Steve Nash is a legendary basketball player. Known for his passing, dribbling and shooting abilities, the two-time league Most Valuable Player holds a dear place in the hearts of many Arizonans even after being traded last year to Los Angeles. In the mid-to-late 2000s, Nash led the Phoenix Suns to several consecutive playoff appearances, but it was around this time when his marriage of five years ended. But it was just the beginning of litigation that recently concluded in the Arizona Court of Appeals addressing how much child support Nash should pay his ex-wife for their three children.
The Nash v. Nash decision answered, among other things, the question of when is it okay for courts to award greater child support than what the law says it should?
In most Arizona child support cases, courts determine the amount one parent pays by applying a framework called the Child Support Guidelines (A.R.S. § 25-320). The Guidelines were designed to create a system "consistent with the reasonable needs of children and the ability of parents to pay." Arizona uses, as do several other states, the Income Shares Model, which is based on two principles: (1) The total child support amount approximates the amount that would have been spent on the children if the parents and children were living together," and (2) "Each parent contributes his/her proportionate share of the total child support amount." (Guidelines, § 1). In addition to sharing combined income, other considerations are added to the mix including, but not limited to: "the cost of the children’s medical, dental and/or vision insurance coverage, if any" also childcare costs "appropriate to the parents’ financial abilities" and "reasonable and necessary" education expenses "when such expenses are incurred by agreement of both parents or ordered by the court." (Guidelines, §§ 9(A), (B)(1),(2)).
The Arizona Child Support Guidelines list a monthly maximum income of $20,000 for both parents, which may pose an arbitrary limit on child support and undermine the children’s actual needs if the parents make more than $20,000 combined per month. If the children are accustomed to a more affluent lifestyle "a child-support order entered in the dissolution of a marriage of two persons of considerable wealth" should focus on the children’s needs, even if beyond societal norms. (Nash decision, pp. 2, 13). To be sure, trial courts possess broad discretion to deviate from the Guidelines when it is appropriate for the best interests of the children. The Court of Appeals knew this when it remanded Steve Nash’s case back to the trial court because it had not addressed all of the children’s needs.
Deviating from the Guidelines is not a typical thing. In order to deviate, a party seeking it "shall bear the burden of proof to establish that a higher amount is in the best interests of the children." (Guidelines, § 8). This burden compels a parent to show evidence why higher child support is in the children’s best interests. In his case, Steve Nash unsuccessfully argued that his ex-wife failed to prove why the children’s needs were not met by the maximum Guideline child support amount. The Court of Appeals concluded that the trial court erred in failing to "give considerable regard to the reasonable benefits, beyond [the children’s] ‘basic needs,’ accorded to the children during the marriage." Specifically, the Court of Appeals discussed the children’s past international travel, enjoyment of things normally a part of "affluent"households and the children’s entitlement "to share reasonably in their parents’ economic good fortune."
The game now goes into overtime for Steve Nash as he re-litigates child support knowing that the court must consider the children’s lifestyle factors. Don’t go anywhere!
