Transportation Visitation Problems

My fiancee is dealing with this now, despite having signed a court order stating that she is to provide a portion of the transport of their 3 kids his lazy never worked more than 4 hours in a day ex-wanna-be-princess is now being hauled back into court for contempt. I have no pity for this situation, I was a single mom for 13 years and was fortunate enough to have an ex who was as dedicated as I to making sure the kids had good relationships with BOTH parents despite our difficulties, divorce and remarraige. This involved upward of 90 miles most times, and weekday or weeknight they were with whoever they needed/wanted to be with.
Its NOT about who is doing more, its about what is good for your kids.
Being a child of divorce also, know that both of you will be put on the burner for actions or inactions taken that affect your kids now.
Best of luck to you, take the high road and you’ll all be better off.
He’ll have to answer for his actions one day too, and from his own kids.

If your ex lived that distance at the time of executing the agreement, and no provision discussed how pickup and dropoff would occur, it is reasonable that he would be expected to arrange to pick up where the children reside or school. If he moved after the agreement was made for visitation, it is even more clear that he would pick them up as described. Frankly, short of an agreement as to how the exchange will occur, the parent having visitation should pick up and return the kids at the times specified in your agreement.

It might save both of you future headaches to come up with a reasonable visitation arrangement for the benefit of the kids. It might be worth the two of you seeking a meeting with a custody mediator to hammer out a more specific arrangement for visitation. You might consider doing this before one of you decides to seek a court’s help (i.e., motion to modify your current custody arrangement). It will probably save you both time, stress and money to address this disagreement by considering all the varibles, burdens, costs, convenience for both parties, kids, and the like.

Deborah M. Throm
Rosen Law Firm
1829 E. Franklin Street, Bldg. 600
Chapel Hill, NC 27514
919.265.0017 direct
919.321.0780 main voice
www.rosen.com
Email: dthrom@rosen.com

4101 Lake Boone Trail
Suite 500
Raleigh, NC 27607
919.256.1544 direct
919.787.6668 main voice

301 McCullough Drive
Suite 510
Charlotte, NC 28262
704.644.2531 ext. 100

My x lives approximately 60 miles away. Our divorce agreement states that he has visitation with our daughter on the 1st and 3rd weekends of the month from 3pm on Friday until 6pm on Saturday. Suddenly about 1 year ago he began demanding that I meet him halfway on Sunday’s and pick her up. The timing is always erratic and on his schedule anywhere from 3 in the afternoon until 9 at night. This completely turns our Sunday’s upside down, however, I did so just to save peace and to try not to upset my daughter. Now he is demanding that I drive all of the way to his home and pick her up in order to “share costs”. He says if I refuse then he will just refuse to bring her home forcing me to come and get her. Can he do this? This entire situation is getting out of hand and I feel completely bullied by him at every turn. He also says that the agreement lists the times he is allowed to have her but that it doesn’t specifically say that he is “required” to provide for the transportation and therefore, I am required to share the transportation with him. Does anyone know NC law on this?