Washington

Paternity Establishment, Interstate (with Oregon)

Description/Goal

Often times, a paternity acknowledgement may have been signed in a state other than the one working the case. Periodic matches of children needing paternity established with border-state birth records can be used to identify these acknowledgments. The states of Oregon and Washington are experimenting with doing computer matches of their paternity caseloads with the other state's birth records to uncover paternity acknowledgements filed in the other state. The project started with the first match being done in June 1999.

Results

A match of Oregon's paternity caseload with Washington's Department of Health records resulted in the discovery of over 200 acknowledgements filed in the state of Washington.

Location

Statewide

Funding

Regular Federal matching funds are used.

Replication Advice

• Enter into an agreement with the agency maintaining the birth records that allows for release of the information to another state.
• Determine the best data to use to do the match. It may be better to do the match on the mother's name rather than the child or presumed father.