Resolution Remedies

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When someone is actively, genuinely listening to you, it comes as something of a refreshing jolt. The silence that comes after you speak is not awkward, but rather reflective and deliberative. Veteran attorney Barri Kaplan Bonapart is such a listener. She considers this skill a core part of being an effective mediator, arbitrator, and counselor.

"What I bring to the table," Ms. Bonapart says, "is a carefully crafted combination of formal training, social awareness, keen intuition, and an artful sense of how to move and speak with grace and flexibility among disputants. I think it's vital to have a range of tools and an acute sense of timing to intuit how to use them as circumstances unfold."

While Ms. Bonapart's expertise is broad and accomplished -- contract disputes, products liability, personal injury, wrongful death, employment, real estate, construction defect -- she is best known as one of America's preeminent expert attorneys on tree law and neighbor disputes, a combustible field that requires her polished negotiating talents and diplomacy.

"What I have learned," she reflects, "is that one should never run from the high-octane emotional triggers at play. Ironically, some mediators are averse to conflict. I am not. I believe that it is within that place of discomfort where we often find the key to resolution. That's why I don't shy away from bringing disputants together when and as appropriate. That's also why I encourage pre-mediation telephone conferences. And, it's why I often ask the parties themselves what they want. The importance of empowering participants to craft their own resolution cannot be overestimated."

Beyond her legal acumen, unassailable credentials and extensive experience, Ms. Bonapart is empathetic, adept at calming nerves and creating a safe and respectful environment conducive to collaborative problem solving. Bonapart's low-key, relaxed sense of humor is self-effacing and irreverent without being inappropriate, making her a model mediator particularly in volatile or high profile disputes.

Most important, her mindset at the beginning and throughout the process is that, "Working together, we will get the job done." As one satisfied attorney recently said of Ms. Bonapart, "She was able to efficiently move from concept to details and finally a settlement document signed by all parties."

BACKGROUND

Barri Kaplan Bonapart has practiced law and alternative dispute resolution in the San Francisco Bay Area for over a quarter century. Her practice, which covers both the defense and prosecution of claims, is focused upon conflict resolution in complex matters ranging from contract disputes, products liability, personal injury, wrongful death, property damage, employment, construction defect and insurance coverage.

Following a dozen years of practicing law at "big firms" representing primarily multinational corporations, Ms. Bonapart founded her own firm, quickly establishing herself as one of the nation's preeminent experts in tree law and neighbor disputes.

She has successfully resolved hundreds of disputes through negotiation, mediation, arbitration and trial. A strong believer in avoiding protracted litigation in favor of collaborative processes, Ms. Bonapart has helped her clients resolve the overwhelming majority of their matters without litigation. When out-of-court settlements are not possible, she applies her strong advocacy and trial skills to the case.

Her ability to identify and creatively address key issues -- including underlying emotional obstacles -- and seek common ground allows her to assist parties to resolve conflicts quickly and cost-effectively. She has crafted scores of agreements that satisfy and empower all parties, restoring peace in their neighborhoods, businesses, and private lives. Her experience underscores that a kinder, gentler process and outcome best stand the test of time in resolving even the most bitter disputes. These skills make her the ideal candidate for serving as a neutral in highly charged matters.

MEMBERSHIPS & SPECIAL HONORS

Ms. Bonapart received her initial training as a mediator in the 1990s through Pepperdine University's Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution and Gary Friedman's Center For Mediation In Law, and has continued her education through various seminars in conflict resolution. She also teaches both mediation and trial advocacy skills to others, having served as an instructor for programs offered by the National Institute of Trial Advocacy (NITA), University of San Francisco and Stanford Schools of Law, Continuing Education of the Bar, as well as through the Marin, Alameda, and San Francisco Bar Associations.

She is a featured national speaker on tree law for such organizations as the International Society of Arboriculture, American Society of Consulting Arborists, and National Arbor Day Foundation, among others. She has served as a Director of the Marin County Bar Association, and is a pro tem settlement judge, mediator, arbitrator, discovery referee and Small Claims Appeals Hearing Officer for the Marin County Courts and an arbitrator of fee disputes for the Marin County Bar's Client Relations Committee.

EDUCATION

J.D., Boalt Hall, School of Law, University of California, Berkeley, 1985
B.A., University of California, Berkeley (Phi Beta Kappa), with Junior year at Universidad de Madrid, Spain, 1982