Answer:

I had a telephone call with a prior client who had been through a divorce. They have children that live with her, but she has recently got a job out of state and wanted to take those children and have them live with her. Now, ultimately, in Georgia, if you can move and not get in the way of the other party’s parenting time, then the court can’t tell you that you can’t leave with these children; however, if you are interfering with the other parent’s parenting time or ability to exercise their parenting time, the court’s going to consider that to be a change of circumstance. Depending on your facts around how you moved and your reason for moving, the court could change custody to the other parent and not allow you to take the children to leave and live with you in another state.

It really is more complicated than just can I move and take my children with me because there are lots of factors in everybody’s different cases. It may even come down to what judge you have as to whether that judge is going to give you a nod of approval to move children that have been in our circuit or in our state to another state. In Georgia, so long as the children are residing here, the court ultimately has the authority to decide what’s in their best interest during a custody case.

If you’re planning on moving, what I would say is make sure you’re giving the other party prompt notice, and that you’re evaluating whether your move is going to affect the children and affect their time with the other parent. Bring those facts and circumstances into our office. Let us look at that. Let us look at your prior court orders and determine whether you would need court approval to move or whether you’ve met your burden of alerting the other parent, whether there may be an agreement for you to move.

Oftentimes, if you are moving out of state, there’s going to be some changes to your prior paperwork. Even if everyone is on the same page about you moving, you would want to make sure that you file the appropriate court case just to get the judge’s approval on any new parenting time, child support obligations that may change. Any move is probably going to deem a change of circumstances to the extent that a court is going to want to look at that in the modification action just to be safe and make sure the children and their best interests are being looked after. If you have questions about that, just give us a call. I’ll be happy to bring you in, meet with you, and talk to you about those things, and ultimately help you make a decision as to whether you should or shouldn’t be moving with your children.