Application of Spousal Maintenance Support Modification

FOURTH COURT UPDATE

By Justice Irene Rios

In a case of first impression, we held subsection 8.057(c)(1) of the Texas Family Code does not require the trial court to apply a modification of spousal maintenance support to all payments accruing after the date the motion to modify is filed. Wallace v. Wallace, 690 S.W.3d 718 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 2024, no pet.); see also Tex. Fam. Code Ann. § 8.057(c)(1).

In Wallace, Husband was ordered to pay $1,150 per month for spousal maintenance in an Agreed Final Decree of Divorce signed on April 19, 2011. On November 6, 2015, after Husband retired and his annual income decreased, he filed a petition to modify spousal maintenance. In addition to seeking a modification, Husband asked the trial court to retroactively apply the modification to November 2015 and reimburse him for any overpayment of spousal maintenance from when he filed his motion to modify to when the trial court granted the modification.

The trial court granted a modification in 2019, but Husband filed a motion to reconsider the modification. In March 2022, after vacating the first modification order, the trial court held a second hearing on Husband’s modification motion. On April 14, 2022, the trial court granted a modification, ordering Husband to pay Wife $379.73 per month in spousal maintenance. The trial court declined Husband’s request to retroactively apply the modification to November 2015 under subsection 8.057(c), ordered the first modified payment due on April 1, 2022, and denied Husband’s request for reimbursement of alleged overpayments.

Subsection 8.057(c) authorizes a trial court to modify spousal maintenance “on a proper showing of a material and substantial change in circumstances that occurred after the date of the order or decree….” Tex. Fam. Code Ann. § 8.057(c) The statute provides the court: “(1) shall apply the modification only to payment accruing after the filing of the motion to modify; and (2) may not increase maintenance to an amount or duration that exceeds the amount or remaining duration of the original maintenance order.” Id.

On appeal, Husband argued the trial court erred when it did not retroactively apply the modification of spousal maintenance to payments after November 2015 because the word “shall” in subsection 8.057(c)(1) requires the trial court to retroactively apply the modification to all payments accruing after the filing of a motion to modify. Wife argued the trial court has discretion to apply the modification retroactively, but subsection 8.057(c)(1) prohibits the trial court from retroactively applying the modification to payments that accrued prior to the filing date of the motion to modify.

In determining whether the trial court erred when it declined to retroactively apply the modification, we applied rules of statutory construction to interpret subsection 8.057(c) (1). We “consider statutes as a whole rather than their isolated provisions.” TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Co. v. Combs, 340 S.W.3d 432, 439 (Tex. 2011). Here, subsections 8.057(c) (1) and (c)(2) are limitations on the trial court’s authority to modify spousal maintenance, not mandates on the trial court’s application of spousal maintenance modification.

“If it were the legislature’s intent to require the trial court to retroactively apply modification to every payment accruing after the motion was filed, it would have said so by removing the word ‘only’ and simply stating: ‘The court shall apply the modification to payment accruing after the filing of the motion to modify.’” See Wallace, 690 S.W.3d at 724; see also Pedernal Energy, LLC v. Bruington Eng’g, Ltd., 536 S.W.3d 487, 491 (Tex. 2017) (“We must interpret the statute in a way that gives meaning to all its words.”). The trial court may apply the modification to any payments accruing after the motion to modify is filed. Wallace, 690 S.W.3d at 724. We did not deduce from the statute that the legislature intended to deprive the trial court of its discretion to determine on what date it may apply the modification—whether retroactive or not—so long as the modification is applied after the filing of the motion to modify. See id. at 724–25. Thus, we held the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it applied the modification to all payments accruing on and after April 1, 2022.

Justice Irene Rios has served on the Fourth Court of Appeals since January 2017. Justice Rios previously served as Judge of County Court at Law No. 10, in Bexar County, for fourteen years. Prior to her appointment to the bench, Justice Rios spent nine years in private practice. She is a Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation and a Fellow of the San Antonio Bar Foundation, and she has served as a Special Master of major litigation.