Alternative Dispute Resolution: Encouraging An Open Hand

The cost, time, and stress associated with initiating or defending a lawsuit can be crippling. Alternative Dispute Resolution North or ADR North, in Chico, intends to alleviate these concerns and offer a better method to settle civil disagreements through the process of mediation.

Patricia Savage and her partners, Nicole Reimer and Ryan Lamb, have over 25 years of civil experience and believe that the mediation services offered in California’s larger counties should also be offered here in the Northstate. Most court cases can take up to five years before achieving a resolution; costing time, money, and undue stress along the way. According to Patricia, “Mediation provides a way to solve legal disputes that is less expensive, faster and reaches a result that brings about better results than court or a jury trial. It’s a wonderful way of getting people closer to resolving problems instead of just fighting them out endlessly while racking up enormous lawyer bills.”

Patricia and her partners see the need for the service here in the Northstate and intend to offer a way to reach highlyqualified mediators to recommend to clients based on their specific legal needs. Good mediators have extensive experience in the courts and can use that experience to assist parties in reaching an endgame to their dispute. Good mediators listen and offer solutions, which when done well, takes the conflict out of the conflict. As the judges here in Butte County often order parties into mediation before trial, it only makes sense that there is a place that mediation can begin, with something as simple as a phone call. That service is what Patricia and her team aim to provide, which until now, has largely been unavailable for cities north of Sacramento.

During mediation, the two sides of a dispute will meet with a “neutral” and be given an opportunity to explain their side of the story. It’s common for both sides to provide a written brief explaining the facts and their legal position. Simple mediations may only take a handful of hours while more complicated mediations, which often include numerous parties or complex legal issues, can last a full day. Mediation promotes clearer communication between the parties while helping to identify and delineate steps to resolve the disagreement. When you take a case to trial, it’s a gamble. You don’t know the judge you’re going to get. You don’t know how long it’s going to take. You don’t know if you’re going to win because maybe the law has changed, or if there is some other variable at play that will cause you to lose. At trial, it’s anyone’s guess as to what will happen. Mediation can allow the parties control over the process and help resolve the problem more expeditiously. “That’s always a good thing,” says Patricia. “The fighting can stop, the spending can stop, the sleeplessness and the worry that people have when they’re involved in a lawsuit can stop. They can reach a result that’s amicable, will be upheld in the courts, and the anxiety of not knowing what’s going to happen in the court system can end.”

Cooperation and resolution are more effective and constructive than fighting at trial. Patricia believes in alternative dispute resolution and the process of mediation and remembers something her rhetoric professors at Berkeley taught her, “An open palm or the shake of a hand often accomplishes more than a closed fist.” Contact ADR North for your mediation needs at 1 (844) 590 9795.