Texas lawmakers decided during the state's budget crisis that it will no longer pay the required federal fees for child support services and will make custodial parents pay them instead.

"For what?" Jose Ramirez asked KFOX-14 reporter Jacob Rascon. He has paid child support for his 11-year-old daughter Elizabeth for six years.

"You pay happily?" Rascon asked Ramirez. "Oh yeah," Ramirez said.

"A check, that's it!" Diana Medina said. She has been receiving a child support check for her now-18-year-old son Anthony for almost 14 years.

Medina and Ramirez are two of around 30,000 people who use the services of the El Paso County domestic relations office after paying fees.

"Through these fees we are able to practically cover the cost of this operation of the entire office," said Jim Fashing, executive director of the office. "[That way] the taxpayer at large does not have to bear that burden -- only the people who use our services."

Texas will now follow the example of that office. The state and the taxpayers have been absorbing the $25 federal fee per child support case since it was first required in October 2006, amounting to more than $25 million.

That $25 will now come out of child support checks of the custodial parent if he or she receives more than $500 per year in child support. In "registry only cases," custodial parents will pay a $3 per month, or $36 per year.

Medina and Ramirez said they are somewhat disappointed because that means less money for the children.

"Twenty-five dollars is $25," Medina said.