Mediation in Divorce (and Parentage) Cases
Mediation is generally required in family cases in Illinois. Unless there is a good reason for a judge not to refer a case to mediation, (such as domestic abuse) any family case in which the parents cannot agree how to divide time and responsibilities of their children, will likely wind up in mediation.
I see good results with mediation – warring mothers and fathers sitting down together and talking out their issues and jointly making decisions that benefit their children. And as part of that dialogue, some of the distrust and suspicion fading away too.
Of course, mediation is not always successful. Many times, I have been disappointed by an unsuccessful mediation. That’s why we have judges. But even unsuccessful mediations can result in partial agreements, and parents opening up a dialogue in a safe place with a neutral third party with no “taking sides” and no judgment against either parent.
One of the points of mediation is that parents should make their own decisions about how their children are to be raised and which parent the children are going to be with and when. Why should a judge make these decisions when it is the parents’ right to do so? Parents know their children far better than a judge.
Mediators can mediate more than parenting issues. Mediators can even mediate property, child support, and all other issues and can save people a lot of time, aggravation, and money. Parents who were never married, but have children together, can also benefit from mediation. Think about the effects on the children of mediation as opposed to an all-out war.
Over the years I have gotten a lot of feedback from clients who have gone through meditation. I recall one time a formerly really angry parent telephoned me after mediation and told me how glad he was to have gone through mediation because he had been so bitter at the mother for so many years after the divorce.
In our circuit we have two types of meditation. One is judicial mediation for parents who cannot afford to pay for mediation. In judicial mediation, a judge who is not the judge on the parents’ case, takes off his or her black robe and sits down with the parents to try to help them come to an agreement. This “judicial” mediator is not acting as a judge and cannot order you to do anything. If either or both parents have lawyers, the lawyers usually DO NOT attend mediation. If the parents can come to an agreement with the judicial mediators help, the judicial mediator can draft an order right then and there. It’s called a “provisional order” and it still needs to be approved by the actual judge handling the case.
The other type of mediator is a private person who is certified by the Chief Judge as an approved mediator. This person is usually a private attorney, but mental health counselors can also be certified as mediators. Private mediators charge a fee (it is customary in the local area to charge $600 for up hour mediation session) and if the parents reach an agreement the private mediator drafts up a memo or letter with the agreement. Again, the lawyers usually do not attend mediation. As a matter of fact, is not necessary that the parents have lawyers in either type of mediation although many people prefer to have their own lawyer.
Usually in our local area, the Second Judicial Circuit of Illinois, a case will have a referral to a mediator by the court. However it does not have to be that way. In some areas where mediation is more evolved, the spouses or parents will approach a mediator from the start and the divorce or parenting dispute can be handled civilly before it gets to court.
You can find out more about mediation on the Second Judicial Circuit of Illinois’ web site. www.illinoissecondcircuit.info. You should be able to find yours truly, Rebecca M. Blakeslee, on the list of approved family mediators on the Illinois Second Circuit website.
