Court Opinion

ID: 9579500
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:55:46.568027+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:35:33.342260
License: Public Domain

AMUNDSON, Justice
(concurring in part and dissenting in part).
On Issue II, it is unclear whether the court considered Christopher’s actual needs, or Mother’s wants and desires, in making its determination.* The trial court’s findings of *532fact are replete with concerns for Mothers needs instead of Christopher’s. The crux of the issue' is Christopher’s standard of living, which the trial court found to be dictated by Mother’s earnings. These parties never lived together, nor has Christopher lived with his Father. Yet the trial court thought it was appropriate to multiply the guideline amount of $687 by 254%.
Although we agree that Fathers standard of living must be considered in making a determination, SDCL 25-7-6.9 requires the final award to be set at an “appropriate level, taking into account the actual needs and standard of living of the child.” (Emphasis added.) The explicit language and goal of this statute is to meet Christopher’s needs and standard of living, not Mother’s needs nor Father’s standard of living. Mother’s testimony reiterates her own desires for a standard of living commensurate with Father. An excerpt of her testimony on her budget is as follows:
Q. ... What kind of car are you driving?
A. ’85 Dodge Lancer. c
Q. What kind of shape is that car in?
A. It’s got some problems.
Q. Would you like to be able to have a more rehable car?
A. Sure.
Q. How do you get the kid to and from the sitter?
A. ... I drive him.
Q. I notice here you have a credit card payment that shows an outstanding balance of about eighteen hundred. Is that — do you run about at that level all the time?
A. Probably right around there.
Q. It doesn’t show that you have any life insurance but that it is something that you would like. You have no private insurance of your own?
A. No, just through work I have a small one.
You would like to be able to provide for your child, I assume, some life insurance? O’
Yes. <j
How old is the child now? O
Christopher is two and a half. <3
Have you thought of the kinds of things that you would like to be able to provide for him in the future? O
I would like to be able to take him places and just provide things that he wanted, he needed.
Have you considered musical lessons or any of those kinds of things that he might in the future need or want? <©
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Q. Have you considered preschool?
A. Not right now. Maybe a year or two down the road ... [.]
Both this testimony and the trial court’s findings of fact are lacking statements of Christopher’s needs; rather they include “vehicle payment,” “eating out,” “vacations,” and “life insurance” as Mother’s “desires to provide for the child.”
We agree that these items are desirable amenities of life. However, Mother has not shown how they are “needs” for two and one-half year old Christopher. Therefore, Moth*533er has not sustained her burden of proving what the child’s “needs” are in this situation or how they are being neglected.
What the trial court accomplished was to give Christopher the standard of living of Father. Christopher and Mother never lived with Father. The statute explicitly states the “standard of living of the child” is to be considered when setting “an appropriate level” of support. See SDCL 25-7-6.9. This guarantees that the child’s needs will be met. By using Father’s standard of living as a guidepost in determining Christopher’s support, the trial court ignored the fact that there was never any prior family relationship between Christopher and Father. The statute allows the trial court to fix child support in such amount as meets Christopher’s needs, while not raising Mother’s standard of living through the vehicle of child support. Effectively, the trial court in this case imposed an unauthorized obligation on the part of Father toward Mother. This award is, in essence, an alimony/palimony windfall contained in the rhetoric of child support. The circumstances should dictate the result, allowing Christopher a standard of living that he never became accustomed to would go beyond the direction of SDCL 25-7-6.9.
The majority opinion cites Steffens, 503 N.W.2d at 258, Bloom, 498 N.W.2d at 217, Earley, 484 N.W.2d at 128, and Jones, 472 N.W.2d at 785, to uphold the trial court’s extrapolation. All of these cases can be factually distinguished from the case at hand— the parents in all of the above were married and the child[ren] lived with the obligor. See Steffens, 503 N.W.2d at 256; Bloom, 498 N.W.2d at 214; Earley, 484 N.W.2d at 126; and Jones, 472 N.W.2d at 783.
Without any showing of need or specific articulation of how the child’s accustomed standard of living is being denied, this court cannot say that $1,733.43 per month is an “appropriate level.” Following the reasoning of the majority, it appears as though Christopher would probably be in line to receive a chauffeur-driven limousine at the ripe old age of five or six. Therefore, I would remand for a determination of child support and arrearages consistent with the actual needs of Christopher.

The trial court's findings of fact emphasized:
10. Plaintiff and the minor child live in a modest apartment with the child being transported in an older car. Plaintiff presented a budget of minimal monthly expenses which totalled $1,705. Her budget did not include provisions for a vehicle payment, life insur-*532anee, savings, good quali[t]y clothing, eating out, a residential home, vacations, or enriching opportunities for the minor child, all items which plaintiff desires to provide for the child. 11. Defendant owns a quality home in a fashionable area of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to which he has made substantial improvements over the last few years. He owns a vacation cabin in the Black Hills, South Dakota. He has traveled extensively, has provided financial assistance to his parents, owns late model automobiles, has substantial life insurance, and the ability to support his former wife and child who live with him in this same fashion. 12. The child’s present standard of living has been dictated by the marginal earning of his mother rather than the far more substantial earnings of his father.
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14. Defendant is able to provide substantial support for the minor child commensurate with his standard of living. (Emphasis added.)
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In addition, the trial court's letter accompanying its findings of fact and conclusions of law stated: "Mr. Nelson’s support obligation as calculated above, is commensurate with the father’s standard of living." (Emphasis added.)