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Local group promotes children’s rights
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| Michael L Johnson, executive director of Coalition of Protective Parents, stands next to the organization’s bus. |
By KOSAKU NARIOKA
This week we profile Michael L. Johnson, executive director of Coalition of Protective Parents, a Deer Park-based non-profit organization that promotes children’s rights awareness and offers support programs to protect children from emotional abuse, especially when their parents are going through a divorce.
Deer Park Broadcaster: What kind of mission or goal do you have?
Johnson: Our main goal is we want to change the family law to stop children’s emotional abuse, because parents that go through divorces and custody battles get their children in the middle and they get abused emotionally. Emotional abuse could be worse than physical and even sexual abuse. So we are trying to build a coalition large enough to change the family law.
(There is also) a program -- what we call protective parenting for kids’ rights. This is our Children’s Bill of Rights. (He showed a plate that lists children’s rights) That’s what we are trying to get in to school, daycare center, church, lawyer’s office, you name it, for all the kids and parents to see so they can know what their children’s rights are, so that children know what their own rights are. We got these out of a book, and we got the permission from the author and the publishing company to use these. I can’t remember the name of the book, but it’s about divorce poisons and what divorce does to parents and kids, and he wrote these rights in his book.
There are several versions of Children’s Rights. The United Nations has their own version which covers a broader range of Children’s Rights. We specifically focus on these because it pertains to protecting them from the emotional abuse. There are other organizations that protect (them) against physical abuse, against sexual abuse and kidnapping, that type of things, but there are not many organizations that focus on emotional abuse in the area of divorce and custody battles. That’s what we do. So we are trying to bring the awareness of what’s happening, build a big enough coalition to where the state of Texas legislators listen to us, change the family law and make it fair for the kids because as soon as parents go file for divorce, the kids get caught in the middle and they get denied their rights because the state of Texas family law gives one parent more visitations than the other parent from the start. It’s not fair for their child. It’s not fair for the parent that loses. We are trying to make it as equal as possible.
Mr. Larry Cernosek, owner of Deer Park Paint & Body, has recently donated a painting to your organization’s bus. How are you going to use that bus?
The bus is going to be used for a billboard, mobile support group meetings, mobile workshops and meetings as well as parades and festivals. We drive it to different locations to advertise our cause and offer workshops, where they see videos, and they have a workbook, and they see how children are caught in the middle and how to prevent it. So we intend to go around different locations to offer these workshops. Now we are going to have support groups for parents and children, separately of course. We work with the kids [so they will] be able to talk about their situations and to learn what their rights are in a way that won’t cause a conflict between them and their parents. We want to take the bus to Austin, when we introduce our bill to the state legislator to change the family law.
Have you ever introduced a bill to a state legislator?
Not yet. We are working on researching different states to come up with the best plan for Texas.
How can we change the family law system in Texas? How can we make it better?
There is a collaborative law. That’s where the parents and what they call a parent coordinator work with the attorneys without conflict. They are able to work things out. The parent coordinators represent the children and the parents listen to this parent coordinator to do what’s right in their divorce, so it’s fair and it keeps them out of the court system because an average custody battle cost $30,000 for each side. It takes 18 months on average to get to a trial. That just makes parents mad at each other, very mad. And they abuse their children because that’s the only tool they have. So we want to stop all that. We recommend collaborative law. We recommend parent coordinators.
We are in a process of putting together a program. We have a program director who is working on this, where if somebody wants to file for divorce, they can come to us. We’ll help them and guide them towards the collaborative law with parent coordinators and show them experiences of going that route versus through an attorney, fighting in the court system. And we show them all the data and differences of the end results.
Can you give me an idea? If there are 100 couples get married, how many of them are going to divorce?
More than half.
The emotional abuse these kids go through, it’s terrible. I personally went through my parents’ divorce when I was a senior in high school. It was very ugly. My mother said none of you kids are allowed to talk to your father, just all of a sudden. We didn’t even know they were having problems and all of sudden we were not allowed to speak to him. Of course my dad and I were close. We had a good relationship. So I made a vow to myself-If I get married, I would never get a divorce. That didn’t work out that way. I got married and four years later, [I was] getting a divorce and I had a two-year old daughter. The mother, her mother, for many years, 12 years or so, denied me visitation. It was very stressful for me, more stressful for her because she is confused. She doesn’t know who is right and who is wrong. My current wife and I decided this is terrible for her and terrible for us, and we have to fight for custody. We did. We got exclusive custody, but it cost me over $150,000, which is totally unfair. I should have never been put in that situation. She should have never been put in that situation. It should have never been allowed to get that far and that’s why me and some other folks created COPP. We decided something needs to be done. There are only two in the state of Texas that are fighting for fathers’ rights. There are just no organizations that we know of in this area, in a whole region, are fighting for kids’ rights, so we decided to focus on from that, because by default it will help the parent that’s being wronged. Most of the time, it’s the father. Sometimes it’s the mother. So if we can make it fair for the kids, it’s fair for both parents.
How big is this coalition? How many supporters do you have?
We have around 300 people that signed up.
Where are they from?
Pasadena and Deer Park. Some in La Porte. It’s really difficult for us because the limited amount of funding that we get is based on the fundraisers that we have. We’ve been looking for someone to help us with some grant applications. We haven’t had any success for that. Everybody charges a lot of money. Getting coverage is very expensive. We try to take some ads out. When we joined the Deer Park Chamber of Commerce, we had an article that ran in your paper for a month. We didn’t even get any calls to that. I think maybe one call when the state of Texas took those children from the polygamists, we had one person called, very vocal about what we should do to put a stop to all that, you know, we are powerless. We all have full-time jobs, so it’s difficult to grow the organization with the limited amount of time that we have. We try to have a meeting once a month, advertising, parades, you know, and try to recruit some supporters and volunteers. We’ve had some support group meetings for step-families and divorcees.
Do you have a Web site where people can learn more about your organization? What is the URL?
It's www.kids-rights.us
We are in a process of developing a professional Web site with a program called Dreamweaver.
What do you do?
I’m an engineering specialist.
Where are you from?
Well, I’ve been here in this area since 1966.
Where are you originally from?
I was born in Aurora, Colorado.
Did you go to school in Aurora?
No, I’ve been here since I was 4 years old. My father was in the United States Air Force when I was born. We moved to Colorado, Georgia, England, Germany and Pasadena.
Which school did you go?
I went to Dobie High School. I don’t have a college degree. I’m going to college right now at Warren University. I’m working for a business degree online and I am four classes away. Never too old, right? I probably have plenty of college hours for a degree because I was taking many classes, but not for a specific degree.
What do you like to do in your free time?
Ride my motorcycle, photography, travel and woodwork.
Deer Park Broadcaster: What kind of mission or goal do you have?
Johnson: Our main goal is we want to change the family law to stop children’s emotional abuse, because parents that go through divorces and custody battles get their children in the middle and they get abused emotionally. Emotional abuse could be worse than physical and even sexual abuse. So we are trying to build a coalition large enough to change the family law.
(There is also) a program -- what we call protective parenting for kids’ rights. This is our Children’s Bill of Rights. (He showed a plate that lists children’s rights) That’s what we are trying to get in to school, daycare center, church, lawyer’s office, you name it, for all the kids and parents to see so they can know what their children’s rights are, so that children know what their own rights are. We got these out of a book, and we got the permission from the author and the publishing company to use these. I can’t remember the name of the book, but it’s about divorce poisons and what divorce does to parents and kids, and he wrote these rights in his book.
There are several versions of Children’s Rights. The United Nations has their own version which covers a broader range of Children’s Rights. We specifically focus on these because it pertains to protecting them from the emotional abuse. There are other organizations that protect (them) against physical abuse, against sexual abuse and kidnapping, that type of things, but there are not many organizations that focus on emotional abuse in the area of divorce and custody battles. That’s what we do. So we are trying to bring the awareness of what’s happening, build a big enough coalition to where the state of Texas legislators listen to us, change the family law and make it fair for the kids because as soon as parents go file for divorce, the kids get caught in the middle and they get denied their rights because the state of Texas family law gives one parent more visitations than the other parent from the start. It’s not fair for their child. It’s not fair for the parent that loses. We are trying to make it as equal as possible.
Mr. Larry Cernosek, owner of Deer Park Paint & Body, has recently donated a painting to your organization’s bus. How are you going to use that bus?
The bus is going to be used for a billboard, mobile support group meetings, mobile workshops and meetings as well as parades and festivals. We drive it to different locations to advertise our cause and offer workshops, where they see videos, and they have a workbook, and they see how children are caught in the middle and how to prevent it. So we intend to go around different locations to offer these workshops. Now we are going to have support groups for parents and children, separately of course. We work with the kids [so they will] be able to talk about their situations and to learn what their rights are in a way that won’t cause a conflict between them and their parents. We want to take the bus to Austin, when we introduce our bill to the state legislator to change the family law.
Have you ever introduced a bill to a state legislator?
Not yet. We are working on researching different states to come up with the best plan for Texas.
How can we change the family law system in Texas? How can we make it better?
There is a collaborative law. That’s where the parents and what they call a parent coordinator work with the attorneys without conflict. They are able to work things out. The parent coordinators represent the children and the parents listen to this parent coordinator to do what’s right in their divorce, so it’s fair and it keeps them out of the court system because an average custody battle cost $30,000 for each side. It takes 18 months on average to get to a trial. That just makes parents mad at each other, very mad. And they abuse their children because that’s the only tool they have. So we want to stop all that. We recommend collaborative law. We recommend parent coordinators.
We are in a process of putting together a program. We have a program director who is working on this, where if somebody wants to file for divorce, they can come to us. We’ll help them and guide them towards the collaborative law with parent coordinators and show them experiences of going that route versus through an attorney, fighting in the court system. And we show them all the data and differences of the end results.
Can you give me an idea? If there are 100 couples get married, how many of them are going to divorce?
More than half.
The emotional abuse these kids go through, it’s terrible. I personally went through my parents’ divorce when I was a senior in high school. It was very ugly. My mother said none of you kids are allowed to talk to your father, just all of a sudden. We didn’t even know they were having problems and all of sudden we were not allowed to speak to him. Of course my dad and I were close. We had a good relationship. So I made a vow to myself-If I get married, I would never get a divorce. That didn’t work out that way. I got married and four years later, [I was] getting a divorce and I had a two-year old daughter. The mother, her mother, for many years, 12 years or so, denied me visitation. It was very stressful for me, more stressful for her because she is confused. She doesn’t know who is right and who is wrong. My current wife and I decided this is terrible for her and terrible for us, and we have to fight for custody. We did. We got exclusive custody, but it cost me over $150,000, which is totally unfair. I should have never been put in that situation. She should have never been put in that situation. It should have never been allowed to get that far and that’s why me and some other folks created COPP. We decided something needs to be done. There are only two in the state of Texas that are fighting for fathers’ rights. There are just no organizations that we know of in this area, in a whole region, are fighting for kids’ rights, so we decided to focus on from that, because by default it will help the parent that’s being wronged. Most of the time, it’s the father. Sometimes it’s the mother. So if we can make it fair for the kids, it’s fair for both parents.
How big is this coalition? How many supporters do you have?
We have around 300 people that signed up.
Where are they from?
Pasadena and Deer Park. Some in La Porte. It’s really difficult for us because the limited amount of funding that we get is based on the fundraisers that we have. We’ve been looking for someone to help us with some grant applications. We haven’t had any success for that. Everybody charges a lot of money. Getting coverage is very expensive. We try to take some ads out. When we joined the Deer Park Chamber of Commerce, we had an article that ran in your paper for a month. We didn’t even get any calls to that. I think maybe one call when the state of Texas took those children from the polygamists, we had one person called, very vocal about what we should do to put a stop to all that, you know, we are powerless. We all have full-time jobs, so it’s difficult to grow the organization with the limited amount of time that we have. We try to have a meeting once a month, advertising, parades, you know, and try to recruit some supporters and volunteers. We’ve had some support group meetings for step-families and divorcees.
Do you have a Web site where people can learn more about your organization? What is the URL?
It's www.kids-rights.us
We are in a process of developing a professional Web site with a program called Dreamweaver.
What do you do?
I’m an engineering specialist.
Where are you from?
Well, I’ve been here in this area since 1966.
Where are you originally from?
I was born in Aurora, Colorado.
Did you go to school in Aurora?
No, I’ve been here since I was 4 years old. My father was in the United States Air Force when I was born. We moved to Colorado, Georgia, England, Germany and Pasadena.
Which school did you go?
I went to Dobie High School. I don’t have a college degree. I’m going to college right now at Warren University. I’m working for a business degree online and I am four classes away. Never too old, right? I probably have plenty of college hours for a degree because I was taking many classes, but not for a specific degree.
What do you like to do in your free time?
Ride my motorcycle, photography, travel and woodwork.
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