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What is Legal Decision-Making?
One of the first questions you may ask when hearing about legal decision-making is “what is legal decision-making?” What may make it easier to understand the term is to learn that until very recently, January 2013 to be exact, the concept of legal decision-making was known as something else altogether, though the definition was essentially the same. Prior to 2013, there were two concepts in Arizona: Parenting time and legal custody.
Parenting time, now as it was then, is the time a parent actually gets to spend with the child. Legal custody, by definition, encompassed the decisions a parent could make for a child. Legal custody determined what decisions were made for the child, and who had the authority to make those decisions. After the law changed in Arizona in January, the term custody has been written out of the statutes and legal custody is now referred to as legal decision-making. Despite the change in terminology, the intent behind it remains the same. The parent with legal decision-making rights is the parent that controls the major decisions in a child’s life, such as medical and educational decisions.
Many people confuse legal decision-making with actual parenting time or physical custody, which are different. What type of medical treatment does the child receive if it has ailments? Should the child go to public or private school? Everything from major to minor life decisions of a child are what are encompassed in the legal decision-making rights that a parent may have. There are different legal decision-making scenarios, including joint legal custody (joint legal decision-making), where both parents make the child’s decisions together, or sole legal custody (sole legal decision-making), where one of the parents has the right to make those decisions alone.
Parenting time and legal decision-making are two very important concepts in family law. Both are issues that will be decided in your family law matter, in the event of a divorce or paternity action. If you are currently involved in a legal matter related to either, you should seek expert legal help to ensure you are represented effectively and efficiently.
