A court has an ongoing obligation to safeguard minor children’s best interests. Collaborating parents may agree to enlist court review to approve modifications when events they anticipated in their parenting plans occur.
Parents’ attempts to trigger automatic modifications for uncertain future events, which may not take place for months or years (if they ever do), invite reversal. For example, in Natali v. Natali, 313 So. 3d 958 (Fla. 2d DCA 2021), the court rejected a parenting plan that provided multi-phased timesharing arrangements. Such arrangements would automatically progress once predetermined but contingent events might happen.
First, dad had to exercise supervised visitation for 3 months. Second, he had to take a parenting course and file with the court proof of completing it. But these benchmarks could take months or years to occur. By then, however, circumstances bearing on the best interest analysis could change significantly. The parenting plan, which provided for no court intervention or decision-making for the dad to advance to the next phase of multi-phased timesharing, fell short.
Similarly, in a paternity case, TA v. AS, 335 So. 3d 208 (Fla. 2d DCA 2022), the Second District reversed a four-phase timesharing schedule. The schedule the judge had ordered was based on contingent events occurring. When they’d happen, timesharing would automatically change, but without judicial intervention.
Enlist Court Review of Agreed Parenting Plan Modifications
You have power to provide adjustments in parenting plan provisions for events likely to occur. But, to avoid the prohibition on a judge’s performing “prospective-based” analysis of your child’s best interests, you and the child’s other parent should enlist court review of the adjustments.
Ask the judge to approve them. As events you and the other parent planned for come about, invite the judge to confirm the modifications are in your child’s best interest. If you reach impasse, consider ways to resolve it without fighting in court.
Enlist Court Review: Contingencies Plus Future Best Interest Hearing
First, anticipate contingencies about timesharing reasonably likely to occur. Second, agree on future modifications to your parenting plan, subject to the court’s then-determining your child’s best interests. Third, invite the judge to hold an evidentiary “best interests” hearing when the events unfold. That way, you and the judge avoid prohibition on speculating about your child’s future best interests.
Williams v. Williams – 2026 Parenting Plan with Contingencies for Modification Upheld
The trial judge, not the parents of two daughters, included in a parenting plan two contingencies. Once these contingencies would materialize, dad’s timesharing would change to a regular and holiday schedule. Williams v. Williams, Case No. 3D24-0974 (Fla. 3d DCA Feb 04, 2026).
Background Facts: Williams
Until March 1, 2022, the parents had been sharing time, with each alternating weeks. In a separate action from the dissolution action, mom got a final judgment of injunction for protection against domestic violence with children. At trial in the dissolution action, she testified dad dropped the parties’ two daughters and their belongings off March 1, 2022, then left. The girls had been only with her since March 2, 2022.
Dad didn’t contact mom and blocked her from contacting him by phone or text. He reappeared Thanksgiving 2022, told her the divorce wasn’t fair, and said he should get the parties’ Homestead, Florida property.
She filed on her own behalf, but not on the children’s behalf, for an injunction for protection against domestic violence. Dad testified she prevented him from seeing the kids since he dropped them off on March 1, 2022, the relationship between mom and dad was toxic, and they called the cops on each other multiple times. He decided to stop trying to contact the children and let the judge resolve the issues.
Mental Health Treatment
Dad, who’d getting mental health treatment since 2019, was on medications. His mental health got worse in 2022. He asked the court to grant him time with the children in the summer and on holidays until he moved back from Chicago to Miami.
Mom asked the judge to provide dad with reunification therapy. She wanted a reunification therapist to mediate reunification between the daughters and dad.
The judge entered a final judgment of dissolution of marriage with an incorporated parenting plan in March 2024. The timesharing schedule in the parenting plan provided for contingencies upon the happening of which, if the judge were to later determine modifying the schedule to be in the children’s best interests, would result in modification.
Contingencies and Modifying the Parenting Plan
The trial court further noted there were two contingencies in this matter: dad’s reunification with the children and his relocation back to Miami. Both were in flux.
First, after finding mom had been the children’s sole caretaker for the past two years, and dad had abandoned his parental responsibilities since March 2, 2022, the judge ordered reunification therapy for him. Once reunification therapy commenced, the judgment said he’d have regular timesharing on alternating long weekends.
Second, once dad completed reunification therapy, he’d get holiday timesharing: the children’s birthdays, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Spring Break, Summer Break, Thanksgiving, and Winter Break.
Future Court Review: Further Hearing Necessary
Then the trial judge noted in the final judgment, if dad returned to Miami, the court was mandated to conduct another hearing on the children’s best interests for a modification of the time-sharing schedule. On appeal, the court deferred to the trial judge’s broad discretion in timesharing matters: “Accordingly, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in the time-sharing plan it created.”
Timesharing Plan Upheld, Even When Contingencies Were “In Flux”
The Third District Court of Appeal upheld the trial judge’s timesharing plan. The opinion lacks specific discussion about the certainty or not of the contingencies taking place. On the contrary, the trial judge’s using stating the contingencies were “in flux” suggests no reasonable certainty they’d take place.
Still, the appellate court was okay with the trial judge’s exercise of discretion. In creating the time-sharing plan, with the children’s best interests as the primary consideration, the judge had addressed each best interests of the children factor in section 61.13(3), Florida Statutes. Further, there would be no automatic modification of timesharing. Instead, the judge required a future hearing to evaluate the children’s best interests.
It appears logical, then, parents can provide in agreements for predetermined modifications without running afoul of prohibitions on speculating about a child’s prospective best interests. If, when contingencies occur, the parents have an opportunity to present evidence, and judge considers, whether the previously agreed modifications are in the children’s then-current best interests, finding an abuse of discretion is unlikely.
Failing to Provide A Mechanism to Resolve Impasse
Parents who failed to provide a mechanism for resolving their impasse on the private school their child should attend found themselves in costly, contested litigation, including an appeal. See Watt v. Watt, 966 So. 2d 455 (Fla. 4th DCA 2007). The settlement agreement provided no mechanism to resolve an impasse on the private high school their child should attend, to which both parents had to agree. Their impasse on this vital matter was unanticipated when they signed their settlement agreement.
The father objected to modification. He contended his failure to consent, standing alone, could not meet the substantial change in circumstances test for modification. The mother convinced the judge, and the appellate court confirmed, the impasse constituted a substantial change in circumstances. The impasse warranted modification of the parenting plan and the court’s giving mom final say over the school decision. Importantly, the parties had provided no mechanism for resolving the impasse.
Enlisting Court Review: When Might Staged Parenting Work?
On the other hand, staged parenting plans providing for resolving impasse may work. As the concurring judge in Natali wrote:
“…as long as a family judge has dutifully considered the statutory factors and can apply those factors to events that are ‘reasonably and objectively certain to occur at an identifiable time in the future,’ Rivera, 252 So. 3d at 286, based on the competent, substantial evidence presented, it may be an appropriate exercise of discretion, in certain cases, for the family law judge to fashion a ‘staged’ parenting plan that includes limited changes or alterations over the course of time based upon the occurrence of those future events.“
See also Perseo v. Donofrio, 379 So. 3d 1183 (Fla. 4th DCA 2024), in which the court upheld parents’ agreement in their parenting plan to modified timesharing when agreed-upon milestones took place. If they couldn’t agree, they’d go to formal mediation before bringing unresolved disputes to the trial judge.
How Will You Resolve Disputes About Future Events You’ve Covered in Your Parenting Plan?
Parents in intact relationships sometimes disagree about decisions for their children. Most find ways to resolve their disagreements. Parents whose bonds as partners are dissolving must continue coparenting. Even when they have anticipated and provided in their parenting plans for future significant events in their children’s lives, they may disagree. How should the provisions apply to anticipated events when they unfold?
Parents who choose the collaborative process often make alternative dispute resolution (ADR), such as returning to the collaborative team or going to mediation, a condition before going to court. Courts enforce agreements imposing ADR conditions before filing adversarial lawsuits.
Enlisting Court Review: Courts Enforce Alternative Dispute Resolution Commitments
In Rudnick v. Harman, 301 So. 3d 266 (Fla. 4th DCA 2020), an ex-husband’s successfully petitioned for certiorari review of an order granting, without hearing evidence, an ex-wife’s motion to waive mediation. The parties’ post-judgment settlement agreement made mediation a condition precedent to filing a child support or other modification action. The court held the requirement in the marital settlement agreement to mediate before suing couldn’t be meaningfully enforced postjudgment. That would defeat the purpose for presuit ADR: avoiding filing the lawsuit in the first place.
Contrast that outcome with cases in which pursuing alternative dispute resolution was not required before filing suit. For example, see Beeline Petro, Inc. v. HSA Golden, Inc., Case No. 2016-CA-2977-O (Circuit Court of the Ninth Judicial Circuit, Orange County, Florida October 24, 2016) (because the contract between the parties did NOT make mediation a condition precedent to filing suit, the trial court – county court – did not depart from the essential requirements of law in denying the motion to dismiss) (Per curiam). Likewise, in Kissimmee Health Care Associates v. Garcia, 76 So. 3d 1107 (Fla. 5th DCA 2011), mediation was no condition precedent to filing suit, where Florida’s nursing home statute didn’t specify which party must initiate mediation and require mediation as a condition before suing.
How will you resolve future impasses? To read about options to consider, read more here.
- Collaborative Family Law Agreements A Child’s Prospective Best Interests
- Collaborative Family Law Agreements: Parenting Plan Basics
- A Child’s Future Best Interests and Collaborative Family Law Agreements
- Florida Parenting Plans and Events Reasonably Certain to Occur
- Children’s Best Interests: Parenting Plans Entail Prediction
- Collaborative Parenting Plans: Extraordinary Burden for Modification
- Collaborative Family Law: Florida Favors Settlement Agreements
- Collaborative Parenting Plans: Judges Must Safeguard Children
- Collaborative Parenting Plans: Anticipating Events Reasonably Certain to Occur
- Collaborative Parenting Plans: How Will You Resolve Future Impasses?
- Can Contingencies Parents Build into their Parenting Plans Be Modifications?
- Florida Parenting Plans: Agreeing to a Different Burden for Modification