Purpose

This bill updates how courts evaluate and decide parenting time and custody by revising the factors used to determine the best interests of the child, adding specifics about health, safety, and cooperation, and clarifying how parenting responsibilities should be handled.

Main Provisions

• Expanded list of factors for the best interests of the child (to guide custody and parenting time decisions):
  • The child’s physical, emotional, cultural, spiritual, and other needs and how proposed arrangements affect development.
  • Any special medical, mental health, developmental disability, or educational needs requiring special parenting arrangements or services.
  • The child’s reasonable preference if the child is old enough to express a reliable choice.
  • Whether domestic abuse, as defined in 518B.01, has occurred and the implications for parenting and the child’s safety and development.
  • Any physical, mental, or chemical health issues of a parent that could affect the child’s safety or development.
  • Each parent’s history and nature of caregiving for the child.
  • Each parent’s willingness and ability to provide ongoing care to meet the child’s ongoing developmental, emotional, spiritual, cultural needs, and to maintain consistency with parenting time.
  • How changes to home, school, or community affect the child’s wellbeing and development.
  • The impact of proposed arrangements on ongoing relationships with each parent, siblings, and other important people.
  • The benefit to the child of maximizing parenting time with both parents and the detriment of limiting parenting time with either parent.
  • Each parent’s disposition to support the child’s relationship with the other parent and to encourage frequent and continuing contact.
  • The willingness and ability of parents to cooperate in raising the child, share information, minimize conflict, and use dispute-resolution methods for major decisions.
• Detailed findings required:
  • Courts must make detailed findings on each factor with evidence and show how each factor influenced the custody and parenting time decision. No single factor may be used to ignore others; factors may be interrelated.
• Focus on healthy, stable, nurturing relationships:
  • Courts must promote the child’s healthy growth and development through safe, stable, nurturing relationships with both parents.
• Gender neutrality and equal consideration:
  • Courts may not prefer one parent solely because of gender; both parents are presumed capable of nurturing relationships unless substantial reasons suggest otherwise.
  • There can be many valid ways for parents to respond to a child’s needs; parenting approaches may differ by family and culture.
• Disability and behavior:
  • Disability alone (as defined in 363A.03) of a proposed custodian or the child is not automatically determinative of custody.
  • A court may consider violations of certain laws (e.g., 609.507) when determining the best interests of the child.
• Joint custody presumption:
  • A rebuttable presumption that joint legal custody is in the child’s best interests, but this presumption can be rebutted if domestic abuse has occurred.
  • If domestic abuse occurred, the court weighs the nature and context of the abuse and its impact on parenting and the child’s safety and development.
  • There is no automatic presumption for or against joint physical custody; it does not require an absolutely equal division of time.
• Service member deployment:
  • In cases involving a service member’s child, the court may not base the decision only on past or possible deployments when deciding best interests.
• Overall framework:
  • The court must consider both parents capable of nurturing relationships unless there are substantial reasons otherwise, and there are many valid ways to meet a child’s needs beyond traditional expectations.

Significant Changes to Existing Law

• Introduces a comprehensive, multi-factor framework for evaluating the best interests of the child, with an emphasis on detailed, factor-by-factor findings.
• Establishes a strong emphasis on gender neutrality in custody decisions, preventing gender-based bias.
• Creates a presumption in favor of joint legal custody, while allowing that presumption to be rebutted in cases of domestic abuse.
• Clarifies that joint custody does not require an equal split of parenting time.
• Expands consideration of a wide range of factors, including health, developmental needs, and the child’s preferences, and ties these to concrete parenting responsibilities.
• Explicitly states that disability alone should not determine custody.
• Adds protection for service members’ families by preventing deployment alone from dictating best interests.

Practical Implications for Families

• Parents may need to prepare more detailed documentation of caregiving history, plans for meeting the child’s health and development needs, and strategies for cooperation and dispute resolution.
• Courts will assess a broader set of information, including the child’s own preferences and the impact of domestic abuse on parenting arrangements.
• Joint custody decisions will be common, but can be adjusted if abuse has occurred or other compelling factors exist.
• Deployments of service member parents will be considered with broader context, rather than as the sole factor.

Relevant Terms

• best interests of the child
• custody
• parenting time
• joint legal custody
• joint physical custody
• domestic abuse (as defined in 518B.01)
• Minnesota Statutes 2024 section 518.17 subdivision 1
• special medical health developmental educational needs
• reasonable preference of the child
• parental cooperation and dispute resolution
• safe stable nurturing relationships
• gender neutrality
• disability (as defined in 363A.03)
• presumption/rebuttable presumption
• service member child and deployment (518E.102)