What are the benifits
Compliance rates tend to be higher with mediated agreements than with court ordered agreements. Nationwide there is between 75% to 93% compliance rate with mediated agreements. Between 2006 and 2007 96% of the people in Oregon who participated in mediation were satisfied with the process . Nation wide surveys show around 80% to 90% satisfaction with mediation as opposed to 30% to 50% satisfaction with court settled cases. Although it is difficult to compare cost savings there have been studies that have averaged the cost of mediation, including the time of the volunteer mediators, to be $72 to $131 while court cases on average $186 to $239. Other studies have shown that police referrals have led to a decrease in return calls thus leading to direct cost savings (Hedeen, 2004).
The time committed to mediation is considerable less than corresponding court related cases. On a national average mediation can take 10 to 24 days to resolve while court cases take anywhere from 63 to 98 days.
Do we need mediation?
Ultimately that depends on how satisfied people are with the way they solve conflicts.
During 2008 there were 1,432 small claims, 361 FED (eviction) 1,437 civil and 468 juvenile cases filed in Umatilla County . Filing fees average around $100. Some cases, like small claims, automatically go to court-ordered mediation. If the cases cannot be resolved in mediation, the plaintiff can expect to pay an additional $500. This does not include lawyer fees or the costs of enforcing a judgment if the plaintiff wins. The time invested with a court-filed case averages 90+ days just to reach trial, not counting collection time.
All of this adds to a total of 3,698 potential mediation cases. Spending just a few hundred dollars during the lifetime of a court case, we can easily estimate around $1,000,000 spent on court resolution. Community mediation is a free service. The potential savings in both time and money is great. The average time to complete community mediation is 10 to 30 days. The compliance rate for mediated agreements is 93%. The satisfaction rate is 96%, compared to a 50% satisfaction rate for court-settled cases.
In Pendleton alone, with a population of 16,354 the police department received 36,633 calls, over 21,000 of those for service with only 3,192 citations in 2008 . Nationwide studies have shown that mediation referrals in these code enforcement cases greatly reduced the return calls, saving valuable time for the police officers.
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