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Child Support
Every child needs financial and emotional support and every child has the right to support from both parents. Minnesota’s child support program benefits children by enforcing parental responsibility for their support.

The Child Support Enforcement Division supervises the child support program. County child support offices administer it by working with parents to establish and enforce support orders. The child support program helps:

• children receive the financial basic support, medical support, and child care support they deserve
• families work toward becoming and remaining self-sufficient
• parents establish a financial partnership

Private information
Child support information is classified as private data under the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act. Anyone can ask for public data.

Private data on individuals or nonpublic data not on individuals can be given to:
• the person who is the subject of the data
• others who the law says can see the data
• anyone the person who is the subject of the data says, in writing, can see the data.
If you want the Department of Human Services (DHS) and the county child support office to give private information concerning your child support case to a third party, such as your current spouse, attorney, relative or friend, you can complete the Authorization for Release of Child Support Information to a Third Party. Fax or mail the authorization to the person you want to release the information.

Hot Topics
DHS imageChild support analysis of service delivery model – To address interrelated policy, infrastructure and service delivery issues, the Minnesota Department of Human Services contracted with Deloitte Consulting to assess the child support program in Minnesota. Deloitte proposed models that would allow the state to manage the most cost-effective program, meet all federal requirements and maintain the state’s high level of performance for children. A letter from the program’s director, Wayland Campbell, provides a helpful introduction and contains working links to the report.

DHS imageIndependent consultant examines child support processes - An analysis of current Child Support Enforcement Division (CSED) policies and procedures identifies 21 projects of varying complexity needed to renew a top-performing program that is increasingly stressed by customer service demands from constituents, rising case loads and greater competition for federal incentive funding. The report (PDF), a 255-page document, culminates about a year of work by Deloitte Consulting to identify opportunities to streamline CSED operations, reduce complexity and improve program efficiency through automation.

The Child Support Performance Report for 2009 provides data for state fiscal year 2009 (July 1, 2008 – June 30, 2009) on state and county collections and case load information for Minnesota’s Child Support Enforcement program.

Job Loss and Child Support - During these hard economic times, parents, who have been laid off, may not be able to meet their child support obligations. Help is available.


Related Pages
•  Provide comments and suggestions to improve this site
•  Child Support Online Calculator
•  County child support phone numbers and addresses
•  Minnesota Child Support Online
•  Veterans information

Related Links
•  Appendix A - Child Support orders
•  Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE)
•  State Court System
•  Minnesota New Hire Reporting Center
•  Financial Institution Data Match
•  MinnesotaHelp.info

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