Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 28, 1990 TAG: 9003280168
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOE KENNEDY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
"I hope I don't have to come here," she told Susan Yoder, the center's director of training, who happened to be standing nearby.
"If you hear that I murdered somebody, you'll know that I should have come in."
Yoder asked a few questions and determined that the woman was having trouble with her neighbor upstairs - another woman who made noise at all hours of the night, despite many protests.
Yoder helped the woman select brochures and wished her well. The woman was walking proof that there's a market for mediation and other conflict-resolving techniques - which often are cheaper, less time-consuming and less emotionally taxing than going through the courts.
The Community Mediation Center has operated since 1982, using volunteer mediators to provide impartial guidance in negotiations between disagreeing people.
Mediation as means of solving problems goes back hundreds of years and includes among its practitioners former president Jimmy Carter and the United Nations.
The community mediation movement had its start in the 1970s in California. The Harrisonburg center is modeled after a San Francisco program.
And it's serving as the model for a non-profit conflict resolution center planned for Roanoke.
"We feel like there are a number of cases that get into the court system that could be settled outside of the system with less expense, more quickly," said Leighe B. Hanes Jr., a Fincastle lawyer and board chairman of the Roanoke center.
"We would hope to include some services which involve divorce cases, custody matters, property settlements" and other civil disputes including real estate and business conflicts.
Mediation is a term used for the process in which the parties themselves work out solutions with guidance from an impartial third party.
It is gaining favor in many judicial districts as a means of helping alleviate congestion in the courts.
One study determined that more than 2,000 child custody and visitation disputes went through mediation in 1987 in Virginia, according to Richard Balnave, the University of Virginia Law School professor who runs the Virginia Dispute Resolution Center in Charlottesville.
"Of those, I believe it had a success rate or a settlement rate of 71 percent. That's 1,435 cases that got settled in that 12-month period."
Those settlements then were endorsed by the courts.
The point is not to take business from lawyers, mediation proponents say, though some lawyers may see it that way. Indeed, an increasing number of lawyers offer mediation in addition to their legal work.
Holly Peters says co-mediation, conducted by a mediator and a lawyer, is increasing, too. Peters, a Legal Aid lawyer in Roanoke, is vice president of the Roanoke center's board.
The Roanoke center may have an office as soon as May 1 and may start taking clients by October, Hanes said. He expects it to get many referrals from Roanoke area judges, who have, organizers say, expressed their support.
At the moment, the only public service family mediation program is in Roanoke County. At least one private mediation service, owned by a Radford University professor, has been in operation for about 18 months.
Community mediation centers have sprung up in Fredericksburg, Richmond, Charlottesville, Harrisonburg and Northern Virginia. The mailing list for the grassroots Virginia Mediation Network contains 400 names, said Diane Bryner, one of the network's founders.
"I think it's an idea whose time has come," Hanes said. `As a matter of fact, I think it's an idea whose time has come and passed." He said community mediation groups number about 150 nationwide 10 years ago, "and my understanding is there are 450 now."
But mediation still is not widely known or understood, said Catherine Whittaker, the Radford University professor of social work and criminal justice who operates the Family Mediation Service of Roanoke.
She, too, is on the board of the proposed non-profit mediation center.
Because it's still a grass-roots movement, neither licensing nor certification standards have been set for mediation in Virginia.
"There was some effort last year to get some kind of legislation to cover issues of confidentiality for mediators," Bryner said. The state network initially supported the legislation but withdrew its support when the wording was changed.
She and other professional mediators working for court service units believe some sort of certification or licensing is necessary. "Without it, I don't think the profession or skill level will be recognized."
What that will mean for centers that use volunteers, as in Harrisonburg and possibly Roanoke, is unclear. Whittaker, the Radford professor, says there is room for different categories of mediation.
The Roanoke center will conduct a fund drive to underwrite its service.
"We'll be in the ever-growing pile of non-profit agencies trying to raise money," Peters said.
The Harrisonburg center charges $10 to $80 per hour determined by the client's ability to pay. Its budget of $100,000 includes donations from businesses and individuals.
by CNB