A new child support law is taking money out of single parents’ child support.

As part of a 2005 bill lawmakers passed, the law imposes a $25 annual fee for every case the Division of Child Support Enforcement gets involved in.

The money would be paid by the parents seeking help obtaining child support, and it's now being enforced and those parents say it isn't fair.

About 40,000 single moms and dads in Hampton Roads received a letter last week informing them of the fee.

Melody Criger, like any single parent, is doing her best to support her seven-year-old son Brennan and her 11-year-old daughter, but she relies on court order child support that doesn't always come on time.

Now the fee is adding to her frustration.

"The babysitter got her letter and they were upset and then I got home to find my letter in the mailbox and I immediately started writing everyone I could think of to write,” said Criger. “It just didn't seem right."

The fee is federally mandated and was passed as part of the large Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 and is now being enforced.

Many single parents feel it's penalizing the wrong people.

"If it wasn't for him, if he was being responsible and paying his child support like he was supposed to, we wouldn't have to go through DCSE and there wouldn't be this fee,” said Criger.

Local parents are so upset that they’ve started an online petition that is quickly gaining support.

"It's their money,” said Criger, referring to her children. “They didn't ask them. They are not old enough to vote. It seems ridiculous that you would pretty much tax someone that is under 18."

Virginia is expected to raise $2 million with the fee, and two thirds of that will go to the federal government to the deficit.