DOUGHERTY: And, I'll sound like a broken record. Make sure you have a witness form filled out. Please proceed, and introduce yourselves and where you're from.

     CLIFTON: My name is Larry Clifton, and this is my wife, Robin Clifton. We're from Christian County, in Sparta, Missouri.

     And, I'd like to go ahead and address first, I guess. I'm 36 years old. I'm a divorced father of two young girls. I'm here in Jeff City for my girls, fighting for their correct upbringing.

     DOUGHERTY: Mr. Clifton, bring that microphone forward.

     CLIFTON: I am a non-custodial parent. I pay for their health insurance, their dental, their eye wear, and their child support. I spend three days a week in their presence, at my home. As a father, I tell them often I love them. They are my world. I help bring them in this world, through an operation, because of a low sperm count. I bore as much pain as their mother.

     After 16 years of marriage, a divorce under certain circumstances was brought into my two girl's lives. This divorce took my home, all my possessions, and my girls from myself. Every lawyer that I talked to said I did not have a chance in court to have custody granted to me, because I'm a father.

     Because I am a father, right from the beginning, I'm categorized as someone who is irresponsible in the eyes of the system. What I don't understand, is why I am in that category. Am I in a category of a pedophile, or maybe a deadbeat because I'm a father.

     Since I have been divorced, I've noticed how TV depicts fathers. On father's day, of this year, while sitting with my two girls, most every channel had crimes on males, such as assault to women and children. This is the one day that the nation commends fathers, and not defile him. Because I am a male, I should be given an equal opportunity to raise and protect my children. If I have no final say so as a non-custodial parent has, how, as a father, can I protect, teach, show, my girls the love that comes from a father in those categories. Why must I have to pay almost 50 percent of my girl's income to an ex-wife, when nowhere near that much will go to my girls, and still have no say so in my children's well being. Is this why the nation has so much unpaid child support? Is this why there are so many deadbeat parents? Is this why our children are out of control, because the lack the discipline of a father can show?

     Parents United as One, wants both parents as equal to the children, and not unequal to a non-custodial parent. Let's stop this one-sided theory and get back to raising their children, so our nation will prosper in the coming years. I'm not a deadbeat father. I am very, very much concerned about my two girls, and as being a non-custodial parent, I have no final say so.

     My eleven year old girl is dating a 13-year old boy. Shouldn't be happening. I have no final say so.

     My ex-wife is driving around in a new car, has a new double-wide, and I'm paying seven hundred and some dollars a month. A box of cereal doesn't cost four or five dollars. The least that this committee could do is pass a law and show receipts from where my hard-earned money is going. I want things to happen for my children. I don't mind paying child support. It's my responsibility, and I want that responsibility. But, I don't want it to be abused. I want my girls to have a father. And, if I can't tell my oldest daughter that a 13-year old boy is too old for her, then I've lost being a father, and there's no father up here that can't tell me that they wouldn't want that for their daughter, but when the government pulls it away from them, they don't have a choice, and that's why there's so many deadbeat fathers. That's why fathers are depicted like they are. But, if we can't have a chance, what are we supposed to do. That's all I have to say. Thank you, very much.

     DOUGHERTY: Thank you. It was Larry, is that correct?

     CLIFTON: Excuse me?

     DOUGHERTY: Would you like to comment, Robin? Let's take just a moment here and ask a few questions, if we could, and then we'll come to, is it Robin, in just a minute.

     Can you tell us, in the divorce, what type of divorce decree was given to you, what kind of custody arrangement was ....

     CLIFTON: It was a joint custody. The lawyer had told me that in order, for like the visitation, which I despise. I'm not a visitor. My kids are not a visitor. I'm a parent. I'm a father. That I could see my children every other week, every evening birthday that they have and on father's day from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., unless - that's what would happen if my wife was to get mad at me. That's what in the creed, and that's what he told me, that the government had set aside for if there is a nongrievance, which found out later that that isn't true. And, as far as the child support rules, the lawyer sat at a table, opened a book up, put a piece of paper over the book, and went down line-by-line, so I couldn't see it until it got to the bottom, and when it finally got to the bottom, is when I got really mad, because it was a gross amount. I don't know if you all have seen the book. I'm sure you have. Take your income, and try it on the book, and see if you can live, and tell me where all the money is going, because it doesn't take every day, $100.00, to raise two little girls.

     DOUGHERTY: You have joint custody?

     CLIFTON: Yes.

     DOUGHERTY: And, then you have the visitation schedule in the decree?

     CLIFTON: Yes, Sir.

     DOUGHERTY: Is that visitation schedule being respected?

     CLIFTON: Yes, that.....

     DOUGHERTY: That part's okay. In your case it is?

     CLIFTON: Yes.

     DOUGHERTY: Your point is, you're saying the joint custody decree situation, as you have it, you don't have any say so, even you though you have joint custody.

     CLIFTON: It says in my decree I have no final say so on church, school, any final decisions. I have no final say, but the custodial does, which my wife has used against me countless times.

     SENATOR YECKEL: Mr. Chairman.

     DOUGHERTY: Yes, go ahead.

     YECKEL: I have a question for you. Does that mean, then, that he doesn't have joint legal custody?

     DOUGHERTY: I'd like to see that one. That's an interesting one.

     Representative Smith.

     REPRESENTATIVE SMITH: Get back to Senator Caskey's admonition, how do you think we ought to change the law?

     CLIFTON: I that, as far as child support, they should have to keep the receipts, that they say they're spending. I think that should be set up.

     SMITH: It's already in the law.

     CLIFTON: It's already in the law. How come nobody knows about it? You see these things, when the divorced fathers go to court, they don't know this. The lawyers are not telling them. It's not right. I've found out a lot of things since I have met Robert, that I wish I would have known then, and I am up here to, mostly what I'm looking for is to have say so over the final. I want children to have a chance, and to help the fathers that are starting to get divorced, because there (inaudible - witness sitting too close to PA mike, getting a garbled sound). That's why I'm here.

     SMITH: So, besides the receipts, what else would you like?

     CLIFTON: I would like to have an equal - I would like to have an equal say so in the final decision of my children, because I feel that the reason the children are (inaudible - witness sitting too close to PA mike, getting garbled sounds) is because they have no father in their lives, and even if they do have a father in their lives, the government is saying, we don't have the final say so.

     SMITH: Are you talking about the major issues that you want to have a say so on, like church and doctors, and .....

     CLIFTON: I wouldn't say so much as far as church and school. The only thing, that being, is if they moved out of state, somewhere far away, then I'd like to have a final say so, and my daughter is too young to date a 13-year old. My daughter is too young to spend the night there. Just father things. Nothing more.

     SMITH: It's pretty tough to do, though, when you live in one place and your children live in another place.

     CLIFTON: It's even tougher when this creed says I don't have final say so, when there's no mediation or nothing or no where you can go, except to the courts, and that costs a lot of money, and it takes a lot time. In the meantime, your daughters.....

     SMITH: Mediation would, in the end, cost money, right?

     CLIFTON: Yes, as long as it was fair, yes.

     SMITH: But, it would also cost money, is what I'm getting at. If we, in the legislature, set up some type of medication system, it's going to cost some money, then, unfortunately, who pays for that in the end. I don't think you're going to see what the general public wants the legislature or your state government to pay for that. So then it's going to be on you, or the father or the mother to pay for that.

     CLIFTON: And, if the general public doesn't want to pay for that, then who is paying the Child Support Services?

     SMITH: For the Child Support Services?

     CLIFTON: Yes, Sir.

     SMITH: Well, you are, the taxpayers.

     CLIFTON: Yes, Sir.

     SMITH: So, you want the taxpayers, also, to pay for the mediation service?

     CLIFTON: Well, they're paying for the child support. I think this is - my daughters is going to grow up without a father, basically, a father's say so. My daughter is going to marry some - and when you have a wife and a husband, and the wife has never seen a father relationship, how is she going to treat her husband? It's going to end in divorce.

     SMITH: I would submit to you that it is difficult, if not impossible, for the legislature to legislate good parenting. I just don't know how to do it. And, if you can give us the answers, I'd be more than happy to try to fashion that into legislation, but I just don't know how we do that.

     CLIFTON: I was just looking at the future, Sir.

     SMITH: No, I understand what you're saying, but, I don't know how to do it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

     DOUGHERTY: Senator Yeckel.

     YECKEL: Mr. Clifton, I was wondering how your girls are doing in school?

     CLIFTON: Excuse me?

     YECKEL: How are your daughters doing in school?

     CLIFTON: My daughters are average, although my youngest daughter went from straight A, last year, to below average this year.

     YECKEL: Okay, and did the school call you about that?

     CLIFTON: The school does not contact me. They don't consider me as a parent. I have tried to step into the principal's office, and I know the principal firsthand, and I say hello to him, the days I take my children, which is Monday and Tuesday, and they don's consider me as a parent, because they spend too much money sending circulars to  two different parents, so they send it to the custodial.

     YECKEL: Okay. Thank you.

     CLIFTON: Thank you.

     DOUGHERTY: I just have one further question on your description. You say, your decree says joint custody, and then you say there's, I'll use the word, "there's a but in there somewhere that says you don't have say so over certain items?

     CLIFTON: Yes, Sir, it does.

     DOUGHERTY: Okay, thank you, very much. Robin?

     SENATOR BENTLEY: Could I ask a question?

     DOUGHERTY: Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't hear you. Please, Senator Bentley.

     BENTLEY: I would like to see you work, well, you probably have tried to work with the principal. You've acknowledged that, but, if you have joint legal custody, then, you have a right to get reports from the school, and have that kind of relationship. You are a parent.

     CLIFTON: Yes, Ma'am. I would love to have that.

     BENTLEY: Is Sparta Christian County? Is that the county where you're divorce decree was.....

     CLIFTON: I'm not sure. They go to school. They go to school at Hardenville, and we live in Sparta, so, we have to drive from Sparta, when we have them, all the way to Hardenville, and then back.

     BENTLEY: Wow, that's about, what? 35 miles?

     CLIFTON: Yes, Ma'am. It's a distance, but it's worth it.

     DOUGHERTY: Robin?

     ROBIN CLIFTON: Okay, Larry has said mostly how I feel about being a parent. I watch my husband go through so much, because of the lack of communication with his children's mother. It's very unfair, because he has no say, what goes on in their live.

     They both went to the Children's First Program, before the divorce. It doesn't work. I've been through it myself.

     The child support is so high that dad's have to have no time to spend quality time with the children, because they have to work overtime to pay support, plus, have the money for his own life, and I don't see who has the right to tell a non-custodial parent when or where they can see their child. No judge should have to make that decision.

     That's, basically, how I feel about it, and I don't think anybody is seeing the real thing, and these wives and mothers are using their anger through the children, and it's hurting the child more than anything, and nobody is really seeing it.

     That's it.

     DOUGHERTY: Are there questions?

     BENTLEY: I would like to ask one about the Children First Program. You said you don't have much faith in it. It doesn't work.

     ROBIN CLIFTON: It hasn't worked. I've watched - you go in and you watch a video, like, what was it, two or three times.....

     CLIFTON: Uh huh.

     ROBIN CLIFTON: .....and, it's to show you the things not to do to hurt children, and to put them first, and it shows the bad things that each parent would do to conflict against the other parent, and I've watched his children's mother do all those things, and it didn't help.

     KASTEN: To further expound on that, we've been told that the video of the vendettas are not particularly realistic. Is that true, or are you talking about a series of situations the divorces go through. Is that what you're......

     ROBIN CLIFTON: Yeah.

     KASTEN: Are they not realistic? Is that why they don't work?

     ROBIN CLIFTON: I think the videos are basically what goes on. They're realistic, but, the message is not getting across, because the parent is not seeing the damage that she's doing or he doing, anybody, to the child, because of the anger they're still doing, they're using the child, basically, for whatever reason.

     KASTEN: I realize that. I had always thought those were very good, and I was wondering, you're saying that they're good, but they just don't comply, or they're not applied, is that what you're saying?

     CLIFTON: What probably needs to happen, is you go in there, and you said you watched videos, and everybody just looks around the room. What needs to happen is one-on-one. You're paying for it. What needs to happen is somebody there, a psychologist needs to talk, one-on-one with each group of parents to let them know that they can't pull the child to use against you, like in my case, everything is kept quiet, because the money is not going to the children, so my children don't talk to me. They have let things out once in a while about her new husband going to Bass Pro, and my youngest daughter will say, no, be quiet, you're not supposed to say that, and it's things like this that are being used constantly against me, using my children, and that's what I don't like.

     KASTEN: Those of us that worked all these years on children using families, we know that to be true, that the children use parents. I have thought that series would be helpful to families. You say it needs to be followed up by discussions, is that what would make it more applicable, do you think?

     CLIFTON: Yes, Ma'am, like at the beginning, before the course, you have to have, with this Children First, a psychologist should talk to each parent that is getting divorced, one-on-one, yes, I believe that.

     KASTEN: Thank you.

     DOUGHERTY: Thank you, both, very much. Just a suggestion, not that people pay attention to the law anyway, but there's a chapter in the law that explains unless you are forbidden because of domestic violence or child abuse, you have a legal right to those documents, and I suggest, maybe, waving that in front of them and suggesting they contact their lawyer might be helpful.

     CLIFTON: Sir, I would do all that, except that it costs so much money, and the money that I send to my ex-wife would be used back against me.

     DOUGHERTY:   No, no, I didn't say hire a lawyer. I just said, I suggest you get it xeroxed from the library, of that particular section, and hand it to the principal. They usually don't like trouble, anyway. I would suggest that.

     CLIFTON: Thank you, very much, Sir. I will do that. (Audience applauding)