The court’s leadership should establish a committee of judges, court staff, and other stakeholders involved in addressing the needs of families in court to assist with their deliberations. The first consideration is how broadly the court wants to define family cases. The broader the definition, the more opportunities a court will have to address a family in a holistic manner. A broad definition on its own, however, will not guarantee an integrated approach. Courts that choose to broaden their definition of family cases may want to do so in stages to ensure an infrastructure to support coordination and collaboration, resources to address the families encompassed by the definition, and acceptance of an integrated approach by the local legal and service cultures.

If courts choose to expand gradually, they can begin by considering which cases frequently occur together (e.g., dependency, domestic violence, and substance abuse) and focus on addressing those cases in a more coordinated and holistic manner. Alternatively, they could identify certain subsets of families that seem to have the most contact across court divisions. The “Resources and Examples” section, below, provides examples of how different jurisdictions have identified family cases.

Another issue for the court is the definition of “family.” Family could include:

• Adoptive or foster families, with or without birthparents Grandparents Never-married parents Guardians, custodians, etc.Gay and lesbian partners and their families
• Heirs (in probate cases)
  

Once the court has defined the scope of family justice, it should consider its current practices in light of the definition. What practices are working well and should be expanded, what practices detract from an integrated family justice approach and should be eliminated or modified, and what practices need to be instituted to promote a more integrated approach? Potential strategies to address the needed changes are described under “Step 3: Identify Solutions.”

Resources and Examples

• Armstong, M. W. (Winter 2003). The integrated family court in Maricopa County, Arizona. AFCC Newsletter, p. 6.
• Bozzomo, J. W., & Scolieri, G. (January 2004). A survey of Unified Family Courts: An assessment of different jurisdictional models. Family Court Review, 42, 12.
• Flango, C., Flango,V. E., & Rubin, H. T. (1999). How Are Courts Coordinating Family Cases? Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts. See pp. 11-19 for a discussion of methods to determine whether cases involving families arise with sufficient frequency to justify a coordinated effort and issues associated with specific types of cases. The volume also has several examples of how different jurisdictions define family cases.
• See Hawaii’s Family Court Jurisdiction for a discussion of cases.
• Pankey, Kenneth G., Jr., Anne Skove, and Jennifer Sheldon. Charting a Course to Strategic Thought and Action: Developing Strategic Planning Capacities in State Courts. Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, 2002. Provides an overview of the strategic planning process.
• Uekert, B. K. (2002). Integrating Criminal and Civil Matters in Family Courts: Performance Areas and Recommendations. Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts. See “Recommendation 3: Courts must determine what types of cases and/or families will participate in the integrated family/criminal court program” on pages 33-34.
• “Unified Family Courts: Recent Developments in Twelve States.” Judges’ Journal 42 (Spring 2003): 10.

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