Program Spotlight: Paternity Opportunity Program

Janelle Mora, CA DCSS

For over 22 years, the California Department of Child Support Services’ (CA DCSS) Paternity Opportunity Program (POP) has helped more than 3.1 million parents legally establish the identity of a child’s father. California POP launched a successful three-county pilot phase in 1993, and on January 1, 1995, the program became required by the Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement.

“Establishing paternity is crucial because it contributes to a child’s well-being and development,” says CA DCSS POP manager, Kyla Kuryllo. “This legal relationship ensures the child will have access to benefits such as social security, health insurance, survivor’s benefits, military benefits, and inheritance rights; along with knowledge of family medical history.”

There are two ways to establish legal fatherhood: obtain a court order or complete a Declaration of Paternity—also commonly referred to as a “POP form.” Obtaining a court order can be costly and time-consuming since it requires DNA testing and a judicial ruling, but the CA DCSS POP offers their services free of charge..”

The CA DCSS POP unit is small yet mighty, consisting of one manager, two full-time analysts, one “borrowed” analyst, and two student assistants. This handful of staff successfully manage their own customer contact center to assist the public, hospital staff, local child support agencies, and other partners via phone and email. On average, they receive 2,500 to 3,500 POP forms a week…that’s more than 130,000 forms a year!

The POP unit also conducts outreach to the public by participating in health, wellness, and education fairs. They provide training to witnessing agencies, such as notary public, county registrar offices, hospital staff, child care centers, pediatric offices and more so they clearly understand the rights and responsibilities associated with completing the POP form so they can, in turn, better educate parents.

Over the last five years, California has had a total of 970,654 paternities established, with 186,631 occurring in 2016 alone. That’s almost one million children who know who their father is, thanks to the CA DCSS POP team.