Document Actions
|
|
1103 Sheridan Park N. E.
Atlanta,
Georgia
30324
Phone: 404-315-0700
Fax: 404-315-8811
|
Through its principal Robert P. Wildau, NewSouth Mediation Services has resolved hundreds of cases since he became a full-service mediator and arbitrator in the early 1990s.
The firm has had equal success in family law and business matters, including contract and workplace issues, employment discrimination, corporate and partnership breakups, landlord-tenant, construction and insurance disputes. Mr. Wildau practiced law in Atlanta for 23 years before founding NewSouth in 1995 and becoming a full time neutral in 1998.
Mr. Wildau served as a Judicial Officer on the Family Court of Fulton County and was President of the Family Mediation Association of Georgia and later Chair of the Dispute Resolution Section of the Atlanta Bar Association. He is active on the Steering Committee of the Collaborative Law Institute of Georgia and speaks regularly on dispute resolution topics to professional and lay organizations.
A graduate of Dartmouth College and the Case Western Reserve University School of Law, he is a Practitioner-Member of the Association for Conflict Resolution and sits on the mediation and arbitration panels of the American Arbitration Association, the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, Resolution Resources, Inc. and ADR Associates, LLC. He had a prior career as a journalist in Europe, Vietnam and in several American cities and was a criminal justice planner in the State of Ohio.
Lawyers and Mediation
Mediation can be a way for parties who are not comfortable with lawyers to resolve disputes without involving them. But advice from an attorney is usually helpful:
- To help you define your goals and alternatives
- To advise or coach you during negotiations
- To
make sure, before you sign it, that your agreement says what you intend.
The attorney-client relationship is rarely simple. Lawyers are trained to be aggressive in setting the agenda at the start of a case. Sometimes clients think that assertiveness inflames the situation for no reason. They may find their lawyer over-protective, but hesitate to come out and say so for fear of insulting her or weakening her commitment to their case.
Normally lawyers and mediators are equally concerned about meeting the client’s needs, but their functions are different. Sometimes it takes a lawyer to file a lawsuit so the client can learn the true facts and therefore define his goals. But mediation at an early stage can help parties look at the case with fresh eyes, before they get too committed to their positions. And mediation can often bring a party to accept a reality that her own lawyer couldn’t make her understand – that her goals just aren’t realistic.
Mediation is always an opportunity to advance one's cause, if not to settle the case then to learn more about the other parties' interests. Hearing the other party's story from his or her own mouth is crucial to being able to assess the strength of your own. That's why a lawyer should always prepare her client to participate in mediation and to be ready to make decisions if the opportunity comes up. If the parties don't find the common ground and settle their case, they will be better prepared to proceed to trial and confident that they have explored every option.
No party or lawyer who has been through mediation at NewSouth goes away without feeling heard and having a clear understanding of what is at stake in their case. The goal of mediation is always to reach agreements that parties will voluntarily live up to. But any agreement must also be clear and definite enough to be enforceable by law if necessary.
The NewSouth neutral records a memorandum of agreement on a laptop computer, and prints it out in easy-to-understand language that covers every important point. If lawyers are involved, it's easy for them to put the memorandum into final form without further argument.
Separation and Divorce
Breaking up a marriage is intended to lead to happier lives for both partners.
But while it's happening, they struggle with anger and disappointment. It's tempting to let off steam by lashing out at each other through lawyers, and by trying to gain the favor of their children.
Just when the future is the most uncertain, husbands and wives waste savings or go deeper into debt fighting over limited resources. Children dread more than anything else being forced to take sides. Studies show they are marked for life by the spectacle of their parents hurting each other.
But strange as it may seem, you can have a bad marriage and still achieve a good divorce. The key is working out your divorce with your spouse, instead of fighting it out.
A good mediator will help you do that.
Divorce mediation separates the people from the problems in a way that makes solutions possible. But both parts of the divorcing couple have to share certain priorities:
| They choose | They reject | |
| Making the future better | instead of |
dwelling on fault and blame for the past |
| The love of children for both parents | over |
their bitterness with each other |
| A fair and workable settlement | rather than |
getting the last dollar |
They understand that life is long and that how they act is more important than what they say. In divorce especially, experience shows that "what goes around comes around."
How does divorce mediation work?
In divorce cases the mediator helps spouses define their issues, collect information they need to make decisions, generate options, then negotiate agreements. No commitment is needed except to play by rules that you and your husband or wife agree on.
The mediator helps you and your spouse figure out how to share the ups and downs of raising children in the real world waiting out there for when the divorce is over. Each of you works through a budget and figures out how to meet your own needs, and what help you need or can afford to give to your children's other parent. Together you draw up an inventory of the property and debts that you accumulated during the marriage. Then you divide them in the way that best meets your different needs.
But why should I take the chance of going through a divorce without a lawyer to protect my rights?
You shouldn't! But keep control of the process yourself, instead of turning it over to a hired gun, or a court system which can't afford to give your case the attention it deserves. By discussing with you how a court may treat your case, a lawyer can give you the confidence you need to settle your own divorce. (Psychologists, accountants and financial planners can be helpful too.) So consult with an attorney in advance, call her for advice during a break or bring him to the table. The best use of a lawyer in mediation is as a coach, not a fighter.
How do I prepare for mediation?
Pulling together the necessary financial information is always the most time-consuming part of any divorce process. You can make your mediation most efficient by using NewSouth's copyrighted forms:
|
|
|
|
Download
Adobe Acrobat Reader to view NewSouth's forms. 
|
Pre-Nuptial Issues
About half of all first marriages end in divorce, and an even higher percentage of second marriages! If only couples could address the challenges of married life as seriously before they marry as they do at the time of divorce. But most husbands and wives get only a quiet little pre-marital counseling session with a clergy-person. It rarely touches on the subject of money, which triggers more divorces than any other cause.
A pre-nuptial agreement can achieve two wonderful purposes. First, it is a forum for talking about difficult issues before marriage. Second, and more important, it is a means of resolving tough financial questions at a time when the parties are respectful and loving towards each other rather than feeling angry and insecure.
For a long time, most prenuptial agreements involved couples who differed widely in age and wealth. So we think of a "prenup" as an unromantic contract that smacks of selfishness. But a prenuptial agreement is only selfish if it is unfair, as in "you keep what is yours, and I keep what is mine" when I am many times wealthier than you. Under those circumstances, if the marriage lasts for many years, the agreement probably is unfair and won't be enforced anyway.
Although the prenuptial agreement seems pessimistic because it contemplates divorce at the very beginning of a marriage, it is becoming increasingly popular. And as a road map for a couple's lifelong financial dealings, it can set a pattern for fairness and openness in their entire relationship.
Having helped many husbands and wives find fairness amid the turmoil of divorce, NewSouth has the tools and seasoning to make pre-nuptial financial counseling a valuable experience for every engaged couple.
Please email us or visit our website for additional information.
