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[h1 align=center]DADS of Michigan Legislative Forum[/h1]
[p align=center]Thursday, February 19
11:30 - 1:30 PM
Mackinac Room of the Anderson House Office Building
124 North Capitol
Lansing, Michigan[h2]CALL FOR ATTENDANCE AND PARTICIPATION[/h2][p]DADS of Michigan will be sponsoring a Legislative Forum in Lansing, Michigan on Thursday, February 19 from 11:30 - 1:30 PM at the Mackinac Room of the House Office Building. At the Legislative Forum we will review the family legislative agenda for 2004, family education programs, global joint custody programs, trends on families and children, and US Department of Health and Human Services strategies for family preservation. Complimentary luncheon will be provided.[h2]LEGISLATIVE FORUM AGENDA[/h2][p]11:30 AM
 Welcome and Introductions (lunch is served)[p]11:35 AM
 DADS of Michigan PAC Introduction[p]11:40 AM
 Current Situation of Family, Children, and Marriage[p]11:55 AM
 Recommended Solutions[p]12:15 PM
 Keynote Speakers[p]12:30 PM
 Family Preservation[p]12:40 PM
 Paternity and Access[p]12:55 PM
 Family Court Reform[p]1:05 PM
 Parent Education[p]1:15 PM
 Conclusion[h2]PETITION DRIVE MEETING[/h2][p]From 10:00 AM – 11:00 AM we will announce our initiative to amend the Child Custody Act to provide for a presumption of joint custody. During the meeting we will be presenting a summary our state-wide petition effort, a schedule of activities and milestones and organizing information for our regional directors and volunteers.[h2]DAY SCHEDULE[/h2][p]9:00 AM - 10:00 AM
 Political Action Committee Call on Legislators[p]10:00 AM - 11:00 AM
 Public Petition Drive Meeting[p]11:30 AM -1:30 PM
 Legislative Forum with Complimentary Lunch[p]1:30 PM
 Visit with Legislators Offices and Ad Hoc Meetings[h2]DRIVING DIRECTIONS AND CONTACT INFORMATION[/h2][p]The following web site provides detailed driving directions to the capital area complex:[p]http://www.michigan.gov/documents/gethere_14067_7.PDF[p]Please direct all inquires regarding this event to DADS of Michigan PAC Chairman Jim Semerad ([email protected], 248-693-0558) or Vice-Chairman Jim Tracey ([email protected], 517-437-9547).[p align=center]DADS of Michigan is an Affiliate of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children
6632 Telegraph Rd, Ste 110
Bloomfield Hills, MI 48301
248-559-DADS
[email protected]

From my inbox:

Date:  Tue, 24 Aug 2004 13:22:01 -0700 (PDT)
From:  Alan Radloff
Reply-To:  [email protected]
Subject:  [azfrmembers] Need pictures of your kids?
To:  [email protected]

After being told the last 3 years that my children did not have photos taken, except for their student ID card and for the school yearbook, I discovered it is possible to obtain copies of those photos. Lifetouch Phots, located at 4925 W Bell Rd, Suete C10A takes about 90% of the school photos in Arizona. Their telephone number is 1-800-450-3866 or 602-938-6254. I met with them yesterday, they checked their records and found photo packages were done the last 3 years on all my children. They gave me the opportunity to purchase those minim package of the const of $23 per packgage, plus a $10 late fee. They only keep the negatives for 1 year after the photos were taken so I was able to obtain last year's photos, plus this years and a picture of my daughter graduating from high school. While it is not much, at least I will have current photos of my kids.

When I told them other NCP's may be facing the same situation, they encouraged me to pass on this information. You will need to provide them with the school name, grade, childs name and if possible the teacher or homeroom advisor.

Hope this helps out those of you searching for information on your kids.

Never Give Up and Never Give In!!! Your are a parent for life!!!!

Alan

I received a message from Dr. Jen yesterday. She has had a family emergency that called her out of town and has taken up all of her free time for the past few weeks. She will be back to support this board soon, but we need to be patient.

Meanwhile, I hope you will continue to support each other.

SPARC admin and leadership team members have been monitoring this board closely, but have been keeping a hands-off attitude because we really want this board to be by and for non-custodial mothers.

As moderators of all the boards, we have always preferred to err on the side of those who post, and not delete messages unless they were clearly unacceptable. Although there have been a few negative posts on this new board, I don't think they have crossed this line yet, especially since some of the responses helped to explain why this board is so necessary. We look at the whole discussion, not just the individual posts, and sometimes a few negative statements can bring a flood of positive responses.

Dr. Jen has promised to return soon. The SPARC leadership team is also considering asking other experienced NCP Moms to assist her as moderators on this board. Please be patient and continue to support one another.

Thanks!
TGB, SPARC Admin, and the SPARC leadership team.

Another biased article.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14870310/site/newsweek/page/1

Here is the response I sent to [email protected]

I have worked with many parents, both fathers and mothers, who were victims of an alienating parent. In many cases that I know of, the victim parent was clearly able to show the court that alienation was taking place, but was unable to get custody because that, alone, is not reason to subject the children to the trauma of a change in custody. I don't know of any judges that will change custody just because a parent is alienating the child. Only when the behaviors of the alienating parent are clearly hurting the child will the judge consider changing custody.

Parental alienation is a form of emotional and psychological abuse of the children. In all of the severe cases that I have seen, the alienated child feels a strong need to "protect" the alienating parent. Alienating parents depend, to an unhealthy, suffocating extent, on the attentions of their children. They are also very adamant that the children are "my children". They are incapable of recognizing the contributions of the other parent to the children's well-being.

When I work with alienated parents, I make sure that they are carefully documenting not only the alienation, but also how that alienation is affecting the children. It is critical, in a court case, to prove that the alienating parent is hurting the children through his or her behavior.

The best place to start is with school and medical records. In nearly every severe alienation case I have worked with, the child has had very poor grades in school. This is not because the child is unable to perform, but because the child has high absenteeism, repeated failures to turn in homework, and discipline or behavior problems in class. The medical records will show that the absences are not based on true illness, but if the child saw the doctor at all when absent the complaint was very minor. I have even seen where doctors wrote in the record that the child was clearly making excuses to get out of school.

True alienating parents are unable to properly discipline their children, and are so nurturing that they are unable to assist the child in overcoming the inevitable problems that people encounter in their daily lives. Instead they and their children become eternal "victims" of the people and circumstances around them. If a child has discipline problems in school, it's the teacher's fault. If a child fails to turn in homework, the alienating parent is always there to help come up with an excuse. If there are financial problems, it is because the ex is failing to provide proper support.  Never will an alienating parent admit that they are in any way contributing to their own situation or that of their child.

To alienating parents, the world is divided into two groups of people, those who are with them and those who are against them. They are constantly seeking sympathy and trying to win people over to their point of view, to align them against the "evil parent" and the "conspiracy" that is trying to take away his or her children.

The only thing that bothers me is that, all too often, an alienating parent is successfully able to manipulate the world into believing their story. Without any evidence to show that they are the better parent, or that the other parent is an evil batterer, they expect the world to believe them. The other parent is left with a never-ending barrage of accusations, unproven allegations, and innuendo against which he or she must defend or lose all access to the children. Every time an alienated parent meets a demand of the alienated parent or proves that an allegation is false, there is a new allegation, requirement, or barrier created by the alienating parent to prevent access to the children.

Remember the Elian Gonzalez case? Every time Mr. Gonzales met the demands of the relatives who had Elian, demands they made him comply with in order to see his child, they came up with a new requirement or excuse to keep the child away from his father. His only recourse was to go to court and fight for his son. Fortunately, he won. I was extremely disappointed, however, that his win was on a technicality of the immigration law instead of on the merits of his rights as a loving, caring father.

Did Sarah Childress even bother to look at the court records on Genia Shockome's case? I'm talking about the very thick file in the courthouse, not the selected documents, if any, that would have been shown her by Genia. If she had, she would have seen it clearly documented why the Father won custody. Judge's don't just transfer custody on a whim. They look at the evidence. What evidence did Sarah look at before creating such a biased article? Did she even talk to the father and ask him for his side of the story? Was she yet another gullible victim of an alienating parent? I would expect better of a reputable news magazine such as Newsweek.

Respectfully,
TGB

I recently met one-on-one with Wade Horn, the Secretary of Heath and Human Services and a founder of the National Fatherhood Initiative (//www.fatherhood.org). He reserved a whole afternoon in his schedule to visit with a few of us at a father's charity I work with (in addition to SPARC, I work with //www.aboutdads.org). The single best thing that George W. ever did was to appoint Wade to this position. Remember all the howls set up by the feminists when he did that?

Almost immediately after Dr. Horn was appointed four years ago, I started hearing about the changes that he was making. I attended a family support convention in my state, where I was the ONLY representative of noncustodial parents amongst hundreds of support enforcement people. In the seminars and discussions I was amazed at all the changes that were taking place. I have continued, over the past 4 years, to work with a number of government agencies, and continue to be very impressed with the quiet, behind the scenes changes that have not been in the papers but that are extremely apparent to anyone who works with these federal agencies.

In June, I had the opportunity, along with several friends, to assist in making presentations to the National Head Start Institute on Fatherhood, where several thousand social workers and Head Start program officials went to learn about the importance of fathers and how to get them more involved. A significant portion of the presentations focused on noncustodial fathers. No such national meeting would ever have occurred under Clinton, nor is it likely under ANY left-wing administration with their close ties to NOW. They would not risk alienating such a major constituency.

There have been many other changes that are moving in the direction of fathers. Most have not been widely publicized. Changes to rules and laws have allowed fathers to get forgiven for some child support arrearages. Programs in prisons now help fathers who owe child support to get it adjusted for the time they have no income. Programs have been started that focus on helping dads who owe child support to find work, to get job training, or receive other benefits formerly only given to custodial parents. In my state there are even programs that help teach mothers applying for child support to work with the fathers.

Government agencies and nonprofit social agencies have been encouraged or required to look at their programs and make sure that they are "father friendly." Practices that typically discriminate against men are stopped or changed. Father advocates or father involvement specialists have been hired or designated at many agencies.

There is still a VERY long way to go, but I'm extremely excited by all the changes I have seen over the past four years. I pray that Dr. Horn will have an opportunity to continue his work.

Please consider this when casting your vote this week.

Like many fathers, I am excited about the father-friendly position of Michael Badnarik. But unlike many on the message boards and e-mail groups I frequent, I am NOT going to waste my vote on him.

12 years ago I had many friends who, disgusted with both of the major candidates for President, decided to Vote for Ross Perot. I liked Ross, and would have voted for him myself, if I had thought he had a chance of winning. I wasn't willing then, either, to throw my vote away. I wasn't particularly fond of Bush Sr., but I knew that a vote for Bill was also a vote for Hillary and her sisterhood of feminazis and I didn't want either of them in office.

After the election I talked with many who had voted for Ross Perot, and most of them regretted it. All those votes did was allow Clinton to win.

Thanks!
TGB

I am preparing a presentation for the National Head Start Training Institute on Father Involvement in Dallas for June 15-17. I need at least two nonresident fathers in that area who can be part of a panel to discuss their involvement in their child(ren)'s schooling and how it affected the child(ren). May also be asked to discuss how the teacher's or school's attitude towards you affected your involvement. There will be two presentations per day for each of the three days.

I don't know if my proposal will be accepted, but I have reason to hope it will be.

I have attended Head Start meetings like this before. I am very excited about the positive attitude presented on father involvement in their children's education. For the most part, these people are genuinely interested in increasing father involvement.

Significant others, teachers, or custodial mothers may also be suitable for this presentation, if they have first-hand knowledge of a father's relationship with the child(ren)'s school or teachers and how that affected the child(ren).

Thanks! Please respond by sending me an e-mail at [email protected]