Do I need a Will ? – Essential Estate Planning

Do I need a Will ? “I don’t own anything.”  “It’s too complicated.”  “I’m too young to think about a Will.”  I have heard all of these reasons and more for not adequately preparing an estate plan.

“Do I need a Will ?” is a very important question and this article will shed light on your Will’s importance and what happens if you don’t have one. While it may trigger unwanted emotions, having your “affairs” in order is the best gift you can give to your family and friends.

What happens if you do not have a Will? For the family and friends of those who have died without indicating their wishes for the disposition of their assets after death, not having a Last Will and Testament can be a nightmare.  State law determines where assets go when someone dies without a Will and the state doesn’t always get it right.  If you are married, your spouse receives your estate.  If you are married with children, most states direct half of your assets to your spouse and the other half to be divided among your children.  This may or may not be appropriate depending on an individual’s wishes and the ages of their children.estate planning trust, estate planning gay estate planning, lgbt estate planning, glbt estate planning, Wills, trusts, gay family law

If you do not have children, the state will look to your closest living legal relative as a recipient of your estate. This is where it gets tricky.  In most cases, a surviving parent is next in the line of succession, then siblings and their children.  If you do not have siblings, nieces or nephews, then the court will look out to your aunts, uncles and cousins.  The reality of this scenario is that someone who you may have never met, or had a relationship with may be the beneficiary of your estate if you do not plan carefully.

How does a Will work? A Last Will and Testament is the foundation for all Estate Plans and it passes only probate assets, or assets that are owned    in one person’s name without a designated beneficiary.  Examples of probate assets include land, homes, cars, personal belongings and bank accounts.  A Will does not cover non-probate assets.  A non-probate asset is something that is owned jointly or an asset with a designated beneficiary.  Examples of non-probate assets include jointly held real property, a joint bank account, a life insurance policy with a designated beneficiary and an IRA, 401(k) or other investment account with a designated beneficiary.  You may also name a “TOD” (transfer on death) designation for a bank account you own solely in your name.

The above described assets pass outside a Will, the benefit of which is a faster and easier transfer of someone’s money or property when they die. If, however, you are single and there is no appropriate person to name as a designated beneficiary, it is imperative that you have a Will to pass your property where you want it to go upon your death.

What else does a Will do? A Last Will and Testament, in most states, is the only document that will allow you to name a guardian for children if something happens to both legal parents.  If you have young children, it is critical that you have a Will to state who you want to care for them if anything were to happen to both parents.  A Will also allows you to name an executor.  An executor is the person who will be in charge of marshalling your assets, identifying your debts and ultimately paying them off and making a final distribution according to your wishes as written in the Will.  If you die without a Will, your closest living legal relative will be the first choice for an executor.  Only you know whether this would be appropriate or not.

What happens after I die? If you die with a Will, the executor named in your Will petitions the probate or surrogates court in the county where you lived to receive authorization letters from the court.  This process is called “probate” and it ensures that a Will has been drafted and executed correctly, as well as managing the asset distribution.  Authorization letters will allow you to set up a bank account in the estate’s name and start paying any bills that are due.  If an executor must spend their own money to start a probate proceeding, it will be reimbursed prior to any distribution of assets.

Each state is different and will have a different time line and fee structure, so it is imperative that you meet with an attorney in your area to discuss the process in detail. If you find yourself asking, “Do I need a Will ?,” now you know better how to answer that all important question.
For more information, visit www.timeforfamilies.com or email me at Anthony@timeforfamilies.com.

in Estate Planning / Featured Articles / Legal / Parenting  by Anthony Brown 9 comments

A surrogacy fairy tale

Anthony Brown and his husband Gary Spino’s neighbor in their West Village apartment building in New York City wore all black, only went out at night and had a frequent cough.

She was, “the type of woman you’d see coming down the street and you might cross the street,” Brown says. Now and then the couple would see her coming home at night from grocery shopping and would help carry her groceries upstairs. One day after falling in her apartment the woman, named Janet, called the couple to help. The result was a seven-year friendship and the gift of Brown and Spino’s son, Nicholas.

Brown and Spino came to learn she suffered from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, had lived all over the world and that she was also wealthy from family money. When she died, they discovered she had been so touched by their kindness that she left them half her estate. Because of her, the couple were able to afford surrogacy with Spino as their son’s biological father in what Brown calls, “a New York fairytale.”adoption new york,new york adoption,new york state adoption, stepparent adoption process,adopting step children,co parent adoption,2nd parent adoption,second parent adoptions,gay adoption new york,gay couple adoption, gay couples adopting

“It was a gift from God, truly. Or at least a gift from Janet,” Brown says. “We still have her picture and a heart-shaped urn that has some of her ashes. We sprinkled her ashes all over the world. We took her ashes to all the places where she had lived and tried to do her justice.”

As they embarked on their surrogacy journey, the couple went to a Men Having Babies meeting at the Gay and Lesbian Center and began gathering information. Brown, an attorney, would eventually go on to become chairman on the board for the organization.

While working with Men Having Babies, the group became a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization and started a grant. The grant used money from events the organization produced to help with its gay parenting assistance program.

The program now offers qualifying individuals and couples discounted services, donated free services and cash grants. So far the organization is in its fourth class of recipients and 13 babies have been born to parents who have utilized the gay parenting assistance program.

“It’s one of the greatest things in the world to be able to talk to the recipients and see myself in them and to know I would never have been able to have afforded the surrogacy route had it not been for the grace of a kind woman who lived in my building. So it’s a full circle moment for me personally,” Brown says.

Brown is also no stranger to the other side of surrogacy. Before having their son, Brown worked for a marriage equality organization in the early ‘00s. Brown and Spino met a lesbian couple through the organization who wanted to have a family with a known donor. Brown and Spino agreed to help and the partner Brown was working with became pregnant first. Through her, Brown has an 11-year-old biological daughter. The experience led Brown and Spino not only on their own journey to welcome their son into their family, but for Brown to embark on a passion project to help other gay couples expand their families.

In 2012 Brown went deeper on his mission to help others and started TimeforFamilies.com, a website filled with information for LGBT families to learn how to start families.

Brown covers topics such as surrogacy, estate planning, co-parenting and specific topics like having a known donor versus an anonymous donor. While Brown notes the majority of website visitors are from the New York area, people from Africa, Asia and Europe have also accessed the site. Gay families can also send in their personal stories and photos to be featured on the website.

By Mariah Cooper, 10/6/2016, WashingtonBlade.com

Click here to read the entire article.

in Assisted Reproductive Technology / Egg Donation / Legal / Parenting / Personal Stories / Recently Added / Surrogacy  by Anthony Brown 2 comments

New Kids’ Book – The Great Big Body Book – Is Trans-Inclusive

A new children’s picture book  – The Great Big Body Book – about human bodies includes transgender and gender nonconforming people as well as same-sex parents. That’s a rare and wonderful thing, making this a welcome book, despite a few caveats.

 

The Great Big Body Book, by English author Mary Hoffman, is the fourth in her Great Big Books series for preschool and early elementary school kids. An earlier book in the series, The Great Big Book of Families, showed families with same-sex parents, among others, and Hoffman brings the same inclusive sensibility to her new work. The Body book begins by asking “What is a body?” and goes on to explore, in a fun and lighthearted way, how our bodies grow and develop over our lifetimes and the many things our bodies help us do.the great big body book, transgender, trans inclusive, trans kids, trans

Lively illustrations by Ros Asquith highlight both the main text and the humorous side vignettes that show short dialogs between characters. The characters show a great range of racial and ethnic diversity. Several wear headscarves and one wears a turban. We see two-dad, two-mom, and single-parent families. There are characters with a variety of physical disabilities, too, including ones in wheelchairs, one using a walker, and one with a short arm. To Asquith and Hoffman’s credit, they are always shown doing active things—they are not there as examples of harm or limitations to bodies.

In one spread, titled “Boy or Girl,” Hoffman gently pokes fun at the obsession with babies’ genders. One mom on the page, when asked “What is it?” responds simply “A baby.” A dad is asked “What’s her name?” and answers, “Fred.” Hoffman notes that pink doesn’t have to be for girls, nor blue for boys.

She then observes, “Some bits of your body are different, according to whether you are male or female.” That stays the same for most people, she says: “If you are born a boy you become a man and if a girl, you grow up to be a woman.” A few people, however, “don’t feel completely comfortable in the body they were born in and not everyone fits neatly into a ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ box. That’s OK—just be yourself.”

Overall, it’s a positive, simple explanation of being transgender or gender nonconforming. Hoffman doesn’t use those terms, however, which could be seen as a negative. At the same time, she never uses the word “puberty” despite discussing the changes teens go through, so this may be part of an overall decision to focus on concepts more than terminology—or perhaps a praiseworthy desire to avoid labels.

This brings us to the section on teens, in which Hoffman notes that “Boys’ voices get deeper and they start growing hair on their faces and private parts. Girls grow breasts and their hips get wider. They get hair in private places too.” That’s not true for all trans teens, of course, especially if they are not using hormones. I would have preferred a more nuanced view, perhaps simply by adding “most” before “boys’” and “girls.”

I also have concerns with a spread explaining that having a baby bump is not the same as being fat. Several pregnant women are shown at the top of the page. One of the side vignettes, which usually contain funny comments about the topic at hand, shows a boy pointing to a person with a beard and a large belly and saying, “Look! He’s having a baby!” The message seems to be that if a male-appearing person looks pregnant, it’s funny—a mistaken assumption. The humor is vague enough, however, that the image could also be interpreted as an actual trans dad, if desired (and alternatively, the character has gray hair, so maybe age is the intended butt of the joke, not gender), but a different vignette might have been better.

Via Mombian,com, October 5, 2016

Click here to read the entire article.

in Parenting / Personal Stories / Recently Added / Resources  by Anthony Brown 1 comments

Considering Known Sperm Donors

Lesbian couples are choosing known sperm donors in increasing numbers for a variety of very important reasons. Your choice now can make a big difference in your child’s life.

Known sperm donors are a much more viable option for lesbian couples today than they have ever been.  What greater decision can there be than the biological parent of your child? Choosing an anonymous sperm donor used to be the norm.  There are many reasons why known sperm donors are becoming the preference for lesbian couples and this article explores some of the most important ones.  But first, make sure you know the law.

One of the most cited reasons for choosing known sperm donors is to have a greater insight into the biology of your child. Having a known sperm donor’s medical history can be critical for mothers who have medical or genetic issues that they must consider before having a child.  An anonymous sperm donor file will provide some medical information, but a known donor can share his family medical history, which may be crucial for the health of your child.remarkable parenting

While medical considerations are one of the top reasons for having a known donor, knowing the emotional and social character of the donor is also an often overlooked consideration in many people’s path to parenthood.  No anonymous donor profile can show the complete picture of the person who may be the biological father of your child.

Legal considerations are also important reasons to choose between anonymous donors and known sperm donors. Anonymous donors surrender their parental rights to any children born with their genetic material upon deposit to a sperm bank or fertility clinic.  When you choose an anonymous donor, they may offer the option of allowing the child to contact them at age 18, but there is no question as to their lack of parental rights to that child.

Known sperm donors in many states, New York included, must surrender their parental rights to a child born with their genetic material after the birth of that child.  And if the mother is a single parent by choice, the known donor in many states may not surrender their parental rights at all.

In New York, as in most states, the best interest of a child is considered when allowing a genetic parent surrender their parental rights. If a known donor is surrendering his parental rights to the spouse or partner of the mother, then the court will authorize that surrender.  If, however, there is no other parent who will be assuming parental rights, the known donor cannot surrender their parental rights and will be able to sue for custody and visitation.  The mother will also be able to sue that known donor for child support.  This is the most important reason why single mothers by choice should use an anonymous donor.

One reason why lesbian moms are choosing known sperm donors is for the emotional health of their children later in life. Many studies show that the more a child knows about their biological background, be they adopted, a child through surrogacy or through known or anonymous sperm donation, the better adjusted they are as adults.  These same studies also show high satisfaction levels in the mothers who have chosen known sperm donors.

One other consideration in choosing a known sperm donor is where they live. If you envision a known donor as a parental figure in your child’s life with a more active role, the donor must be geographically able to fill that role.

Finally, many mothers choose between known and anonymous donors because of the degree of control they wish to have over their family formation. Choosing a known donor can be tricky and many mothers prefer to maintain the kind of parental control over their family that can only be experienced with an anonymous donor.

Whether you are considering known sperm donors to help you create your family or whether anonymous donors are right for you, the most important part of this decision is that you and your spouse or partner are comfortable with it and on the same page. And please make sure you know the law! For more information about known sperm donation and the legalities surrounding our families, contact Anthony@timeforfamilies.com or visit www.timeforfamilies.com today.

in Anonymous/Known Donation / Featured Articles / Known Donor / Legal / Parenting / Second Parent Adoption / Step Parent Adoption  by Anthony Brown 1 comments

New Study Shows No Differences in Family Relationships or Child Health Outcomes between Same-sex and Different-sex Parent Households

New Study Shows No Differences in Family Relationships or Child Health Outcomes between Same-sex and Different-sex Parent Households

LOS ANGELES — Households with same-sex parents show no differences from those with different-sex parents with regard to spouse or partner relationships, parent-child relationships, or children’s general health, emotional difficulties, coping and learning behavior, according to a new report by researchers affiliated with the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law, the University of Amsterdam and Columbia University.

“This study is the first to use a nationally representative survey to compare the two types of households by focusing only on those with parents that have been in a continuous relationship,” said lead author Henny Bos, Ph.D.gay parents adoption

The study, titled “Same-sex and Different-sex Parent Households and Child Health Outcomes: Findings from the National Survey of Children’s Health,” compared family relationships, parenting stress and child outcomes in households with female same-sex parents versus different-sex parents.

Ninety-five same-sex parent households were matched to 95 different-sex parent households on eight demographic characteristics – parental age, education, U.S. birth status, and current geographic location, and the studied child’s age, gender, race/ethnicity, and U.S. birth status.

Although the study found no differences in family relationships and child outcomes, same-sex parents reported more parenting stress.

“Future investigations might explore whether the cultural spotlight on child outcomes in same-sex parent families is associated with increased parenting stress,” said psychiatrist and co-author Nanette Gartrell, MD, Visiting Scholar at the Williams Institute. “Some of our earlier studies have shown that lesbian mothers feel pressured to justify the quality of their parenting because of their sexual orientation.”

Click here to read the entire article.

Nanette Gartrell, MD – The Williams Institute

in Parenting / Recently Added / Science  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

Meet the Soon-to-Be 1st Trans Parents in South America

LGBT activist Diane Rodriguez and her boyfriend Fernando Machado are an Ecuadorian couple who are set to become South America’s first-known transgender parents. They recently announced their pregnancy which has received much support for the couple.trans couple

Rodriguez wrote in a Facebook post: “I’m going to be a mum, my boyfriend Fernando Machado is pregnant with me. After having spoken with my family, people who are very close to my life and social environment, I wish to make public one of the news that I think is the most important in my life and that of my partner, Fernando Machado.”

She added that she understood that the announcement would receive comments in favor and against the happy news, however, she believes the news is important for society to change and is something wonderful for her and her boyfriend to celebrate: “But as an activist and transsexual woman committed to a process of profound social transformation , I believe that public opinion must know this wonderful news : Fernando Machado and Diane Rodriguez will be mom and dad.”

Click here to read the entire article.

thenextfamily.com By Alex Temblador

in Family Stories / International / Parenting / Personal Stories  by Anthony Brown 2 comments

ALEC MAPA AND JAMIE HEBERT: FAME, FAMILY, AND FOSTER CARE

“I was booked to perform at one of her R Family Vacations cruises in 2007,” recalls actor Alec Mapa, telling Gays With Kids that he and husband Jamie Hebert were surrounded by so many LGBT families that they just knew fatherhood was in the cards for them, too.

“I met a social worker on the ship specializing in helping LGBT families find foster-adopt placement,” Mapa continues, describing how he got her card and promptly lost it back on land in the junk drawer that is his garage. What happened next was kismet.

“So, when I was finally ready to call this woman, I realized that card was in a box somewhere in that garage! And I reached into a box, and the first thing I touched on was that card. We went to meet her at the Extraordinary Families agency, we took the foster-adopt courses … and nine months later we had a kid living in our house.”alec mapa

If you don’t know “America’s Favorite Gaysian,” you know his face: Mapa’s resume is catalog of critically-acclaimed comedy, from “Desperate Housewives” and “Ugly Betty” (where he played the hyperkinetic Suzuki St. Pierre) to “Devious Maids” and “The Gossip Queens.” He met producer Hebert on the set of his one-man show “Drama” in 2002 and the two have been an item ever since, marrying in 2008.

But this journey to fatherhood differs from most. When Zion came into their lives, he was the kind of kid most prospective parents don’t touch: He was African-American, he was a boy, and, at age five, he was old. Moreover, he was a foster-child, meaning his birthmother had not yet signed away her parental rights. To top it off, he had already been placed with four other families before Alec and Jamie got a hold of him.

“And were like, ‘This is our kid! We’re not giving him back!’” Mapa, 51, laughs. “Three months into our foster placement, he had the TPR — termination of parental rights — and nine months later, he was ours!”

Foster care and adoption are two different legal animals. The latter completely and permanently signs over the rights and responsibilities of the child from the birthparents to the adoptive parents. The child takes the surname of their new family and loses all automatic rights of inheritance with the old. A foster child can, and often does, maintain ties with their biological family even while in the care of another, and the biological parents have the final legal say in decisions concerning their child. Additionally, fostering lacks the permanency of adoption; children often shuffle from one foster family to another until they reach the age of 18, whereupon they are effectively cut loose.

For all the good intentions, it is no secret American foster care is overburdened, with up to 250,000 children entering yearly. It’s not all doom and gloom; 33 percent are back with their families within 11 months, and only seven percent of foster kids remain in care for more than five years. However, the longer a child stays in, the harder it is to get out. Chances for permanent placement drop drastically for children over five, siblings, children of color, and for self-identified LGBTQ youth. Some leave the system only after “aging out” of it, and can face the possibility of being family-less.

“The children in foster care deserve better,” says Rich Valenza, founder and CEO of Raise A Child, Inc., a foster-adopt advocacy and education resource for prospective LGBTQ parents (and for which Mapa is now a spokesperson). “Given the numbers, the solution to the foster care crisis is within reach and the answer is right here within the LGBT community.”

The numbers to which Valenza refers come from a 2013 study conducted by the Williams Institute, a think tank at UCLA Law, confirming no significant difference in children raised by straight and LGBTQ parents, and stated two million gay, lesbian, and bisexual people express an interest in foster parenting. That number dwarfs the 400,000 children in the American foster care system, 104,000 of whom are available for adoption as of this writing.

Adds Mapa, “When we were talking about adoption, I wanted a baby. And when we met Zion, he was five and that was a baby. When you are five, you still need your mommy, you still need your daddy. Or two guys with a really cute house!”

by GaysWithKids.com, August 1, 2016

Click here to read the entire article.

in Family Stories / Foster / Foster Care / Parenting / Personal Stories  by Anthony Brown 2 comments

Same-Sex Parents Still Face Obstacles Under New York’s Standing Rules

Prior to the tragic events of Sunday, June 13, 2016 in Orlando, Florida, one might have felt optimistic about the evolving societal acceptance of and respect for same-sex parents and the corresponding progressive state of family and matrimonial law.

We shared in the sense of uplift from the recent United States Supreme Court decisions in United States v. Windsor and, especially, in Obergefell. v. Hodges, decided a little over one year ago on June 26, 2015. Obergefell dealt in sweeping fashion with discriminatory and unconstitutional objections to marriage for same-sex couples. As set forth in Justice Anthony Kennedy’s dramatic and moving language, the need for same-sex parents, and the children of those relationships, to be granted the social dignity and the many societal benefits that go along with stepping into the light of mainstream acceptance by virtue of a nationwide right to marry is required by the equal protection mandates of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.gay parents adoption

In concluding that its “analysis compels the conclusion that same-sex couples may exercise the right to marry,” 576 U.S. 12 (2015), the Supreme Court in Obergefell detailed not just the importance of being able to enter the institution of marriage, but the need for same-sex couples to do so on fully equal footing as other couples, through the front door, and stressed in its exhaustive analysis that the focus should not be on how these couples love, but that they love and wish for that love to be reflected in their social standing.

Choices about marriage shape an individual’s destiny. As the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts has explained, because “it fulfils yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity, civil marriage is an esteemed institution, and the decision whether and whom to marry is among life’s momentous acts of self-definition. Goodridge, 440 Mass., at 322, 798 N.E. 2d at 955″ cited at 576 U.S. 13 (2015).

As this court held in Lawrence, same sex couples have the same right as opposite-sex couples to enjoy intimate association. Lawrence invalidated laws that made same-sex intimacy a criminal act. And it acknowledged that “[w]hen sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring. 539 U.S. at 567. But while Lawrence confirmed a dimension of freedom that allows individuals to engage in intimate association without criminal liability, it does not follow that freedom stops there. Outlaw to outcast may be a step forward, but it does not achieve the full promise of liberty.

576 U.S. at 14.

Further, Justice Kennedy singled out the importance of the right to marry to the children of these relationships.

Excluding same sex couples from marriage thus conflicts with a central premise of the right to marry. Without the recognition, stability, and predictability marriage offers, their children suffer the stigma of knowing their families to be somehow lesser. They also suffer the significant costs of being raised by unmarried parents, relegated through no fault of their own to a more difficult and uncertain family life. The marriage laws at issue here thus harm and humiliate the children of same-sex couples.

576 at U.S. 15.

In New York, the passage of the Marriage Equality Act in 2011 directed that all of the laws, benefits and obligations bestowed by the Domestic Relations Law with regard to marriage be read and implemented without regard to sexual orientation, and, if necessary to do that, in a gender neutral way.

Section 10-a. Parties to a marriage.

1. A marriage that is otherwise valid shall be valid regardless of whether the parties to the marriage are of the same or different sex.

2. No government treatment or legal status, effect, right, benefit, privilege, protection or responsibility relating to marriage, whether deriving from statute, administrative or court rule, public policy, common law or any other source of law, shall differ based on the parties to the marriage being or having been of the same sex rather than a different sex. When necessary to implement the rights and responsibilities of spouses under the law, all gender specific language or terms shall be construed in a gender-neutral manner in all such sources of law.

Yet, despite the passage of the Marriage Equality Act and the newfound nationwide ability to marry, the courts in New York are contending with circumstances in which same-sex families were formed and children brought into them by using strategies that pre-date the ability of same-sex couples to marry. This approach has potentially devastating consequences when those families and their respective rights are addressed in divorce and family court proceedings. These problems arise from, and the courts continue to wrestle with the vestiges of, a rule established by the New York Court of Appeals a generation ago in Alison D. v. Virginia M., 77 N.Y.2d 651 (1991), which set the stage for categorical discrimination against same-sex parents based upon their lack of a biological or adoptive relationship to a child.

The impact of Alison D. was eroded somewhat by the Court of Appeals decision in Debra H. v. Janice R., 14 N.Y.3d 576 (2010), which, through application of comity, recognized parental standing of a non-biological non-adoptive parent in 2010 based upon Vermont’s judicially created rules granting standing based upon the couple’s civil union in Vermont. However, without the right to marry or enter into a civil union in New York at the time, children of unmarried same-sex couples in New York were not afforded the same benefits and protections.

This discrimination is not so easily remedied by the directives of the Marriage Equality Act because many of the parents involved in these situation were not or are not married at the time that their children are born and because the conceptual framework for the denial of standing is based upon a biologically based terminology that is found throughout the family and matrimonial law. This terminology reflects a fixation with the biomechanics of conception, a fixation which runs deeper than mere gender assumptions. Instead of a focus on the “best interest” of children, which is the bedrock determination of all other matters related to their custody and welfare in New York matrimonial and family law, the New York Supreme, Family and Surrogate’s Courts continue to trip over the threshold issues of “standing” when it comes to same-sex parents because of references to “birth” parents or the heterosexual and gender assumptions implied by the use of the word “paternity.” For example, a “paternity” test directed in Family Court proceeding continues to only apply to men and only to establish the biological relationship of men to children obviously born to women. Perforce, this excludes same-sex couples.

By Meg Canby and Caroline Krauss Browne

law.com

Click here to read the entire article.

in Legal / Parenting / Recently Added / Second Parent Adoption / Step Parent Adoption  by Anthony Brown 2 comments

Co-Parenting – One More Option For Creating Your Family

Co-Parenting is fast becoming an alternative to adoption, surrogacy and IVF for many in the LGBT community who want to have a family on their terms.

Co-parenting is quickly becoming a viable option for gay and lesbian individuals who want to be parents. Co-parenting also requires an incredible amount of care and preparation to ensure that all parties, and particularly the children, are protected and acknowledged legally.

Co-Parenting Defined

In a co-parenting relationship, two individuals who are not romantically involved come together for the purpose of having a child and parenting that child with a mother and a father. The key to understanding co-parenting is in the intention of the mother and father.  Many enter into co-parenting relationships because they do not want to be single parents and acknowledge their desire for their children to have a maternal and a paternal influence.co-parenting

Protecting a Co-Parenting Relationship: The Co-Parenting Agreement

Before entering into a co-parenting relationship, it is crucial to understand the legalities of parenting, as well as the potential pitfalls that may accompany this nontraditional parenting form. First, by becoming a parent, the mother and the father have a fiduciary responsibility to that child, and if the co-parenting arrangement dissolves, to one another in a child support proceeding.  This means that if both parties are not contributing financially to the child’s upbringing, either parent may bring a support action in family court.

Spelling out these financial terms, as well as visitation schedules, educational and religious training is the purview of the co-parenting agreement. The mother and the father will both have separate legal representation in the drafting and execution of a co-parenting agreement and the process of creating a comprehensive agreement will be very helpful for the parties to both feel comfortable with one another and the terms of their individual parenting visions.

Where Can You Meet a Potential Co-Parent?

As this new method of parenting has become more and more popular, so has an internet support industry of which I am a part. Websites such as FamilyByDesign.com, of which I am a legal consultant, and Modamily.com offer information to potential co-parents, as well as a database of individuals who are interested in becoming co-parents to find other such individuals.  Many LGBT Centers around the country now have family divisions that include information and networking about co-parenting.

Special Considerations

One very important aspect of co-parenting lies in the reality that the primary parents may have committed relationships with people other than the other co-parent.   This may be due to their sexual orientation or relationship status when entering into the co-parenting relationship.  Some states now have the ability to name more than two legal parents for a child. But more often than not, these “third party” individuals do not have legal relationships with the children of their romantic partners.  Primary parents must create these rights for their romantic partners by executing medical authorizations and guardianship provisions for the children.

For more information about co-parenting, contact Anthony M. Brown at Time for Families and speak to a specialist family lawyer to secure your and your family’s future or email Anthony at anthony@timeforfamilies.com.

in Featured Articles / Legal / Parenting  by Anthony Brown 0 comments

California Approves LGBT History Lessons for Classrooms

References to gay Americans and events start in second grade.

SAN FRANCISCO—In second grade, California students will learn about families with two moms or two dads. Two years later, while studying how immigrants have shaped the Golden State, they will hear how New York native Harvey Milk became a pioneering gay politician in San Francisco.

California education officials approved those changes in classroom instruction Thursday to comply with the nation’s first law requiring public schools to include prominent gay people and LGBT-rights milestones in history classes.gay family values

The State Board of Education adopted the updates as part of a broader overhaul of California’s history and social-science curriculum. Dozens of people attending the meeting criticized the way Muslims, Hindus and Jews are discussed, but no one spoke out against the new treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights.

“We are proud to represent a diverse state, and we are proud that this framework reflects the state that we serve,” said Lauryn Wild, a Southern California curriculum specialist who chairs the advisory commission that produced the new guidelines.

They weave references to gay Americans and events throughout the history and social-science curriculum, starting in second grade through discussions about diverse families and again in fourth grade with lessons on California’s place in the gay-rights movement.

The guidelines also touch on the topics in fifth and eighth grade—looking at gender roles in the 18th and 19th centuries and examples of individuals who flouted them—and throughout high school.

A capstone of sorts will come in U.S. government courses, where seniors would learn about the 2015 Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide and recent court cases involving bathroom access for transgender students.

The changes are designed to satisfy legislation passed by California lawmakers five years ago that added LGBT Americans and people with disabilities to the list of social and ethnic groups whose contributions schools are supposed to teach and must appear in kindergarten through eighth-grade textbooks.

The legislation also prohibited classroom materials that reflect adversely on gays or particular religions.

The law took effect in January 2012, but its implementation was slowed by opponents’ failed attempts to overturn it, competing educational priorities and budget cuts that stalled work on drafting recommendations for the school board and textbook purchases.

While some school districts and teachers made efforts to incorporate gay history since the law passed, many were nervous about tackling the topic without explicit guidance from the state, said Carolyn Laub, a consultant for a group of LGBT parents called Our Family Coalition.

“If educators perceive, rightly or wrongly, they may not get support from their administration if they face pushback from a parent who says, ‘I don’t want you talking to my kid about that,’ they are reluctant to do a whole lot of inclusion,” Ms. Laub said.

Associated Press  -July 14, 2016

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in Ethics / In the News / Parenting / Science  by Anthony Brown 1 comments