Child support collections in Montgomery County have dropped $6 million over the past four years to $101 million in 2011. Meanwhile, unpaid support — including unpaid arrears — has climbed more than $30 million to $233 million, a Dayton Daily News analysis found.

Agency officials said collections have been hampered by staffing cuts of about 10 percent.

The system has left parents who are owed back child support angry and frustrated.

“It’s horrible to not know where your next meal is going to come from when you depend on a system that does not work for you,” said Malynda Popham, a Springfield mother of four. She is owed $45,000 by her ex-husband, who is in prison on an unrelated charge.

As counties move to cut child support enforcement agencies, which are locally funded, advocates say this pushes people onto other publicly funded programs.

Butler County Child Support Enforcement Agency Director Ray Pater, former director of a lobbying group for CSEA directors, said studies have shown people who are owed child support are three times less likely to fall back on public assistance if they receive their owed support.

“We affect more children than any other social service agency, other than public education,” he said.

Total collections of child support statewide over the past five years have dipped slightly from a high of nearly $2 billion in 2008 to just less than $1.9 billion in 2011. The unpaid amount owed each year — not including piling up back payments — has ballooned from $246 million in 2008 to $330 million in 2011.

Times have changed

A lot has changed since Popham came into the system more than a decade ago. Back then, sheriff’s deputies staged roundups of deadbeat parents who owed back support, and county agencies published wanted posters featuring the people who faced charges for failure to pay their child support. Now, those once-common enforcement tools are rare.

“We used to be very aggressive in our work. We had more staff and more money and we had more resources available to us,” said Monica Talkington, Greene County administrator for child support.

Last year, child support collections in Greene County were at $25 million, far below the $28 million collected in 2006.

Talkington said the most effective collection techniques are automated, including withholding of income tax refunds.

Legislative efforts to boost collections exploded in the late 1990s with the advent of driver’s license suspensions. Noncustodial parents who owed back child support would often lose their licenses until they fulfilled their obligations. That “get-tough” mentality has given way to much more flexibility.

Collections bumped in 2008 when many households received federal stimulus checks, which were seized from people who owed child support.

A law passed in 2011 allows parents to keep their licenses as long as they pay at least half of what they owe. Another new law withholds money from an individual’s winnings at Ohio casinos, but it applies only if the gambler takes home more than $5,000.

Kim Robinson, of New Carlisle, who says she’s been fighting for 16 years to get payments from her ex-husband for their two sons, advocates some sort of work program. She wants the state to put those who owe to work and keep them in jail at night until they pay down their debt.

“If I wasn’t feeding them or putting clothes on them or putting a roof over their heads like their dad’s not doing, I would’ve been thrown in jail,” she said.

“They need to be just as much held accountable as the parent (the children) are living with.”

Agencies cut

The Montgomery County Child Support Enforcement Agency has cut the number of full-time child support collection positions by 14 since September 2010 — roughly 10 percent of its staff — and has lost millions of dollars from its budget.

CSEA Director Robert Gruhl said caseloads have ballooned 400 cases per worker because of the cuts.

“It’s hurt our ability to help families,” Gruhl said.

Like officials in other counties, he said they were able to do overhauls in their processes and introduce new technology to keep collections roughly on par with what they have been in the face of staffing reductions.

At the same time, though, the economy is making it harder for people who want to pay to meet their obligations.

“The more folks that get jobs, the more we can collect and the more children we can help support,” Gruhl said.

Threat of jail

State and county authorities declined to identify the men or women who are tops on the list for back child support. Authorities have, however, released the top amounts owed in each county locally. The top amount owed by one person in Montgomery County is $218,957.

The largest amount owed in the Miami Valley is in Butler County, at $347,509.

Montgomery County would only identify people charged criminally for failure to pay child support. Tops on the list is Terry Stevenson, who owes $62,000. He was indicted on four counts of criminal nonsupport and is being sought by authorities.

The threat of incarceration works well, according to Anne Catherine Harvey, a Springboro attorney who has represented clients on all sides of the child support issue. She does not favor license suspension, saying it does not make sense. She said the threat of prison on weekends for true deadbeats is effective.

Still, Harvey said, some people refuse to pay child support no matter what.

“With some people the passion runs that deep. They are not going to pay. They are not going to hold a job,” Harvey said.

The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction now has 295 inmates convicted of failure to pay child support.

Malynda Popham has some advice for parents who are new to the child support enforcement system.

“Keep records and document every telephone call,” Popham said, adding that it is not uncommon to call the local child support office and be told that the call will be returned within seven days.

“In seven days,” Popham said, “I could be on the street if I don’t get help.”