Most Maryland parents leave their first custody hearing holding a form they’ve never seen before and a court date they’re already anxious about. The form is real, the deadline is real, and what you put in that document will shape your child’s daily life for years. A parenting plan in Maryland isn’t a handshake agreement you write up and file away. It becomes a court order, and courts expect it to be specific enough to answer the questions that will inevitably come up once the divorce is final.
At Fatemi Law, we work with Maryland families navigating child custody and visitation as part of divorce and as standalone proceedings. What we see most often is parents who understand they need a parenting plan but don’t know what Maryland actually requires it to contain, which form they’re supposed to file, or how the law changed in 2025 in ways that directly affect how judges evaluate these plans. This post walks through all of it.
What Maryland Actually Requires from Co-Parents
Maryland Rule 9-204.1 makes a parenting plan mandatory in every case involving custody of a minor child, including when custody is part of a divorce proceeding. There’s no option to skip it or leave it for later. Maryland Circuit Courts handle these filings, and parents typically receive the relevant forms at the first court hearing.
Which form you use depends on whether you and your co-parent can reach an agreement. Parents who agree use Form CC-DR-109, the Maryland Parenting Plan Tool. Parents who can’t fully agree must both complete Form CC-DR-110, the Joint Statement of the Parties Concerning Decision-Making Authority and Parenting Time. The Joint Statement is what the court uses to identify every contested issue and rule on it, which means a CC-DR-110 filing signals litigation rather than cooperation.
Once the court finds that the plan serves the best interests of the child, it incorporates the plan into a court order. At that point it’s legally enforceable, not a suggestion. That’s why what you put in the plan matters far more than just checking a procedural box.
How Maryland’s 2025 Custody Law Shapes Your Plan
Maryland Family Law § 9-201, enacted through HB 1191 and signed by Governor Wes Moore on May 15, 2025, took effect on October 1, 2025. For the first time, Maryland statute codifies the best-interest-of-the-child standard by requiring judges to evaluate 16 specific factors for every custody determination. Before this law, Maryland courts applied a common-law best-interest analysis without a statutory checklist. Now the factors are enumerated, and judges must address each one.
A well-constructed parenting plan works directly with these 16 factors. When your plan demonstrates stability, shows how both parents will share rights and responsibilities, describes how the child’s educational and health needs will be met, and limits the child’s exposure to parental conflict, it’s already speaking the language judges are required to use. A vague plan forces the judge to fill in the gaps, which rarely goes the way either parent hoped.
The companion statute, Family Law § 9-202, also effective October 1, 2025, codifies that a parent’s proposal to relocate in a way that makes existing physical custody impractical constitutes a material change in circumstances. That means a relocation clause in your parenting plan isn’t optional planning anymore. It’s directly tied to a statutory standard that will govern any future modification request.
What a Complete Maryland Parenting Plan Must Cover
Form CC-DR-109 draws an explicit line between two distinct concepts parents sometimes conflate. Legal custody refers to decision-making authority over major issues affecting the child, including health care, education, and religious upbringing. Physical custody refers to parenting time. Where the child lives and on what schedule must both be addressed, and they don’t have to be handled the same way. Shared legal custody with primary physical custody assigned to one parent is common, and the form accommodates it.
The schedule section requires genuine specificity. Courts want to see how regular weekly time is divided, how holidays and school breaks rotate, how summer is structured, and how out-of-state or international travel is handled. Plans that use language like “as mutually agreed” return to court more often than plans that spell out exactly what happens when parents can’t agree on a given week. Specificity isn’t rigidity; it’s protection.
Dispute resolution language belongs in the plan itself. If mediation is required before either parent can file a motion to modify, that needs to be written in. Who bears the cost of mediation, how parents communicate day to day, and what platform or method they use are all details courts expect to see addressed rather than assumed.
If You & Your Co-Parent Can’t Agree
When full agreement isn’t possible, both parents must complete Form CC-DR-110. The filing deadlines are firm: the Joint Statement must be filed at least 10 days before a settlement conference or at least 20 days before trial. Planning backward from a court date, that means starting the CC-DR-110 process at least 30 days before those deadlines to leave room for exchange and revision.
Maryland courts view a CC-DR-109 filing more favorably than a CC-DR-110 because a cooperative agreement signals that parents can make future decisions without court intervention. When parents litigate rather than negotiate, they’re telling the court they can’t work together, which becomes part of how the judge evaluates the 16 best-interest factors going forward.
Mediation is permitted during the CC-DR-110 process and can help parents identify disputed issues, work through them one at a time, and often convert a Joint Statement into an agreed plan. Court-imposed orders tend to be less tailored to a family’s actual circumstances than agreements parents reach with professional help.
Provisions That Protect the Plan Long Term
For families where one parent is a non-citizen or has close ties to another country, international travel consent and passport custody language aren’t optional additions. The Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) governs which state or country has jurisdiction over custody matters and can apply in international contexts, particularly when a parent seeks to enforce or modify a custody order across borders. A parenting plan that says nothing about international travel or passport control creates real risk, especially if the relationship between parents is strained.
A modification clause should reference the Family Law § 9-202 standard directly: the plan can be revisited when there’s a material change in circumstances affecting the child’s needs or either parent’s ability to meet them. Because a proposed relocation that makes existing physical custody impractical now meets that threshold by statute, building relocation notice requirements into the plan gives both parents a clear process before any court involvement becomes necessary.
Co-parenting communication platforms like OurFamilyWizard and TalkingParents maintain timestamped records of messages, payment tracking, and schedule changes that courts can review. Some Maryland judges recommend or order their use. Including a platform designation in the plan from the start reduces disputes about what was said and when, and creates a record that protects both parents if conflict escalates later.
Building a Plan That Lasts
A parenting plan built around Maryland’s current statutory framework doesn’t just satisfy the court’s procedural requirements. It gives your child a predictable structure and reduces the number of times you and your co-parent may end up back in front of a judge. The 16 best-interest factors under Family Law § 9-201 exist because the legislature recognized that custody decisions have lasting consequences. A plan that addresses those factors thoughtfully does the same work outside the courtroom that the statute does inside it.
Every family’s circumstances are different, and the right parenting arrangement for one child won’t fit another. We take the time to understand what makes your situation specific before building a strategy. Whether that means negotiating a CC-DR-109 plan your co-parent can agree to or preparing a CC-DR-110 that accurately frames the contested issues for the court, we can walk you through your options. If you’re ready to talk, reach out to us at (301) 857-4914.