Opinion ID: 883354
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Issues I & II: Modifications to Visitation

Text: Appellant's first two issues both deal with limitations placed on Mr. Hunt's exercise of his visitation privileges; Issue I involves the court's prioritizing the children's prescheduled activities during the visitation periods. Specifically as to this issue, the District Court addressed whether the husband could unilaterally change the son's plans for weekends when the son was scheduled to participate in organized team sports. Issue II involves the court's ordering Mr. Hunt to inform Mrs. Hunt of his itinerary and whereabouts during the time he exercises visitation with the children. As both Issues I and II relate to the ability of the District Court to place restrictions and conditions on visitation, we consider them together. The question common to them both is whether the limitations were justified here. Visitation is an inherent part of child custody, in which the district courts have broad powers to determine all problems concerning custody and visitation. Kanvick v. Reilly (1988), 233 Mont. 324, 329, 760 P.2d 743, 747. The standard of review for custody and visitation is whether substantial credible evidence supports the district court's judgment. In re the Marriage of Nash (1992), 254 Mont. 231, 234, 836 P.2d 598, 600. We will overturn a court's custody or visitation decision only when the court's findings and conclusions clearly demonstrate an abuse of discretion. In re the Marriage of Anderson (1993), 260 Mont. 246, 252, 859 P.2d 451, 454. Thus, the issue before us in this case is whether the court abused its discretion by placing limitations and conditions on the exercise of Mr. Hunt's visitation. See In re the Marriage of Wackler (1993), 258 Mont. 12, 16, 850 P.2d 963, 966. The circumstances behind these two issues are as follows: The parties share joint custody of their two children. Mrs. Hunt has primary physical custody of the children and Mr. Hunt enjoys liberal visitation. Mr. Hunt has insisted upon keeping the details of his place of residence, telephone number, and other pertinent information a secret from Mrs. Hunt. He has not allowed Mrs. Hunt to contact him directly regarding visitation or other matters involving the children and has forced her to contact third parties whenever she has a need to communicate with him for any reason. During the times Mr. Hunt exercises visitation, he has refused to permit Mrs. Hunt to know the whereabouts of the children. During the approximate five-month period from June through October when he is employed, Mr. Hunt does not exercise visitation frequently because of the nature of his job as a pilot; however, during the remaining months of the year, he generally has the children with him on alternating weekends. This has caused problems for Mrs. Hunt because Mr. Hunt will not inform her where he will be during these times and often takes the children out of Billings where they reside with Mrs. Hunt. The record further reveals a litany of communication problems relating to visitation, the activities of the children and the transferring of the children to and from Mr. Hunt for weekend visitation. Mr. Hunt objects to the court's prioritizing of team athletic activities which the parties' 11-year-old son is involved in. Particularly, Mr. Hunt had protested his son's involvement in an organized hockey program in Billings which Mrs. Hunt had arranged and which sometimes required the son to be present for Saturday hockey games. Mr. Hunt also protested the son's attendance at Friday afternoon baseball practices. Mr. Hunt particularly objected to Mrs. Hunt's ability to structure these activities unilaterally, knowing that the commitments to these team sports could interfere with his visitation periods. He argues that the time he spends with his children should take on the nature of `sacred' time and that he should not have to abrogate his custodial rights to fulfill commitments made by Mrs. Hunt. He contends that he cannot be forced to take on a role as the children's baby-sitter and chauffeur for commitments Mrs. Hunt has made for the children. He asks this Court to enforce his right to be involved in the children's outside activities especially during his time of visitation, which he refers to as his custodial time. He claims this is the only way in which he is able to protect his ability to have frequent and continuing contact with his children and share in the rights and responsibilities of child raising. Mr. Hunt's second issue relates to the District Court imposing conditions upon him without imposing the same conditions upon Mrs. Hunt. We note that there is no evidence in the record that this has been a problem for Mr. Hunt. To the contrary, Mr. Hunt knows where Mrs. Hunt resides with the children, he knows the telephone number there and, in fact, often speaks with the children over the telephone. There is additional evidence in the record that Mrs. Hunt has advised Mr. Hunt in the past through third parties when she has taken the children away from Billings. Mr. Hunt contends that the above-described restrictions imposed on him by the District Court concerning his exercise of visitation constitute a modification of custody and, thus, the District Court abused its discretion by modifying custody without making specific findings of fact that such modification was in the best interests of the children. We disagree. The District Court here was faced with a visitation problem compounded by the parties' inability or refusal to communicate with each other about their children and what is best for them. Mrs. Hunt asked the court to specify visitation conditions; she did not ask for a change in visitation. The District Court has the power to clarify visitation rights and to specify times for a parent's exercise of visitation and the mode of arranging for visitation. Section 40-4-217(3), MCA, allows the District Court to modify an order granting or denying visitation whenever modification would serve the best interest of the child... See, e.g., Baker v. Baker (1982), 198 Mont. 371, 646 P.2d 522. More recently, in In re the Marriage of Kovash (1993), 260 Mont. 44, 52, 858 P.2d 351, 356, we affirmed a district court's decision which conditioned future visitation upon the father's behavior toward his children in the exercise of his visitation. In Wackler, 850 P.2d at 966, the district court modified the visitation schedule, stating that: Section 40-4-217(3), MCA, grants the district court authority to modify an order granting or denying visitation whenever modification would serve the best interest of the child... . In this instance, Rebecca was not prejudiced by the lack of notice because the District Court only clarified visitation rights as a result of some apparent confusion relating to the previous visitation schedule. Rebecca's counsel was able to discuss these matters and properly raise Rebecca's concerns as to Thomas' request to extend visitation rights, which was denied. We hold that the District Court did not err in its clarification of Thomas' visitation rights. The present case is directly comparable to Wackler. There is ample evidence in the record to support the court's findings that the best interests of the children are served by communication between the mother and father regarding the father's itinerary for his weekend visitation, advance notice of 48 hours prior to scheduling visitation and giving priority in scheduling visits to the children's outside activities. During the hearing on the parties' motions for modification of the original decree, the court stated as follows: [THE COURT] Now visitation. I am not exactly sure what has been requested there. The way you all are going about it is all wrong. I know it takes two to communicate but I know also that one person can sabotage the whole thing. I had only heard the two of you testify here today, but judging from that, Mr. Hunt, I would have to say that you are probably more at fault there for the lack of communication than Mrs. Hunt ... If I were going to give you some suggestions, I would say you got to learn how to communicate. You got to get that chip off your shoulder, you got to get over being mad. Quit spending money on an attorney, good as he may be in these kinds of proceedings, what you need is someone to give you some counseling in how to be able to communicate with an ex-spouse. The simple matter of it is, is that you either learn that or you run a real big risk of messing up these two kids. The rate you are going, these kids will be lucky if they come out of this without some serious emotional scars... . If you don't do it, the kids are the ones that suffer. ... I do know if they are involved in your fighting that that's not good for them. You cannot put these kids in the middle. They will tell each of you separately what they think you want to hear... . It's not fair of you guys to make him choose, that's absurd. He is too little to have that kind of burden, he is just a kid, you guys are the adults. What you have to do, is you have to realize team sports have a different obligation than individual sports. Team sports you have got an obligation to the team as well as to yourself, so if you are involved in a team sport, if you are going to get involved in a team sport in the first place, which is something the parents ought to discuss especially in this situation like this where if you think forward down the road, you realize it's going to have some effects on visitation. But if he is going to be there, then you got to expect that it's going to effect your visitation some because he is going to need to go to those team sports whether it's baseball or hockey or whatever. Now if you don't want that to be the situation, the two of you need to discuss that ... you can't leave it up to him, and you can't make him choose at the last minute, it's not fair. So again, that gets back to the beginning point involving the child, that is you have to learn how to discuss these things and if you can't, the child is going to suffer. If you have to work through intermediaries ... it's not going to likely be a situation that will work. You can't, there is not enough discussion of details in a short enough time to be able to reach decisions, and what will happen is what happened in this case, mom will make the decision because dad is not involved, you have got to get involved. Although the court stated its belief that the parties would benefit from counseling in order to learn how to communicate with one another for the benefit of the children, it did not order such counseling and further did not order that the parties communicate with one another other than to order Mr. Hunt to provide Mrs. Hunt with the above-described information concerning the children's whereabouts when they spend time with their father. In addition to other support from the record, including the comments of the District Court, Mr. Hunt testified during the hearing as follows: Q. (by Mr. Sweeney): All your former wife is asking for, Mr. Hunt, is for you to give advance notice of when you're coming to Billings to see the children, that you let her know your itinerary, and the address and telephone number where the children and you can be reached if necessary, and that you take into account in making your plans for the visits the activities of your children. A. [Mr. Hunt] I don't have any problems with that, Mr. Sweeney. Subsequently, when examined by his own counsel, Mr. Hunt further testified: Q. [by Mr. Leckie] You're not telling the Court that you have any objection to maintaining the kids and their interests or activities are you? A. No I'm not. Mr. Hunt's testimony before the District Court does not indicate that he would have difficulty with the subsequent decision of the court to prioritize the children's activities, nor does it indicate that he would have difficulty with providing Mrs. Hunt certain information concerning his exercise of visitation. The record indicates further that the District Court considered the effect that the current situation could have on the children and considered their best interests in its ruling clarifying visitation. The record further provides that although Mr. Hunt has expressed a desire to share in decision-making regarding the children's activities, he has refused to communicate with Mrs. Hunt except through third-party intermediaries. The District Court determined that this was not a satisfactory method of communication for such matters. We conclude that the conditions placed on visitation, under the circumstances presented in this case, were ordered with the best interests of the children as the primary consideration. We hold the District Court did not abuse its discretion by requiring Mr. Hunt to provide information to Mrs. Hunt concerning his visitation with his children. We further hold that the court did not abuse its discretion by ordering that priority be given to the children's scheduled activities.