The Coalition of Parent Support ("COPS") is a California non-profit 501(c)(3) corporation operating as political advocacy and education organization for those who believe children do best when they have a healthy relationship with both their mother and their father. COPS advocates for joint custody and shared parenting after divorce, accountable and reasonable levels of child support, and individual responsibility.
COPS was founded in the fall of 1992, after hundreds of obligor parents were taken back to court to get the automatic increases in child support provided by SB 370 (Hart). COPS grew into a membership of thousands, with a correlating expansion of issues regarding the inequities and injustices of family law. In 1994, COPS sponsored 7 pieces of legislation, including AB 2539 (Bowler - parental baby-sitting), AB 2754 (Morrow - child support), AB 2856 (Harvey - joint custody). In 1995, it sponsored AB 999 (Morrow - child support) and AB 999 (Harvey - shared parenting).
Recently, COPS participated in the 2010 California Child Support Guideline Review providing input from stakeholders. COPS also participated in the Elkins Family Law Task Force public meetings between 2009 and 2010, providing valuable input regarding the need for substantive due process in family law, that the law is not fairly and uniformly applied by the courts, how unfair custody and visitation orders can have long-term negative effects on parent-child relationships, and the need to prosecute perjury.