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Committee considers substitute to clarify parental-presumption procedures in custody suits
Summary
Senator Brian Birdwell presented a committee substitute to Senate Bill 2052 that would require specific affidavit and factual-finding procedures before non-parents may obtain conservatorship over a child.
The chair called up the committee substitute for Senate Bill 2052 and recognized Senator Brian Birdwell to explain changes to parental-presumption language in conservatorship suits.
Birdwell told members the substitute is consensus language from a workgroup and adds a requirement that non-parents in suits with a parent over conservatorship submit an affidavit that "the denial of the relief requested would significantly impair the child's physical health or emotional development." He said the court would be required to dismiss suits that fail to include adequate information to support that claim.
The substitute also requires courts to "state the specific facts that support the court's finding that the presumption has been overcome, and the extent to which the presumption is overcome," Birdwell said, to give future modification proceedings guidance. The substitute further clarifies the presumption is not overcome by a prior order if that prior order was agreed to by the parent.
Birdwell described the work group that drafted the language as including the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), the Family Law Foundation, the Family Freedom Project, the Homeschool Coalition and former Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzme1n. He asked for favorable adoption; committee members had no questions during the explanation. Public testimony on the original bill had been taken at earlier proceedings; the substitute was presented and testimony on the substitute was opened and closed with no speakers. The committee left the bill pending.
Why it matters: The substitute aims to reduce frivolous non‑parent suits and to ensure courts make explicit factual findings when they find a parent-presumption has been overcome, which supporters say will aid future modification proceedings.
