AUBURN - Everyone has disputes from time to time, Patricia Levin said, and a bit of outside influence can often help get them resolved.
Levin, director of the Cayuga/Seneca Center for Dispute Settlement, hosted an informal discussion at Seymour Library in Auburn Wednesday afternoon to help introduce people to the organization and what services it can make available to the community.
“It is hard to publicize what we do,” Levin said. “This is something that is available to everyone in New York state. We work on settling interpersonal disputes and through our offices we work with all the residents that are in the seventh judicial district.”
Levin said that the center offers an alternative means of reaching a settlement during a dispute situation.
This is accomplished through a process of mediation.
“This is not counseling,” Levin said. “Generally people don't like to be told what to do. This offers people a chance to find an alternative way to get to a solution on their own to have a say in how they accomplish that.”
This process can manifest itself in a number of venues.
Levin said that the center works with people on things such as neighbor disputes - a barking dog or a tree hanging over a property line that can build into larger conflicts.
The goal of mediation is to get both parties to speak and find a means to reach a mutually agreeable resolution.
“We are future-focused,” Levin said. “We know that there is a problem and we try to find a way to get through that and look at ways that everyone can co-exist in the future once an agreement has been made.”
Levin said that this not only applies to neighbors but to other areas that are considered community mediation issues such as small claims, landlord/tenant issues and breach of contract as well as larger interpersonal issues like divorce, custody and visitation.
Often, a couple that is splitting up will be directed to the center as a means of reaching an agreement on issues such as division of property and child visitation.
Once an agreement has been reached, it becomes an order of the court.
“The agreement is reviewed by a judge,” Levin said. “Once the couple has worked out an agreeable settlement after they split they are responsible for filing it with the court and once it is reviewed by the judge it becomes a legal agreement.”
Levin said that this also applies to parent and child relationships, where communication is breaking down.
Levin said that dispute settlement has also been working in areas such as farming.
“That is something that we would like to expand into more here,” Levin said. “There are issues like payment to vendors or division of property among family members if the primary farm owner has retired, who gets the land and who gets what equipment, things like that.”
Levin said that this approach is a model that can also be applied in other workplace settings.
“It is very competitive,” Levin said. “And everyone feels a lot of stress, but when there is conflict in the workplace, one colleague that doesn't want to talk to another, there is a cost to not looking at ways to resolve the issue.”
The mediators are all volunteers who complete a 40-hour training session before spending time observing other mediators in the field.
“We get people from all kinds of backgrounds,” Levin said. “You have to have an interest in learning a new skill, something that will allow you to look at the way you handle conflict in your own life, and also something that you can use and are willing to dedicate the time to, to use to help others.”
Levin said that this approach is not always successful and sometimes issues are so deeply ingrained that finding a mutually agreeable solution may be impossible, but to a large extent, she has found that 80 to 85 percent of cases can be settled.
“This isn't going to solve everything,” Levin said. “But a lot of the time this is the first time both parties will sit down and talk and get to tell their own side of the story. Conflict is tricky, it isn't something you can see or take off the shelf, but we can all see the effects it has and just getting people talking can be the first step to resolution.”
To learn more
For more information on the Center for Dispute Settlement or to learn more about becoming a mediator, contact Patricia Levin at 252-4260
“It is hard to publicize what we do,” Levin said. “This is something that is available to everyone in New York state. We work on settling interpersonal disputes and through our offices we work with all the residents that are in the seventh judicial district.”
Levin said that the center offers an alternative means of reaching a settlement during a dispute situation.
This is accomplished through a process of mediation.
“This is not counseling,” Levin said. “Generally people don't like to be told what to do. This offers people a chance to find an alternative way to get to a solution on their own to have a say in how they accomplish that.”
This process can manifest itself in a number of venues.
Levin said that the center works with people on things such as neighbor disputes - a barking dog or a tree hanging over a property line that can build into larger conflicts.
The goal of mediation is to get both parties to speak and find a means to reach a mutually agreeable resolution.
“We are future-focused,” Levin said. “We know that there is a problem and we try to find a way to get through that and look at ways that everyone can co-exist in the future once an agreement has been made.”
Levin said that this not only applies to neighbors but to other areas that are considered community mediation issues such as small claims, landlord/tenant issues and breach of contract as well as larger interpersonal issues like divorce, custody and visitation.
Often, a couple that is splitting up will be directed to the center as a means of reaching an agreement on issues such as division of property and child visitation.
Once an agreement has been reached, it becomes an order of the court.
“The agreement is reviewed by a judge,” Levin said. “Once the couple has worked out an agreeable settlement after they split they are responsible for filing it with the court and once it is reviewed by the judge it becomes a legal agreement.”
Levin said that this also applies to parent and child relationships, where communication is breaking down.
Levin said that dispute settlement has also been working in areas such as farming.
“That is something that we would like to expand into more here,” Levin said. “There are issues like payment to vendors or division of property among family members if the primary farm owner has retired, who gets the land and who gets what equipment, things like that.”
Levin said that this approach is a model that can also be applied in other workplace settings.
“It is very competitive,” Levin said. “And everyone feels a lot of stress, but when there is conflict in the workplace, one colleague that doesn't want to talk to another, there is a cost to not looking at ways to resolve the issue.”
The mediators are all volunteers who complete a 40-hour training session before spending time observing other mediators in the field.
“We get people from all kinds of backgrounds,” Levin said. “You have to have an interest in learning a new skill, something that will allow you to look at the way you handle conflict in your own life, and also something that you can use and are willing to dedicate the time to, to use to help others.”
Levin said that this approach is not always successful and sometimes issues are so deeply ingrained that finding a mutually agreeable solution may be impossible, but to a large extent, she has found that 80 to 85 percent of cases can be settled.
“This isn't going to solve everything,” Levin said. “But a lot of the time this is the first time both parties will sit down and talk and get to tell their own side of the story. Conflict is tricky, it isn't something you can see or take off the shelf, but we can all see the effects it has and just getting people talking can be the first step to resolution.”
To learn more
For more information on the Center for Dispute Settlement or to learn more about becoming a mediator, contact Patricia Levin at 252-4260
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