Posted by Nydia Streets of Streets Law in Florida Child Support
Is a Florida family law court required to assign the tax dependency exemption between the parents? If the parents present enough evidence for the court to make this determination, the court can assign the exemption. However in the absence of assignment, the default rule is that the exemption is awarded to the parent who has majority time-sharing. This was an issue in the case Leonard v. Gordon, 4D2024-1309 (Fla. 4th DCA December 11, 2024).
The mother in this case appealed multiple issues, but the appellate court affirmed on all issues except one - the tax dependency exemption. After the hearing in the case, the trial court declined to rule on the tax dependency exemption, citing a lack of evidence presented by either party as to the tax consequences of assigning the exemption. However the child support guideline attached to the court’s ruling showed each parent claiming one child for the exemption. The mother argued this contradicted the court’s oral ruling on the exemption.
The appellate court agreed and reversed as to this issue. It held “Therefore, in light of the trial court’s oral ruling, the mother is presumptively entitled to the dependency tax exemption because she has the majority of the timesharing with the children. Frank v. Frank, 394 So. 3d 1187 (Fla. 4th DCA 2024), is instructive on this point. In Frank, the husband argued the trial court erred in failing to include findings as to which parent was entitled to claim the dependency tax exemption for the children. Id. at 1188. We found that the trial court did not err in not including such findings and further found that, under the default rule, the wife was entitled to claim the exemption for both children. Id. at 1189. We explained that ‘Florida law does not require a finding regarding which parent is entitled to claim the dependency tax exemption.’ Id. Rather, the parent with the majority of the timesharing is presumptively entitled to the dependency tax exemption. Id. ‘However, ‘the trial court has discretion to transfer the exemption to the noncustodial parent.’ Id. at 1188.”
The court concluded “In the instant case, the mother has the children the majority of the time and thus, under the default rule, is presumptively entitled to claim the dependency tax exemption for both children. Because the trial court orally ruled that it did not determine entitlement to tax exemptions, the presumption remained with the mother. In summary, given the conflict between the trial court’s oral pronouncement and the amended final judgment, we affirm the trial court’s oral pronouncement but remand for the trial court to strike references in the child support guidelines worksheet to the father claiming either of the children for tax purposes.”
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