Court Opinion

ID: 9543396
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:45:07.469052+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:10:16.728041
License: Public Domain

CLIFFORD, Justice,
with whom ROBERTS, Justice, joins, dissenting.
Because the Court's decision places undue emphasis on the current residence of the children by requiring that their primary residence be in the Town of Yarmouth, a location where neither parent has a reason to reside, I respectfully dissent.
According to the Superior Court’s order, the primary physical residence of the children is to be with Rowland, so long as she does not relocate to Oregon. Rowland has remarried, her new husband lives in Oregon, and naturally Rowland would prefer to live there with him. The Superior Court’s order goes on to provide that should Rowland move to Oregon, the children’s primary physical residence is to be with Kingman, but only on the condition that he reside in Yarmouth. Kingman owns a home in Winslow. The order results in requiring one of the parents to reside in Yarmouth, a location where, other than to be the primary physical custodian of the children, neither parent now wants to reside.
Although the current living arrangements of the children and how they adjust to changes in their home, schools, and community, are factors to be considered by the court in determining the best interests of the children, see 19 M.R.S.A. §§ 752(5)(D), (E) & (G) (Supp.1992), those factors must be considered together with all other rele*618vant circumstances, and in the context of the reality of where the parents live and work. In my view, to require that a residence be maintained for the children in Yarmouth, when neither parent has any other reason to reside there, wastes the parents’ resources, contradicts common sense, and constitutes an abuse of discretion.
I would vacate the judgment and remand for the court to reconsider the primary physical residence of the children, along with parental rights and responsibilities and rights of visitation, in the proper perspective of where the respective parents live and work.