On April 7, 2008, the Colorado governor signed House Bill 08-1176, Concerning the Modification of the Allocation of Parental Responsibilities of Certain Deployed Servicemembers, which creates additional parenting protections for members of the National Guard or Reserves who deploy, thereby causing a temporary change in parenting.

Curiously, the bill is limited to reserve component servicemembers, and not the active component.  Presumably the rationale behind this is that reservists did not really expect they would have to deploy, whereas active component servicemembers signed on for a life of danger and deployments!

Interim Parenting Order During Deployment

The bill creates a new statute, C.R.S. 14-10-131.3, which provides that a modification of parenting time solely due to a reservist's deployment or active federal service is only interim.  Once the servicemember returns from the deployment, or active federal service, the orders regarding the allocation of parenting responsibilities and parenting time which existed prior to the deployment or federal service are immediately reinstated without the need for a further court order.

If a servicemember consents to the other parent raising the children during a deployment/federal service, that consent will NOT qualify as consent to the children being integrated into the other parent's household for the purposes of modifying custody.

In short, the statute means the other parent cannot use the fact of the deployment/federal service as a power play and try to change custody permanently because of it.

Child Home State Jurisdiction

The Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act defines a child's home state for purposes of jurisdiction as the place where the child has resided for the previous six months.  C.R.S. 14-13-102(7).

HB 08-1176 modifies this to exclude period where a child lived out of state purely due to an interim interim order entered pursuant to C.R.S. 14-10-131.3 during a reserve component servicemember's deployment or federal service.

What does this mean?  Only that if Colorado wont relinquish jurisdiction over a child who is only temporarily living out of state while the primary residential parent was deployed.