Originally from Alternatives to the High Cost of Litigation

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This four-installment set of Alternatives articles adapts the second part of a web feature on the Americans with Disabilities Act Mediation Guidelines (available at https://bit.ly/ADAMediationGuidelinesWeb). The first part of the web examination was serialized starting May 2, 2021—a series of weekly refresher posts on the NYC-DR listserv (see https://bit.ly/CUNYDRCListservSub) of the CUNY Dispute Resolution Center (available at https://bit.ly/CUNYDRC). It walks through the first section of the Guidelines on program and case administration, which includes program development, disability access to mediation, and mediator recruitment and selection. The posts in the first part of the ADA Mediation Guidelines refresher series are available at https://bit.ly/GuidelinesRefresherSeriesPartI.

The subject of this second series, which ran in its web form through early January, and the focus of these Alternatives articles, is party capacity. [For background on the development and implementation of the Guidelines, see an excerpt from Judy Cohen, “The ADA Mediation Guidelines: A Community Collaboration Moves the Field Forward,” Cardozo Online Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 2.2 (Spring 2001), at 7 (available at https://bit.ly/CommunityCollaborationExcerpt).]

The section on capacity to mediate in the ADA Mediation Guidelines can be found at https://bit.ly/CapacityADAGL. Please note that when used as a generic term in this series, “ADA mediation” includes both (1) cases of any type where a participant has a disability and may need an accommodation to make the session accessible and (2) cases involving alleged violations of the ADA or other disability rights laws.