Assists people to avoid high legal costs and to solve problems in a quick and cost effective way. Provides support for mediation, pre-trial settlements, legal options, parenting plans, and landlord/tenant conflicts.

Mediation Services offered at Fulcrum Institute Dispute Resolution Clinic

Assists people to avoid high legal costs and to solve problems in a quick and cost effective way. Provides support in mediation for pre-trial settlements and legal options including; parenting plans, family issues, divorce, elder services and more.

Programs that provide a neutral third person who is acceptable to all parties to a dispute who facilitates discussion between the parties and aids them in making their own settlement decisions.

Mediation

Programs that help families resolve conflicts and reach consensus about care options for older family members. The mediator meets with family members (generally adult children) and their parents to sort out contentious or unresolved issues relating to the care plans for their parents. Other relatives and close friends may also be involved in the process. The mediator's objective is to defuse the situation and keep the group focused on finding the best possible outcome for the parent. Topics may include money issues, health care and end-of-life choices, possessions, independence, living arrangements, safety, caregiving responsibilities, economic and geographic disparities among siblings, differing expectations, complicated role reversals, ingrained ways of behaving, old "baggage" and personal commitments.  The service is generally provided by a trained, neutral conflict-resolution professional who may be an attorney or therapist with support, when helpful, from an elder law attorney, financial planner, caregiver or geriatric care manager.

Elder Mediation

Programs approved by the court that provide classes which utilize a specialized curriculum that assists families with family preservation and unification. The programs target families in which children are deemed at risk for abuse and neglect and enable parents to fulfill the requirements of court-ordered family preservation contracts.

Court Ordered Parenting Programs

Programs that help tenants and landlords resolve disputes regarding security and other rental deposits, unsanitary conditions, failure to make repairs, privacy, notice requirements, excessive rent increases, nonpayment of rent, neglect or damage to property, overcrowding or other grievances.

Landlord/Tenant Dispute Resolution

Programs that provide an impartial third person who is selected by the parties to a dispute or appointed by an outside body, who presides over a hearing at which both parties have an opportunity to be heard, and who issues an award that both parties have agreed in advance to accept as final. Included are compulsory arbitration in which the consent of one of the parties is enforced by statutory provisions, voluntary arbitration which involves mutual and free consent by both parties, interest arbitration in which the terms of a contract are settled, and grievance arbitration which concerns the violation or interpretation of an existing contract.

Arbitration

Provides dispute resolution by means of mediation, conciliation, facilitation and training. Types of disputes include but are not limited to: landlord/tenant; consumer/merchant; parent/teenager; employer/employee; neighbor/neighbor; family; divorce; parenting plans/property division; small claims court cases; and non-violent criminal cases.

Mediation/Dispute Resolution offered at Dispute Resolution - Skagit County

Provides dispute resolution by means of mediation, conciliation, facilitation and training for workplace, community and family.

Programs that provide assistance for people who want to obtain custody of their children as a part of a divorce or separation action, who want to appeal all or a portion of the terms of a previous child custody decision, or in the case of a noncustodial parent, who want to establish or appeal the terms of a visitation award or a court-ordered visitation schedule. Included are programs that provide child custody/visitation assistance for people who are not legally married but have children together.

Child Custody/Visitation Assistance

Programs that provide training for school children and others which teaches them techniques for resolving disagreements before they escalate to violence.

Conflict Resolution Training

Programs that help nonprofit organizations, small businesses and other groups understand and use effective techniques for resolving conflicts that arise in the workplace as alternatives to violence or litigation. Included are programs that provide training on conflict resolution techniques, such as negotiation, that help staff resolve an existing dispute or help people settle differences before they reach the stage of becoming a dispute; and those that serve as external mediators in workplace disputes that cannot be resolved internally.

Organizational Conflict Resolution Services

Programs that provide assistance for people who are initiating or responding to a suit for an annulment of their marriage, which establishes that a marital status never existed; a legal separation, which suspends the marriage so far as concerns the cohabitation of the two parties; or a divorce, which totally dissolves the marriage relationship. These programs may also discuss and represent the individual's interests regarding distribution of property assets and parenting issues regarding any children.

Divorce Assistance

Provides Legal information on the following topics: Divorce, Parenting Plan Modification, Paternity, Third-Party Custody and Protection Orders. Also provides services for Land Lord/Tennant Issues, Alternative Dispute Resolution, Bankruptcy, and Will preparation

Legal Services - Low Income offered at Volunteer Lawyer Program of Island County

Provides Legal information on the following topics: Divorce, Parenting Plan Modification, Paternity, Third-Party Custody and Protection Orders. Also provides services for Land Lord/Tennant Issues and Alternative Dispute Resolution.

Programs that provide information about specific legal problems and procedures that interested individuals can access on a website or in person, or by telephone, email, chat, text or other communication channel. Information may be in a self-serve, browsable format (for example a web resource directory or library of audio recordings) or provided by live agents with expertise in the field. Also included are legal aid services, bar associations and other programs that provide basic information about family law, landlord/tenant law, immigration law, consumer law, elder law, patient rights, the rights of persons with disabilities, the criminal justice system, the civil court system and other legal topics via workshops, classes, speaking engagements, printed materials, video tutorials, websites and other similar educational avenues.

Legal Information Services

Programs that provide assistance for people who are unable to pay their creditors and need to declare bankruptcy. Included may be help in evaluating a personal or business bankruptcy as an option, assistance in completing and filing bankruptcy forms and/or representation in bankruptcy hearings.

Bankruptcy Assistance

Programs that provide assistance which helps to ensure that parents fulfill their mutual obligation to financially support and provide health care for their children. Included are services for people who want to locate an absent parent; establish paternity; establish a child support order; request that the non-custodial parent provide health insurance for a child in conjunction with a child support order; change the amount of a child support award; dispute a child support award; or enforce payment of child support monies in cases where the supporting parent is delinquent in paying or refuses to pay or make health insurance arrangements altogether. Child support is money paid by one parent to another for the maintenance, including the education, of their children following the dissolution of their marriage or other relationship. Non-custodial parents enrolled in an insurance plan at work may be required to include the child under this coverage while those not covered by any insurance plan may be required to obtain medical coverage, if available at a reasonable cost. Child support assistance/enforcement may be provided by private attorneys, legal clinics, family law facilitators' offices or child support enforcement programs which are available in all states, often as a component of the district attorney's office.

Child Support Assistance/Enforcement

Programs that help to determine the probability of parenthood in disputes involving a claim or denial of paternity or maternity by analyzing blood and tissue samples from the assumed father or mother for compatibility with the child's blood and tissue. Included are programs that establish claims of fatherhood or motherhood in situations where immigrants are seeking family-based visas for their offspring or parents.

Paternity/Maternity Establishment

Programs that provide assistance on an individual or group basis for people who want to draft a Last Will and Testament which leaves instructions for the disposition of their property following their death and need assistance in ensuring that the document is properly written. Also included are programs that provide copies of the Last Will and Testament form that is valid in their jurisdiction.

Will Preparation Assistance

Mediation/Dispute Resolution offered at Dispute Resolution Center - Everett

Programs that provide assistance for people who are in favor of or want to oppose the appointment of a conservator to protect adults from physical danger and improper treatment and/or to protect their estate from exploitation or waste when they are incapable of managing their own affairs or are competent but infirm. Conservatorships differ widely among jurisdictions. In some states, conservatorships are voluntary arrangements in which a physically infirm but competent individual petitions the court to appoint the conservator of choice to manage whatever powers and property the conservatee chooses to include in the arrangement. In these jurisdictions, guardianships apply to adults who are found to be incompetent. In other states, conservatorships apply only to an individual's property while guardianships address responsibility for the person.  States having no conservatorship arrangements generally have guardianship provisions which address the needs of adults who have been found by the courts to be incapable of managing their own affairs.