; DETROIT -- It took nearly three years to send them out, but the Wayne County Friend of the Court this week mailed more than $5 million in refund checks to 6,000 county families.
   The checks, which average between $600 and $700, are being sent because the 1996 federal welfare reform laws require that all arrearage payments be sent to families. Under the previous law, the state took any child support arrearage payments from parents who received public assistance.
   "Child support can make the difference from someone being on public assistance or not," said Karen Smith of the Family Independence Agency in Lansing.
   The laws requiring states to send all child support payments to families first became effective Oct. 1, 1998. But Michigan's computer system was not set up to accommodate the change, so the state continued to collect those payments and later mailed refunds, according to Llenda Jackson-Leslie, Wayne County Circuit Court spokesperson.
   The state will not be penalized for missing the deadline.
   The Wayne County Friend of the Court is believed to be among the last few counties to issue checks because of the vast number of cases -- 40 percent of the state's case load -- and its computer system is not part of a federally mandated system aimed at tracking deadbeat parents.
   The state's system was able to tackle the task, but not all counties were plugged into it.
   About 67 of Michigan's 83 counties were online with the $327-million computer system in February 1999, and most began sending out refund checks then.
   Wayne County isn't on that system, so the FIA office in Lansing assisted county officials.
   Jackson-Leslie said Wayne County received the money from the FIA last week and mailed the checks Monday.

Detroit News

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