Mandatory Conciliation Custody/Visitation Matters - California's Bold Stroke (From Alternative Means of Family Dispute Resolution, P 152-160, 1982, Howard Davidson et al, ed. - See NCJ-92365)

• NCJ Number: 92164
• Author(s): H McIsaac
• Date Published: 1982
• Length: 9 pages
• Sale Source: American Bar Assoc
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: Reprinted from Conciliation Courts Review, V 19, N 2 (December 1981)

Annotation

This article describes California's law S.B. 961, which made mediation mandatory in all contested custody and visitation matters before a party has any entitlement to a court hearing.

Abstract

The law enabled conciliation courts to be self-supporting through permitted increases in the divorce filing and marriage license fees. The law was passed in 1980. Important principles demonstrated in obtaining the legislation were (1) develop a large broad-based coalition of support beginning with the court; (2) work with the opposition in order to meet their concerns or find alternative solutions for helping them with legislation that would be in their interest; (3) do not waste efforts, but concentrate on contracting the legislators involved in the committee currently considering the bill; and (4) concentrate efforts at the point of attack. Finally, the rationale for the legislation must be clearly thought out and be persuasive. S.B. 961 was based on the following premises: that the use of conciliation in settling custody and visitation disputes encourages family self-determination, which takes government out of the lives of families and helps them to develop their own skills in negotiating conflict in the future and that conciliation removes the parental role from the adversary process through which the legal divorce is accomplished. A total of 17 footnotes are included. A comparative analysis of conciliation and trial court costs and S.B. 961 are appended.