stay but allowed the Father to seek relief based on the alleged impossibility of enrollment in the designated school. The trial court acknowledged a mistake in designating Hillsborough School A and amended the final judgment to base the child's school designation on the Mother's address. The Father contends that the evidence did not sufficiently demonstrate a substantial change to justify the modifications in parental responsibility and time-sharing.
The Father contends that the court's order approving the Mother's petition was adopted without modification and includes unsupported findings. He asserts that the court improperly bypassed an evidentiary hearing on the schooling issue, which was crucial since the initial decision on the child’s school was influenced by the quality of Hillsborough School A. Modifications to a time-sharing schedule require a demonstration of a substantial, material, and unforeseen change in circumstances, as well as a determination that such changes serve the child's best interests, supported by Griffith v. Griffith and other case law. In custody cases involving parental relocation, courts typically do not consider modest moves as substantial changes warranting modification, as highlighted by Halbert v. Morico and Ragle v. Ragle, where moves of forty-five and twenty-eight miles, respectively, were deemed insufficient.
The amended order does not specify a substantial change nor indicate that the Father’s move, the primary change cited in the Mother’s petition, influenced the court’s findings. Additionally, there is no evidence that the trial court prioritized the children's best interests. The Mother’s petition lacked a provision for reserving jurisdiction over schooling, and the court's order did not reflect any attempt at mediation as required by the original parenting plan. The original plan stipulated that the parties must address schooling once the child reached school age, necessitating a court order if they could not agree. The court is required to determine the best interests of the child in such disputes. However, the trial court abused its discretion by modifying the time-sharing plan without adequate findings or evidence supporting that the modification was in the child's best interests, as emphasized in Holland v. Holland. Although the court found it unfavorable for the child to travel two hours for exchanges based on the Mother's testimony, it deemed the Father's assertions about a forty-five-minute travel time untrustworthy.
The trial court determined it was in the best interests of the child to enroll in Hillsborough School A, resulting in the child spending weekdays with the Mother during the school year. Although the Mother was also allocated alternating weekends, the court did not provide findings regarding this arrangement. The court rejected the Father's proposal for the child to attend a Pasco County school, emphasizing the impracticality of long travel times for a child attending school five days a week. The court's analysis focused primarily on geographic considerations and the potential burdens of commuting for the child, rather than on the child's relationships with siblings or the capacity of each parent to meet the child’s needs. The court failed to address the child's bond with her half-sibling and stepsibling, did not consider the stability of the child's living environment, and lacked findings on the parents' knowledge and involvement in the child's life.
The Father contended that the court erred in adopting the Mother's proposed order, as many findings lacked support. While Florida law permits the verbatim adoption of a party's proposed order, the judge must engage in an independent analysis of the relevant facts and law. A significant unsupported finding in the amended order was the travel time between the parents' residences, which the hearing transcript indicated was about forty minutes roundtrip, contrary to the Mother’s claim of two hours. The only reference to the two-hour travel time was related to a voluntary prekindergarten program, not the regular school commute.
The amended order regarding the child's schooling fails to consider critical evidence, including the Father's stepchild and nieces attending Pasco School A, where the Father is zoned. It neglects the Father's offer to facilitate drop-offs during the Mother's custody weeks. The court's decision that the child should attend Hillsborough School A lacks support, as the Mother was uncertain about her zoning for that school, and the Father's testimony indicated she was not zoned there. Although the court referenced the relative quality of Hillsborough School A and Pasco School A, it did not address Hillsborough School B, where the child was ultimately enrolled.
The Father argues that the court erred by not holding an evidentiary hearing on his motion to vacate prior to the supplemental final judgment. The court made two unsupported findings: that the child would attend Hillsborough School A due to the case's location and that a two-hour travel time on weekdays would not benefit the child. The Father's residence and the child's established enrollment in Pasco County were overlooked. Previous case law indicates that increased travel time alone does not justify changes in custody arrangements.
Consequently, the court's findings are deemed unsubstantiated, prompting a reversal and remand for an evidentiary hearing to evaluate the child's best interests. The trial court is urged to expedite this process and issue temporary orders related to time-sharing and school designation. The document notes that the identities of the involved schools have been anonymized, and recent procedural motions regarding the case are acknowledged without needing to address jurisdiction issues raised by the Father, as they are rendered moot by the reversal. The child's half-sibling is noted as not yet being of school age.
