Join us for a four-part series that explores civil diversion programs and their positive impact on court users, judicial efficiency, and communities.
By offering alternative pathways for resolving disputes, these programs can help alleviate increasing burdens on courts and litigants in high-volume dockets such as landlord-tenant, mortgage foreclosures, and debt collection.
Panelists will share insights and resources to successfully implement civil diversion programs and discuss community engagement, program timing and accessibility, outreach strategies, and preliminary findings from NCSC’s Eviction Diversion Initiative. The sessions will also provide an overview of the guiding principles for civil diversion programs adopted by the Conference of Chief Justices and Conference of State Court Administrators.
Register today for the entire series. Contact Laina Combest-Friedman for more information.
NEXT WEBINAR
Session 2: Engaging Community Partners in Civil Diversion Programs
Thursday, October 17, 3 p.m. ET
Successful civil diversion programs leverage existing legal, financial, and social service resources in a community to provide support to litigants who want to resolve their disputes outside of traditional litigation. Learn how courts around the country are thinking creatively and holistically as they work to help litigants address both the immediate legal crisis and their underlying needs through strong collaborative partnerships with community service providers.
In this session, panelists will discuss how courts have thoughtfully engaged with community partners to bolster their civil diversion programs and better meet the needs of their litigants in these high-volume dockets.
Panelists:
- Hon. Steve Duble, Justice of the Peace, Harris County JP 1-2, Houston
- Rae Kyritsi, Caldera Dialogue, Chicago
- James Reynolds, Director of the Landlord Tenant Resource Center, Housing Solutions, Tulsa
FUTURE WEBINARS
Session 3: Outreach & Access Strategies for Civil Diversion Programs
Thursday, November 7, 3 p.m. ET
Completing a civil diversion program can take some time. Parties need enough time to go through a program and work with program partners to reach a resolution. When designing civil diversion programs, courts must make strategic decisions about when and how they will create opportunities for litigants to engage with the diversion program and what the process will look like. Civil diversion programs may focus on upstream interventions, seeking to resolve disputes before they become court cases, or downstream interventions that build resources directly into the court process.
In this session, learn about the range of civil diversion program models operating around the country and how each court has taken steps to build access points and time into the existing court process.
Panelists:
- Mairead Napolitano, Court Division Administrator, Las Vegas Justice Court, Las Vegas, NV
- Priscila Auffant, Eviction Diversion Initiative Program Manager, Center for Justice Innovation, Brooklyn, NY
Session 4: Preliminary Data and Findings from the NCSC Eviction Diversion Initiative
Thursday, November 21, 3 p.m. ET
NCSC’s Eviction Diversion Initiative (EDI) is a four-year grant program that offers state and local courts an opportunity to transform their eviction dockets by implementing eviction diversion programs and related court improvements. Each EDI site received grant funding and technical assistance to design and implement an eviction diversion program with an emphasis on using the court process to connect litigants with the time, information, and resources necessary to resolve their housing disputes in a less harmful manner. As part of the grant, each site collected data to better understand the demographics, circumstances, and goals of court users and to see how diversion programs could shape their court experiences and outcomes.
In this session, learn more about the work happening through the EDI grant program and some of the preliminary findings about its transformative impact.
Panelists:
- Neil Steinkamp, Managing Director, Stout Risius Ross LLC
- Samira Nazem, Principal Court Management Consultant, National Center for State Courts
PAST WEBINARS
September 17
Session 1: Introduction to Civil Diversion