The original SB 5708, NonParent visitation bill was passed unanimously by the House this session.  It recognizes that fit parents have a fundamental right to raise their children as they see fit.  This bill is for rare but compelling circumstances.

However, it got stuck in the Senate Children and Family Services because Senator Hargrove added amendments that would exclude more than 95 percent of the 60,000 children waiting for a law in Washington State. 

There currently is no law that grandparents or third parties can even go before the court to prove they have had a significant parent-like, positive relationship with a child and it is in the child's best interests to have visitation with them.

During our testimony, Senator Stevens, chair of the Senate Children and Family Services Committee, said to us, "Bob, this bill will pass." However, Senator Hargrove who sits on the same committe is blocking its passage.

Senator West, Majority Leader, and Senator Stevens will not go against him because they want his vote on other issues. They are bargaining with 60,000 children's lives in this state. This is wrong!!

Please contact your legislators and the Governor to support this bill and ask that this bill be resolved in the special session beginning May 12, 2003

The Senate committee members of the 2003 Third Party Visitation Bill are:
Senators Val Stevens (Chair), Linda Evans Parlette, James Hargrove (ranking Democrat), Don Carlson, Alex Deccio, Rosemary McAuliffe, and Debbie Regala.

We urge you to get involved and at least contact your legislators to have your voice heard.  Children have no voice so we must be their voices.

We know many people have said, "This won't happen to me. We'll always be able to see the kids we love and have provided a parent-like relationship." However, what if your son or daughter divorced and didn't have custody or if your child died and their spouse remarried?

It has happened often that the custodial spouse or surviving spouse remarries and wants to cut the bonds to the noncustodial or dead spouse's parents. There is no recourse in Washington State to gain visitation with your grandchildren even if the children had lived with you, and you had given them most of their primary care.  There are so many other scenarios that would prevent third parties with a parent-like relationship with a child from contact with that child.

We thought it would never happen to us either.

Our son and grandson lived with us for a time and then moved next door. We had given our grandson much of his primary care and helped financially for those two plus years. Our bond with our grandson was great because of all the care we had given him and his close proximity.

Our son remarried a little before our grandson turned three. Four months later he severed all his parental rights to his son and gave him to his ex-wife.

His ex-wife let us visit him for approximately ten months. Then without warning she did not show up to a visitation we had planned two days before. When we got home there was a letter suspending any visitation or telephone contact with our grandson.

It haunts us to know our grandson must think we no longer love him or want to see him. What will this do to him now and in the long term?

If it can happen to us, it can happen to you.

Please email us at [email protected] with your stories or any contacts that would be helpful in getting a bill passed into law.

People from other states - let us know what you or organizations did to get a good grandparent/third party visitation law passed in your state.

Link to AARP, Grandparent Visitation Rights at http://www.aarp.org/confacts/grandparents/visitation.html.