Child support delinquency is very impactful. States use many different methods to try to address the issue of child support delinquency. One common practice is to bring criminal charges against individuals who are alleged to have failed to make child support payments they were supposed to.

Another thing states sometimes do is initiate programs that are aimed at seizing certain money people who are behind on their child support payments acquire and redirecting said money towards these individuals' child support debt.

One such program that Louisiana has is the casino intercept initiative. Louisiana is one of a handful of states that currently have laws in place allowing child support-related casino intercepts. Under Louisiana's intercept initiative, when a person who is behind in their child support wins over $1,200 at a casino that participates in the initiative, the winnings are seized and used to pay the individual's back-due child support.

Currently, 18 Louisiana casinos participate in the initiative.

According to state officials, so far, the program has been quite successful in collecting back-due child support. According to an article on KPLC's website, thus far, over $800,000 in casino winnings have been seized under Louisiana's casino intercept initiative and redirected towards child support payments. Reportedly, 599 individuals have had winnings seized under the casino intercept initiative.

It will be interesting to see what happens with this initiative in upcoming years. It will also be interesting to see if more states start initiating such programs.

What do you think of Louisiana's casino intercept initiative?

Source: KPLC, "Casino intercept program nets $806,000 in child support arrears," Elona Weston, Jan. 29, 2013

Our firm handles a wide variety of family law matters, including child support matters. To learn more about our practice, visit our Louisiana child support page.