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good evening welcome to Illinois law brought to you by the Illinois State Bar Association my name is Nancy have little and I'll be your moderator this evening tonight's program is sponsored by the child Law Section console of the isba and I have three panelists with me who are very good experts on our topic which is guardianship of children my first panelist is Joe Monahan Joe is founding partner of the law firm of Monahan and Cohen in Chicago he has a master's degree in social work from the University of Illinois and a JD from DePaul University College of Law Joe teaches at Loyola University College of Law and concentrates his practice in probate and mental health litigation my second panelist Margaret Benson has her degree her JD from the Loyola University School of Law she is the executive director of Chicago volunteer Legal Services C VLS and cbos provides free legal services to low income individuals in the Chicago area meg has represented people in family law cases for years including divorce custody visitation adoption and guardianship she currently serves as a guardian ad litem for children in contested guardianship cases she has written articles on the subject and lectured on it and my third panelist is Kathleen Magura Kathleen Magura is a judge in the Circuit Court of Cook County she graduated from IIT chicago-kent College of Law and was an assistant state's attorney for seventeen and a half years eight and a half in criminal court she was appointed to the bench in 1995 and elected in 1996 and retained in oh two and oh eight she served in traffic court domestic violence court preliminary hearings and spent two years in the child protection division in juvenile court she served in Maywood for six years and probate since 2005 she has since 2005 dealt with minor guardianship and now is doing miners with the states meaning children who have some money that has been given to them one way or another and I welcome all of you to the panel tonight thank you I'd like to start with just the most basic we're talking about children what is guardianship and then we'll go into who would get it and why but start with what is a guardianship you know I mean see I think today it's important because of the way we have different families structures you know that we see a lot of grandparents who are raising their children for one reason or another and I think the guardianship is a legal mechanism by which we give some person authority to make decisions for children because they can't make them for themselves and touch you've said in the guardianship court for years and saw all sorts of different types of one thing that strikes me is that and even the law treats it this way that being less than 18 is a disability you can't sign a contract you can't do this you can't do that and so the child needs a representative someone to make those decisions sign those papers get them into school get public aid or whatever the situation is exactly yeah and in our I would have to say complicated world I think many years ago families could do this among themselves but now you must have the guardianship in order to register the child you must have the guardianship in order to receive public aid you must have guardianship in order to sign for medical treatment so a child who doesn't have a parent or guardian won't get any of these services or it's almost like they'll be ignored by the entire society so it's a very important step and just as an example suppose you have a child in your home who is not your child I mean this is it's not for parents it's for aunts uncles whoever has the child home what would you do to start a guardianship there are a couple of different ways to get guardianship and the simplest is if it's a short term if the parent knows that he or she is gonna be leaving town for a few months for a job or whatever they can actually do a short term guardianship which is signing a piece of paper a specific form that allows the person allows you to have all the rights of a guardian for a certain amount of time anything up to one year however that's really only when everyone agrees and it's for a specific period of time if the parents are unable to take care of the child for some other reason or have died in some cases then you start a guardianship by filing a petition in court and the case has to be heard by a judge whose job it is is to make sure that the guardianship is in the best interest of the child and suppose you kill your insane well I was going to say recently thanks to some of the great legislation that meg worked on the law has changed and guardianship in some ways making it easier and more friendly for people but also to make it more clear of who can be that guardian who can bring that guardianship petition because I'm sure as the judge knows there's been lots of disputes about I don't I don't agree the way you are parenting this child I should be the parent of that child and that's why the judges wear the black robes they try to have those difficult decisions and one of the things that you have to consider of course is whether it is in the best interest of a child but there are other considerations for instance parents always have superior rights Illinois is a very very strong parental right State a jo-jo can't come in he can't go to court and petition to take my kids away from me without something being seriously wrong the state can come in if there's abuse or neglect the state can come in take a child away from a parent and go to court within a short amount but Joe can't do that Joe can only do it if I say here please take care of my child or I'm not around and the child's been left with him and he needs to get going let's be real there are some parents particularly because of drugs or alcohol mental illness or a developmental disability it's not really in a child's best interest right so they should have someone else be appointed their Guardian don't you agree me sometimes and I think that's a hugely serious step and it's not really something that the is acerra should be deciding in those cases it's gonna be a state involved case where the parent has a lawyer and the child has a lawyer and the state can decide whether or not this parent cannot take care of this child that's a pretty extreme result though the illness I mean the US Supreme Court has said that the parents right to custody of his or her child is one of the constitutionally protected rights it's a huge huge step to take a child away from a parent and I think Illinois law does recognize that that parents rights are going to be supreme and the court will carefully consider before they take that parent's right to parent away and guardianship is not the same as say adoption or any other condition where you terminate parental rights guardianship is is thought of as a temporary measure until the child turns 18 obviously but it's not it doesn't terminate the parents rights and it is short of actual parentage the parent always has a right to visitation the parent could come back at almost any time there are some limits but at any time and asked to get the guardian of the child back to discharge the guardianship and in some cases it works out very well like say you have a mother who's on drugs in a grandmother and the mother agrees the grandmother should take care of the child while she's dealing with this problem unfortunately sometimes you don't have agreement like that what I find so frequently is that their BLB a child who's living with grandfather whoever relative and then the other side of the family like this is the mother side that the father said they think they know how to be a better Guardian and so there's very serious fights back and forth between the family and I I always tell them that I think a child is entitled to both sides of his or her family and the most ideal situation is when the two sides can work together and then they each can give the child whatever resources and enrichment that they can and I think that's the child's birthright but unfortunately in so many cases the people put winning over what's the best for the child right there I'm just because I've been reading about this in the paper lately a lot of families using a guardianship you spoke about a one-year short term for military deployments are you seeing a lot of those yes and we try to expedite those two but usually in those they are there is an agreement agreement and usually when the parent comes back from their deployment they the whoever is the Guardian is perfectly happy to relinquish the child back to the parent they still have to go to court yeah not everyone understands that if a court granted guardianship then the court is the only entity that can undo that guardianship sometimes people think that mom comes back here I'll give the child back well if grandma's the guardian they need to go to court the judge has to sign up because really ultimately it's the best interest of the child and the judge is the one who has to decide make sure that that's okay that everything's back in place and ready to do that you know another part of the new law that I thought was very important was to really try to describe when a parent when a someone other than the parent would be appointed the Guardian so if that parent is not able or is not willing you know and as Meg was suggesting obviously if everybody agrees then it's gonna be okay but really to say if there is a parent who's ready and there is a parent who is capable of raising their child then the courts gonna look very seriously before they you know allow someone else to be appointed the Guardian and that's really that really does mean ready and willing and able that doesn't mean oh the child I don't like the child's clothing got a bad haircut you know it can't be anything although people tried really means this child is not being cared for this child isn't being taken to school isn't being fed properly this child is living on the streets as homeless his is not his his medical needs aren't being met it's real serious no no I think that's an interesting issue that you brought up there is that when is it appropriate to go into the probate court versus the juvenile court judge and I'm sure after looking at all the cases that you have sometimes you would say this would be better to be in juvenile court is that right yes especially when both options before me are are not good if the grandmother is supplying mom with the drugs right exactly yeah then you know I it's really hard to say that perhaps a foster home would be better but and of course we want to keep the family intact as much as possible but if neither alternative is going to be good for this child then we have to look for when the Guardian can't pick the child there well we'll talk some more about these various options as soon as we come back we're and take a brief break we'll be back in a few minutes with more illinois law My dear it's time for serious talk Oh about my day care when I started out it was just to help the neighbors but lately it's getting to be a real handful I need some help what can I do I need advice on more space alone what about incorporating and insurance wait I know who we can call times like this requires sound advice your lawyer can help a message from the Illinois State Bar Association diamond again generation after generation I is it a tiny you stop the cycle now stop adult violence teach kids peace a message from the Illinois State Bar Association welcome back to Illinois law my name is Nancy habits allah and we're here talking today about guardianship of children i have three good panelists with me and joe Monahan of the law firm of Monahan and Coen Meg Benson who is the executive director of Chicago volunteer legal services and Judge Kathleen McGuirk hears these cases in the Circuit Court of Cook County before our break we were just about to talk about who can become a guardian of a child and just give us a few examples statutes pretty statute says the person is to be age 18 or over they can't be mentally incompetent they have to be a resident of Illinois and they can't have ever been convicted of a crime that is involved it involved hurting a child if they were convicted of a felony that didn't involve hurting a child they can petition but the court has to conduct a hearing to determine if they are appropriate but if it was crime that involved hurting a child then they can't even petition and just as an example would would it matter that the crime was years ago and nothing since or how would the judge look at that well you would definitely take into consideration the age of the conviction and the nature of the offense and frequently we see cases involving someone who might have had a drug conviction 10 or 20 years ago and the nature of the hearing would be to determine if in light of the conviction it would still be in the best interest of the child that the Guardian be appointed so the statute at one time said that if you had a felony conviction you could not be a guardian and that was fairly recently changed and those are the cases that I run into most frequently where someone has a rather old drug conviction and now there they are an appropriate guardian they they work they have a home and and they've been clean for a long exactly yes it can be a grandparent it could be an uncle it could be an aunt and actually the process by which a person asks the court to appoint them as a guardian would include filing the appropriate papers with the court giving notice somehow to the mother and/or father and making sure that they agree or at least they're given notice of the proceeding they also have to go through a background check now what they call a Leeds law enforcement you know a check to make sure that they don't have those felonies and a DCFS check to make certain that they don't have any abuse or neglect charges against them after that it requires the person to go to court stand in front of a judge and then the judge will make inquiry about what kind of resources do they have to be this guardian and what kind of commitment will they have to this child or children and from my experience the judges do a wonderful job of trying to make certain that the Guardian is going to be you know faithful to their duties the other thing that's different is that judge you mentioned earlier the difference that children don't have the ability to make decisions for themselves that they depend upon a parent or guardian to make those and it's particularly tricky for children who have a settlement and money right and it's actually what you're doing now so yeah we're in in the previous court room where it's just guardianship of the person you would see a lot of poverty a lot of our people were at a poverty level and didn't have the only income they might have via the child might be some social security payments now for that you didn't need to open an estate but where the funds came from like an inheritance or most I would say more frequently from some kind of settlement or judgment in a personal injury case and they were these are in the millions of dollars so the court appoints not just well frequently in these cases the parent there's a parent there and so you don't need a guardian of the person but you do need a guardian of the estate and so usually or frequently ones are kept in bank account and so the bank you have an attorney representing the bag because the bank becomes the guardian and then a lot of times they have a case manager and so there's a lot of there are a lot of fees generated there but also this the idea is the estate will produce enough income so that the trust never runs out of funds and it's it's a very very important process to protect the child's money because it is for the child particularly in these horrendous personal injury lawsuits that there would be an award oftentimes the person might have cerebral palsy or other physical disabilities where they're going to need money for the rest of their life and so it's the courts job to lock that money up and make certain that it's going to be there for the rest of that minors life the court will have jurisdiction or will have the authority over that case until the child turns 18 and at that point then the court has to decide whether an a ult guardian would need to be appointed or whether that 18 year old will have control of the money so let's just walk through one of these just to give our viewers a little bit of an example you have a child who is say hit by a car tax and or something like that and and is seriously injured and the settlement is a million dollars which doesn't really happen but I'm using those figures too so that people can understand what we're talking about whatever the injury was a birth injury whatever the child has a million dollars it's supposed to provide his care for whatever he needs the first thing that has to happen is somebody has to approve that settlement and that's one of the you know the the responsibilities of the judge is it a fair settlement is it an appropriate and then once that money is collected you have to invest it in so that it's safe its secure and make sure that it's available for that that miner when they turn 18 so that if a child is in the process of getting such a settlement you know would open the estate before the settlement is done well the case must go to either law Division or whatever the personal injury case is first and frequently that judge will approve the settlement because that's part of their job too and they may open the estate but ultimately that has to be transferred to the probate division to be administered so usually at that point there are attorneys obviously for the miner and sometimes we appoint a guardian ad litem for the estate but usually most of that is done in the law Division and then in a it's actually a new case that they open in the probate division and then we have to give orders as to what kind of account it is and things like that and pay bills sometimes you have to hire a case manager or you know it can amount to a lot of money but people then would come essentially to your court to get approval if say the child needed a specialized wheelchair yes that or some kind of assistive device to help them in school that wasn't covered by the school most of the time that what the court will do is approve a budget if there's enough money that poor court will approve an annual budget then the Guardian every year has to come in and say to the judge this is how I spent the money and get approval for that if there's any unusual expenditures that need to be done those get prior court approval absolutely not only buy a house build a house that's special now there's also cases where there isn't a million dollars there's $30,000 money and in those cases the court once it's all approved and set up and the bills are paid the court will then authorize the caretaker the parent to put the money into a special bank account that's restricted and subject to court order once the money is in that bank account the case is transferred to Judge Magoo's previous court room and in those cases the parent or the custodia has the gara that child if that person needs some money out of the miners estate the child's think they go to court and they ask the judge they might want to buy a computer they might want to buy school uniforms they might want to take the child on a vacation they have to justify the expense of the judgment the judge agrees it's appropriate for that child the judge will give them a court order that they take to the bank and get out a specific amount of money it could be to straighten their teeth to buy me twenty dollars or something up to a few hundred dollars and the judges discretion because again the judge is protecting the judges job is to make sure that money is used only for the benefit of that child not the rest of the family and that as much as possible as left for when that child turns 18 and that child gets control over the money and then you hope that they have the sense to the you know theirs so they're different compartments of guardianship as we talked about there's guardian other person to make those they're you know the medical decisions there's guardian of the estate to make certain that that money it's protected for them for the minors until they become adults and then as we talked in our previous program if children are abused or neglected or dependent then the State Department of Children and Family Services can be appointed their guardian but that usually that's and it's regularly going to happen in the juvenile way as opposed to the probate court so that the the split between the two really has to do with abuse user neglect abuse or neglect would go over to juvenile court and happy children in need of help would come but you know that isn't people what's the genuine concern you know this has been absolutely fascinating just listening to the differences and just hearing the various kinds of things that can be done with guardianship some children and when it's appropriate when it's not next week we're going to talk a little bit more about the guardianship statute so everyone who's watching will want to turn in again and and take a look at what we're doing I thank all of my panelists Joe Monahan made Benson judge McCurry thank you so much for being with us this evening and talking about guardianship of the child my name's Nancy Hamlet so thank you for watching Illinois law good evening welcome to Illinois law brought to you by the Illinois State Bar Association my name is Nancy have witzel and I'm here with my three panelists this evening to discuss guardianship of children this is the second of two programs that we've done and I'd like to introduce my panelists the first is Joe Monahan Joe is founding partner of the law firm of Monahan and Cohen he has his master's degree in social work from the University of Illinois and his JD from DePaul University College of Law he teaches at Loyola University College of Law and concentrates his practice in probate and mental health litigation my second panelist is Margaret Benson Margaret has her JD from Loyola University School of Law and she's the executive director of Chicago volunteer Legal Services C BLS or Chicago volunteer Legal Services provides free legal services to low income individuals in the Chicago area meg has represented people in family law cases for years including divorce custody visitation adoption and guardianship she currently serves as a guardian ad litem for children in contested guardianship cases and she's written articles on the subject and lectured on it and my third panelist closest to me is Kathleen McGarry judge McGarry sits in the probate court in Cook County she graduated from IIT chicago-kent College of Law in 1977 and is was an assistant state's attorney for 17 and a half years eight and a half in criminal court and eight and a half on the civil side and her appointment to the bench was 1995 she was elected then in 96 and retained in Oh two and Oh 8 she served in traffic court domestic violence court preliminary hearings and then juvenile court for two years and the child protection side she went to Maywood for six years on the civil and criminal courts and has been in probate since 2005 doing minor guardianship and now estates of the minors which is another word for children and so we're talking about guardianship of children in our first program last week we talked a lot about the various types of guardianship Sande guardianship just of minors guardianship of minors who for some reason have some money coming to them and and how they would have an estate set up and a little bit about who can be a guardian so let's talk a little bit more today about what are the responsibilities of the guardian judge McGarry what do you expect when a guardian comes into your court for a report what should they have done or what do you ask them before they're appointed well one thing I ask them about is their financial situation I basically just ask them straight out if they their income is sufficient to support the child because the guardianship we do our sometimes people call them private Guardian ships they're not funded by the state or DCFS or anything like that so the guardian has to be able to support the children and do everything for a child pretty much the same as a parent would in other words make sure they go to school make sure they get enough rest do their homework just exactly like a parent and so I do ask them a little bit about are they employed you know what is the source of their income and things like that but to to boil it down I would say yes Guardian even though they're not a parent but they're expected to do pretty much everything a parent would do in other words fill in for a parent basically in this child's life you ask about their house they have to have sufficient room for the child the child should have his or her own bed I know you always ask about the fact you know they can't be sleeping on the floor or with several other people with several other people yeah they don't have to have their own bedroom yeah they have should have their own bed you know that Guardians really have to step in the shoes of the parent and do the statute the law says they have to procure and make provision for that child just as if they were there only children there you know just as if they were the parent you know and that that leads a question about what rights does a parent have last time we talked about the parental rights are not actually terminated parents still have a right to visit and I know that Meg you get involved in those cases regularly about a parent who wants to come and visit and maybe the guardian doesn't think that's such a good idea and that's one of the things the Guardian has the responsibilities of a parent plus they really do have to facilitate visitation they're supposed to facilitate a good relationship between the child and the parent that doesn't always work if the parent is abusive or has a serious drug or alcohol problem the guardians job is also to protect the child so those can really conflict once in a while the parent wants to see the child the guardian needs to keep the child safe that's why sometimes the judge can order supervised visitation the parent and the child see each other at a supervised visitation center or with some other adult there making sure that the child remains safe but other times like Jo said the parent is say that the parent is safe for the child but the Guardian doesn't like that parent and the Guardian doesn't want the mom to visit and we'll throw things in the way impediments sorry you can't come Saturday because the child's got to go to so-and-so's house or we're going to church all day Saturday and all day sunday doing things to make sure and that's a problem too and the judge then has to make sure that the parent and the child have a relationship because really again it's the best interest of the child and it's important for a child to maintain a good relationship with a parent yeah I think a lot of times guardians do not understand that that the idea is because guardianship is supposed to be temporary that eventually whatever the problem is it will be over and the child will return to the family but it's so true that that sometimes guardians and I'm sure they're well sometimes they're acting in good faith but like there'll be some visitation and then they'll say well when the child goes from visitation he or she is nervous or afraid or scared or disruptive and it's a hard concept a lot of times because it is true that the Guardian does have discretion in other words the Guardian is supposed to act in the best interests of the child and use their own good judgment of course a lot of times unfortunately that is not agreeable to the parent or whatever and so we very often have very many contested cases around the issue of visitation and the court can enter very specific court orders you see you'll see a court order that says the mom will have visitation with the child every Saturday at 10 o'clock until Sunday at 6 o'clock and it will detail who picks up the child who drops a child up it can detail you know the child has to take the homework so that the mom can help with homework or the child must be fed three meals while gone it can be really detailed - almost a ridiculous extent but sometimes these these adults the adults in the case need a lot of direction yeah I think in the sort of rare cases where the Guardian and the parent do get to along together it goes so much better because they can work things out they can be flexible if this falls through they can do something else but in the really hotly contested ones if there's one variation from the court order they're you know back in court claiming of violation you know what I think is you know you mentioned several times this whole business of it's in the best interest of the child but depending on who you are you're looking at the best interests that's a whole different way it's a very subjective standard right we mentioned a guardian at litem and and I thought that's kind of a fancy term that some people may not know what it is please explain the guardian at litem is really a lawyer in in most cases who was appointed by the court to serve as the eyes and ears of the court and really to suggest what is in the best interest of the child it's a very very important role last time we talked about some miners with money in the guardian at litem will often make recommendations to the court about whether this should be purchased or that should be purchased or should not be purchased visitation may be another one the guardian at litem will go out and be the eyes and the ears of the court because the court can't go out and see what does that home environment look like who are the other people involved in the home and make a report back to the court it's a it's an interesting and may course you and your volunteers do that regularly for the court it's a wonderful service they can also talk to the child the judge doesn't want to drag the child into court it's not fair to a child to be in a courtroom and say oh where do you want to live they don't do that but a guardian ad litem will get to know do his or her best to talk with the child try to do it in a very non-threatening usually overplaying you know sit down on the car and on the floor and play cars and chant and at some point you can pick up what that child wands are where the child is comfortable and then the GL guardian ad litem can then tell the court and the other parties what the child wants to the best of anyone's and it's formalized and in the law now Nancy that 14 year olds really have a say in the guardianship court to say you know what they they want the court doesn't always have to follow what the 14 year old ones but there is the sense that the guardian at litem will be the voice for the child and will help and assist the court and in making the tough decisions that there are the courts often faced with its altum Utley it's the court's decision but the Guardian it sometimes you do go against the wishes of all worlds because sometimes a 14 year old wants to live with the parent who doesn't make him go to school not a good idea at the bottom of the petition there's a section there called the nomination where a minor who's 14 are older signs saying that they nominate the petitioner as their guardian and I think the other good thing about that is that it gives the child a little bit of input in the case which i think is good at that point I think it does empower the child I'd say that the Court recognizes that you know a 14 year old can have input important input that the court needs to know and I think it's great that the the law actually invites the 14 year old to participate in that way there's other difficult things I think that come up in the guardianship and that sometimes is we you judge you mentioned a couple times that it's a temporary thing getting guardianship back their parents now say you know we're in a different place right now and we'd like guardianship back and I know the new law addresses that right I think this is the perfect place to take two hour break and when we come back that's exactly what we're going to talk about we're going to talk about what happens when the guardianship should be terminated or or should be changed and how does that get done we'll be back in a few minutes like by tannic dear it's time for serious talk Oh about my daycare when I st rted out it was just to help the neighbors but lately it's getting to be a real handful I need some help what can I do I need advice on more space alone what about incorporating and insurance wait I know who we can call times like this require sound advice your lawyer can help a message from the Illinois State Bar Association diamond again generation after generation isn't it time you stopped the cycles now stop adult violence teach kids peace a message from the Illinois State Bar Association welcome back to Illinois law my name's Nancy have Witsel and I'm here this evening discussing guardianship of children with three good panelists Joe Monahan meg Benson yeah I'm Judge Kathleen McGarry and just before we took our break we were going to talk about Joe's suggestion that we talk about how you terminate a guardianship how do you get out of it yeah I think that the the new law addresses that a little more clearly than it did in the past the old statute before this last revision it was like the Hotel California you can get into a guardianship but there was no way out and now there's a way out and I think the court will entertain the the thought that a person you know maybe at some point in time could not parent effectively but now they believe that they can change of circumstances maybe a new relationship with a new or different spout a job job sometimes all it takes you know a break that that person means and a house or completing rehab and they're a different person then and of course we always favor reuniting the family but the good thing about this new statute is that it gives the court some standards to look at it helps the court analyze the changes and the new factual situation in order to make a decision so I'm really grateful for the new steps and some of those standards focus on what's good for the child the the the statute still protects parents the parent say the parent can ask to petition to end the guardianship the parent has to show that something has changed whatever was the reason for the initial guardianship has something has changed so if mom was on drugs she can come in and say I'm not on drugs anymore I'm working in stable that's fine or if mom had a job in the it was in the army or lived in California she can come back say I'm back in town I'm ready to take care of my child at that point then the Guardian would have to show that there's a reason the guardianship needs to continue the Guardian has a heavier burden the guardian has to show more proof about why the guardianship should stay when the parent had to show because the parent has superior rights and then once and at that point also then the judge makes a decision but there are specific standards only as a guideline the judge isn't limited to those standards and some of them do involve help look at the child you look at the child how long has a child lived in his or her current situation the child's adjustment to the home in the community the child's relationship with the parent who once Guardi wants this to terminate the child's relationship with the family or the household of the current caretaker and we were just talking before the break about visitation that is one of the factors did the Guardian help facilitate visitation did the parent actually visit use visitation those are really important issues for the judge to look at and is it also possible just so our audience knows for both sides to agree to terminate a guardianship and just come in and say we both think it's time to end yes I have however also seen cases where the judge even if they come in and they say they agree the judge has said either no or continued it for further investigation because there are cases where a parent has basically browbeaten the Guardian and harassed the Guardian so badly that the Guardian says I can't deal with this I don't want to do this anymore here take the child back and so judges again judges are not gonna rubber stamp anything until they think it is best for the child and it's important to know it's not just a yeah we agree you can do whatever you want with this child there's so many stories about you know they're out of rehab or they found their new whatever the flavor of the month and they want to prove that they're able to parent now and I've been in the same circumstance make where the judge says timeout here let's see what kind of track record that you have that's why a judge's that's a judge doing his or her job and that's another occasion where the Guardian the litem comes in handy to investigate those situations as well give it an objective eye and sometimes they need a little bit of time so the parent says well I want to visit my child that the Guardian won't ever let me well what will happen in these cases as you set up a visitation schedule and let everyone do their thing and six months later mom hasn't shown up for any visits well then we know the story or if mom has and has been doing everything that she was asked to do then the judge has a good idea that mom is being up front and it's a good thing too and the guardianship I think one of the important things and and people think that it's a pretty easy part of the law like so many other parts of the law though they're they're very complicated issues that have to be addressed I often get the question do I need a lawyer going into one of these easy Oh guardianship for children cases my view of course is that it's very important that people understand what their rights are whether they're the grandparent or the person who is asking the court to be appointed guardian but also to for the parent to understand what their rights are and can they get guardianship back and what responsibilities as the law calls it what are residual parental rights that they have whether as we talked about the right to visitation or other things that are so very important and can be very complicated and the other reason people really should have a lawyer during these processes is because they're very emotional this is usually family and even if the Guardian isn't a family member the Guardian who's been taking care of the child is like a family member if they it's emotional you love that child you want that child and as Jo said before everyone thinks their position is best thing for that child so that's a very subjective standard the lawyers job is to be objective the lawyer will step back and say yes you love that child but if you let mom see him once in a while you're not gonna do very well this child needs to see his mom the lawyer will tell you what is best for your case and be able to present your case to the judge without sobbing and without getting angry people get angry they need that distance that a lawyer can provide so it's not just the easy best interest of the child there are standards that that have to be presented to the court to convince the judge who's going to follow the law to say in this instance guardianship will not be awarded because the parent is available or in this instance guardianship will be awarded because of these following factors that's why I think it's essential for these individuals to be represented by a lawyer and you and the lawyer will also make sure that all the proper procedures were followed so that if you do become guardian it's a solid guardianship and a parent can't come back a month later and say well I didn't get notice and for the judge then has to vacate it and give the child back to the parent the the very simple but if they're not followed followed properly the guardianship isn't worth anything it's not valid I agree a hundred percent attorneys at least from my perspective make everything so much simpler calm or and orderly and that seems like a minor point but it really isn't because I think was judge McKeon who wrote an article about how the rules that we are bound to follow are written by lawyers for lawyers and I know people I always say this isn't Judge Judy score because I think people think they can watch TV and just stand up there it's such a disadvantage and then frequently there might be lawyer in the case the guardian ad litem but the Guardian that litem cannot represent either side the guardian ad litem is there for the child only so I know you know a lot of the problem is we live in a very economically difficult time but anything in court where you're gonna get a court order if you don't have an attorney you're really at a disadvantage and it is the judges job to try to make everything fair and we do as much as we can but things go so much better what you can't tell the people how to do it exactly yeah I often times when I'm in court and watching people who don't have a lawyer they're asking the judge to advise them I see the same thing in the clerk's office too and they're not allowed to you know you know and that makes sense they can't practice law because they're not lawyers you see petitions filled out improperly and the judge has to throw it out and people are frustrated there's there's a lot of effort by I think the State Bar Association and other local bar associations to try to provide help for people who cannot afford a lawyer and I think it would be well for anybody who's going into the guardianship arena that they explore all of their options that they have in order to get representation it's very important you know we talked about some of the issues where's visitation because when the guardianship would be terminated we talked a little bit about money and children with money but there's all sorts of other things you know should a guardian be able to move the child out of state for example you know under what circumstances what happens when mother or father don't take the advantage of visitations what's the guardians responsibilities there well when they want to have their ears pierced or tattoos yes even the basic issue of notice if you don't have an attorney so many of the pro se litigants they are not clear on their concept and you know you you'll point the guardian and then it'll be a parent will come and say they had no notice and you have to litigate this and just throw everything out and it's a waste of everybody's time yeah and I would think too just finding your way around the courthouse it's hard for many lawyers but I would imagine that for someone who has never been involved in the legal system it would have to be denied it's very concerning very overwhelming and it's at a time if you're going to take a guardianship that's very emotional I thank you all this has been one of the most interesting and informative segments that we've done and I just thank all of my panelists for coming I thank you for watching and I thank Joe Monahan meg Benson and Judge Kathleen Magura for coming to give you information about guardianship of children my name is Nancy have little I've been enjoying being with you this evening on Illinois law brought to you by the Illinois State Bar Association