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[Gregory]

Tinka has raised an important issue here:

Hmmm, It seems Gregory, with implying your theory of Bob and Gailon that you support the pew money to keep this fiasco of corruption going??? Wow, it has been quite established that all corruption will come to an end with the greatest loss of all. Eternity. So... just thoughts looking in from outside.

That issues essentially questions whether or not the issues currently in litigation could have been resolved in some manner that did not require the expenditure of large sums of money and the involvement of the judicial system.

I remind you that an attempt was made early on to resolve issues in a process known as mediation. That process fell through and the end result was litigation with consequent expenditure of funds.

There are always going to be two parties in the Mediation.  However, there may be several people that consist of one party.  Or, a party may consist of one person. One major difference is that in the Agency where I work, each of the parties to the Mediation has someone who represents their interests who is trained in Mediation.  That is where step in.  As one who is trained in Mediation, I have chosen to fill the role of the representative of one of the parties.  I am there to represent their interests.  I can call a halt to the proceeding and talk privately to the person(s) whom I represent.  I can talk privately, to the Mediator in charge, along with my client during the Mediation and outside of the hearing other party.  In some limited areas, I can simply prescribe the boundaries under which the Mediation takes place.  I can clarify statements that my client makes, as well as introducing material not yet considered.  The Mediator who represents the other party can do the same.

Over 80% of the time, the parties reach an agreement in mediations that I have been involved in.   Most of the time there is total agreement on all issues.  Sometimes it is only partial agreement.  Rarely, there is no agreement on any issue.  Mediation does not force people to agree on anything.

The selection of the Mediator in charge is vital to the process.  Once both parties have agreed to mediate, a formal request is made to an independent local Board of Federal Executives who recommends a Mediator.  That Mediator may come from a Federal Agency not related to the Agency where I work.  Or, in recent times, due to heavy workload, the Mediator has flown in from California.  In any case, the name selected comes back to the two of us who represent the two parties.  If we agree on that selection, it is final.  If we do not agree, we can request that another person be assigned.
If the two parties reach agreement, a written agreement is drafted and signed by each party.  That agreement then goes for review to Federal Attorneys who review it for compliance with the statute and enforceability by the judicial system.  Once it is passed by the lawyers, another signature is added which finalizes the agreement.

Note:  The total costs of the Mediation are picked up by the Agency.
 
 

[Gregory]

I reviewing my post, I see that when I went to copy and paste, a major part of my post was not copied.  I post that part below along with the sentence that places it where it was located in my post:

I remind you that an attempt was made early on to resolve issues in a process known as mediation. That process fell through and the end result was litigation with consequent expenditure of funds.

As a participant in that attempt to mediate, I posted a statement of the issues as I saw them and why I felt that the attempt to mediate had gone wrong.  I am not going to repeat that statement. But, in part, not in whole, I see things somewhat differently now than I did at that time.  Since that time, I have been formally trained in Mediation by the Office of Resolution Management, and I practice my skills formally within an agency of the Federal Government.  In that training, I have learned the differences between Mediation and Arbitration.  I have learned that there are differences in the manner that Mediation is conducted within our society and within the Federal Government.  IOW There is no one set of rules under which Mediation is conducted.   I will explain in more detail the style under which I am involved in Mediation at the present.

One of the first issues on which I was instructed in my training was to determine what is suitable for mediation and what is not appropriate for mediation.  There are simply some situations in which resolution cannot be achieved by mediation. Sometimes that may be due to the attitudes of the people involved.  At other times there may be outside factors that prevent resolution of issues. Coming out of this training I can state that I believe that both sides to the attempt to mediate brought to the table some inflexible terms of mediation which included attempts to mediate some issues which couldnot be settled by mediation.

I will now describe briefly how I am involved in Mediation in the Federal Agency in which I work. 

[Bob Pickle]

I remind you that an attempt was made early on to resolve issues in a process known as mediation. That process fell through and the end result was litigation with consequent expenditure of funds.

I am unaware of any attempt at mediation. The closest thing to that that I can recall is Danny Shelton calling up a friend of mine, a pastor, and telling him that if I didn't back off he was going to sue me. That cannot possibly be called mediation, can it?

If the ASI investigation was intended to be mediation between Gailon/Bob and Danny/3ABN, no one explained that to me. Harold Lance certainly never did. If that investigation was intended to be mediation, then it was only between Linda and 3ABN.

The fact of the matter is that the allegations against Tommy were supposed to be investigated by ASI, amongst other things. And Walt Thompson and Harold Lance never had the courtesy to tell us that the 3ABN Board had rejected that plan until 10 weeks after that rejection.

So if suddenly the ASI investigation into Tommy, etc. had morphed into mediation between Linda and Danny/3ABN, and then morphed again into mediation between Danny/3ABN and Gailon/Bob, why weren't we told about it up front?

In other words, is this the way mediation is conducted, as you are familiar with it?

[Gregory]

Bob, I referenced the attempt by ASI.

Yes, that attempt did not include some of the present issues which have come to the forefront following theattempt by aSI to mediate.

Also, that attempt excluded some issues that some wanted included.  That was part of the reason for its failure.

[Bob Pickle]

In what way was the ASI investigation an attempt to mediate between 3ABN/Danny and me?

Especially is this question pertinent since at the time I was asked to participate in the ASI investigation, I did not have an opinion as to Danny and Linda's divorce and Danny's remarriage.