The Committee included the very best and brightest minds that could be found. There were trial court judges, appeals court judges, lawyers, administrators, and of course one of every kind of mediator under the sun. The committee worked diligently, and after two years it produced a seven-page report. Not a very decisive one, but a report nonetheless.
Nothing happened. Another year passed, and the Committee produced a longer updated report. By now the Chief Justice had retired. Another year passed, and the Committee produced an even longer report for the new Chief Justice.
Although pledged to work in secret, no consensus had been reached in the Committee. The report had contracted logorrhea, and had spread to eleven pages. Worse still, it had leaked into the open, first making its rounds by email, and then seeping into the world by publication on an unofficial website.
The low hanging fruit had been plucked. Everyone thought mediators should have at least a high-school education, a basic training, and a clean criminal background check. Some wanted to stop there, while others thought that a court should only credential experienced mediators who had at least one hundred hours of actual mediation experience. That was a bridge too far for the Committee.
What was to be done? The new Chief Justice was seeing a bunch of disgruntled folks who were clearly in conflict. Worse still, if they could not get their acts together and come to some sensible resolution, she might just have to make a decision herself. Heck, she was the Chief Justice, but she could not make every decision herself, she needed help governing the judicial branch. What on earth could make her supreme court committees be more decisive?
And then it struck her. She summoned the Committee and ordered them into mediation. Perhaps a mediator might help them resolve their conflict and come up with a consensus report. Oh, the irony!
I know I am in fantasy-land there, and I’ll stop. As of today (January 5, 2016), the November 16, 2015 "Draft Policy Establishing Standards for Mediators Accepting Court-Referred Domestic Relations Cases Pursuant to 13-22-311 CRS, is still not posted on the web page for Colorado's Office of Dispute Resolution Advisory Committee. Neither is Judge Plewe's December 23, 2015 cover letter to the Chief Justice, For those Colorado mediators who have an interest in all this, both are presented here together with the two earlier reports and sundry other materials.