In re Scott

• Citation: 999 A.2d 229,160 N.H. 354
• Decision Date: 03 June 2010
• Docket Number: No. 2009–520.,2009–520.
• Court: New Hampshire Supreme Court
• Parties: In the Matter of Roberta L. (Pierce) SCOTT and James P. Pierce.

160 N.H. 354

999 A.2d 229

In the Matter of Roberta L. (Pierce) SCOTT and James P. Pierce.

No. 2009–520.

Supreme Court of New Hampshire.

Argued: April 8, 2010.

Opinion Issued: June 3, 2010.

Wiggin & Nourie, P.A., of Manchester (Andrea Q. Labonte on the brief and orally), for the petitioner.

Law Office of Joshua L. Gordon, of Concord (Joshua L. Gordon on the brief and orally), for the respondent.

DALIANIS, J.

The petitioner, Roberta L. (Pierce) Scott (Wife), appeals an order recommended by a Marital Master (Dalpra, M.) and approved by the Superior Court (Smukler, J.) denying her motion for certain payments from the respondent, James P. Pierce (Husband). We affirm in part, vacate in part and remand.

I. Facts

The record reveals the following facts. The parties married in Massachusetts in 1982 and had two children, a son born in 1983 and a daughter born in 1986. In April 1989, they divorced pursuant to a Massachusetts decree, which expressly incorporated their separation agreement. Under the decree, as modified in October 1989, Husband was to pay child support in the amount of $98 per week plus $15 per week for health insurance premiums until the children were "emancipated," as defined by the decree. In their original stipulation, the parties agreed that their children "should receive the best college education available to them" and that they would meet in the future to discuss "the financial responsibility each of them shall bear" for their children's college expenses. The parties agreed that Massachusetts law governed the interpretation of their agreement and their rights thereunder.

In April 1997, the parties agreed to modify certain aspects of their divorce decree. They stipulated that Husband's total child support obligation would remain $113 per week, but that this amount would be allocated differently: $73 would be for child support, and $40 per week would be placed in an escrow account for Husband's use to visit the children, with whom the stipulation allowed Wife to relocate to California. Any amount not expended from the escrow account by March 30 each year would be deposited in a college education account for the children.

Additionally, the parties agreed to modify the duration of Husband's child support obligation by redefining the circumstances under which the children were "emancipated." Under the original decree, each child was emancipated at age eighteen, unless the child attended college, in which case the child would be emancipated at age twenty-one. By contrast, pursuant to the 1997 stipulation, emancipation occurred when the child reached age twenty-one, unless the child entered college in the September after graduating from high school. In that case, emancipation occurred when the child graduated from college, no longer lived with Wife, or reached the age of twenty-three, whichever occurred first. See Mass. Gen. Laws Ann. ch. 208, § 28 (West 2007). The stipulation did not alter the college expense provision of the original decree. A Massachusetts court approved the parties' 1997 stipulation.

In 2002, after Husband moved to New Hampshire, Wife filed a petition in New Hampshire asking the trial court, among other things, to review the amount of child support under New Hampshire's child support guidelines because more than three years had elapsed since the previous child support order. Thereafter, she registered the Massachusetts decree and orders in New Hampshire. See RSA 546–B:47 (2007).

The trial court granted Wife's petition in October 2003, increasing the amount of Husband's child support for the two children to $187 per week, less the $40 intended for the travel/college escrow fund, and ordering that he contribute $3,000 per year to the college expenses of the parties' son. The 2003 order also required Husband to pay Wife an additional $40 per week toward the $9,360 arrearage he owed to the travel/college escrow account. The 2003 order did not address whether Husband had to contribute to the daughter's eventual college expenses, but required Wife to consult with him about the daughter's plans.

In June 2008, Husband filed a petition to terminate his child support obligations on the ground that his son was older than twenty-three, and his daughter had graduated from college. Wife cross-moved, asking the court to order Husband to pay her: (1) $9,360 plus interest in arrearages owed to the travel/college escrow account as of the date of the trial court's 2003 order and $9,760 plus interest in arrearages owed to that account from the date of the 2003 order to the date of the daughter's graduation from college; (2) $12,000 plus interest for the son's college expenses; (3) a reasonable amount for the daughter's college expenses; and (4) $4,140 plus interest for health insurance premiums between February 2003 and May 2008.

The trial court granted Husband's motion, terminating his child support obligation. Wife does not challenge this part of the trial court's order on appeal. With respect to Wife's cross-motion, although the court found that Husband had not complied with its 2003 order by paying $3,000 per year for the son's college expenses, it ruled that under New Hampshire law, this obligation was unenforceable after February 2, 2004. See RSA 458:17, XI-a (2004) (effective February 2, 2004; repealed and recodified as RSA 461–A:14, V, effective October 1, 2005). The court also found that even if Husband owed an arrearage for the son's college expenses, "any alleged arrearage is significantly less than the amount of child support he paid through May 2008," which, the court concluded, he should not have paid. Because under New Hampshire law, child support terminates when a child turns eighteen or ends his or her high school education, whichever is later, see RSA 461–A:14, IV (Supp.2009), and because Husband continued to pay child support for the daughter while she was in college, the court reasoned that it would be inequitable to require Husband to reimburse Wife for the amounts she claimed. This appeal followed.

II. Standard of Review

"The court's powers in custody, maintenance, and education of children in divorce and separation cases are conferred entirely by statute. We afford broad discretion to the trial court in divorce matters, and will not disturb the trial court's rulings regarding child support absent an unsustainable exercise of discretion or an error of law." In the Matter of Johnson & Johnson, 158 N.H. 555, 558, 969 A.2d 365 (2009) (quotation omitted). "The party challenging the court's order has the burden of showing that the order was improper and unfair." Id. (quotation omitted).

III. Discussion

A. Travel/College Escrow Account Arrearages

Wife first argues that the trial court erred when it declined to order Husband to pay the arrearages to the travel/college escrow account, which she contends are equal to $9,360 until the date of the court's 2003 order and $9,760 from the date of the court's 2003 order to the date of the daughter's graduation from college, plus interest. The trial court declined to order these arrearages because it believed that although Husband paid child support for the parties' daughter until she graduated from college, he was not obligated to do so. Because the amount of child support Husband paid for the daughter exceeded the travel/college escrow account arrearages, the court ruled that they were no longer owed. Wife contends that the trial court's reasoning is flawed under the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (UIFSA). See RSA ch. 546–B (2007). We agree.

1. UIFSA In General

"UIFSA is a model act adopted by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws at the behest of Congress in 1992 and revised in 1996." Marshak v. Weser, 390 N.J.Super. 387, 915 A.2d 613, 615 (App.Div.2007). It was intended to "bring greater efficiency to the process of interstate child support enforcement." Comment, Making Sense of the Changes: The 2001 Amendments to UIFSA, 20 J. Am. Acad. Matrim. Lawyers 323, 323 (2007). UIFSA "governs the procedure for establishing, enforcing, and modifying child and spousal support orders and for determining parentage when more than one state is involved in these proceedings." Annotation, Construction and Application of Uniform Interstate Family Support Act, 90 A.L.R.5th 1, 1 (2001). "[B]y 1998, all 50 states and the District of Columbia had adopted [UIFSA] (1996) as a requirement for receipt of federal funds for child support enforcement." Morgan ed., The Date of Termination as a " Nonmodifiable Aspect" of a Child Support Order Under Section 611 of UIFSA, 16 No. 4 Divorce Litig. 60, 60 (April 2004). New Hampshire enacted UIFSA in 1997, effective January 1, 1998. See Laws 1997, 263:32. Since New Hampshire adopted UIFSA, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws has amended the uniform act twice, once in 2001, and again in 2008. See Symposium, Uniform Interstate Family Support Act, 43 Fam. L.Q. 75, 83 (2008).

To interpret UIFSA, we rely not only upon our ordinary rules of statutory construction, but also upon the official comments to UIFSA. See Wills v. Wills, 16 Neb.App. 559, 745 N.W.2d 924, 928 (2008) ; cf. Bendetson v. Killarney, Inc., 154 N.H. 637, 643, 913 A.2d 756 (2006) (holding that we will look to the official comments of the model act for guidance on the intended meaning of the election statute); Estate of Gordon–Couture v. Brown, 152 N.H. 265, 273, 876 A.2d 196 (2005) (because language of New Hampshire statute is nearly identical to that of model act, we will look to model act as well as to similar statutes from other states to interpret New Hampshire statute); State v. Donohue, 150 N.H. 180, 183, 834 A.2d 253 (2003) (reviewing official comments of Model Penal Code for guidance to interpret analogous New Hampshire statute). Under our ordinary rules of statutory construction, we are the final arbiters of the legislature's intent as expressed in the words of the statute considered as a whole. In re Alexis...