Center offers conflict resolution

By Shazia Haq

Jan. 1, 2008 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

Marcus added Brianna to his MySpace.com friends’ list after the school field trip, and Patty is furious.

Luke Patterson, 27, who for two years has served as a mentor from the Asian Dispute Resolution Program, shifts his weight on the side of a desk at Jefferson High School one recent afternoon and prepares for each side to communicate without fists.

“You all need to get this problem out of the way so you can get back to business and show off your mind, not your mouth,” Patterson says. His words ring clear, and after an hour of mediation, the girls hug it out.

“Boys are dumb,” Brianna concludes.

Peer mediation programs like this are only one of the initiatives the Asian Pacific American Dispute Resolution Center spearheads in order to improve dialogue in Los Angeles. Many of the city’s problems stem from a lack of community and personal communication, and much can be done to turn that around, said Charles Chang, the center’s executive director.

“Most conflicts in Los Angeles aren’t racial; they’re just two normal people having normal problems,” he said. “A landlord and his tenant. Two neighbors. Disputes can snowball quickly, so it’s critical to get mediation involved before that happens.”

Founded in 1989, the nonprofit center, in Koreatown, provides mediation and conflict resolution services to the wide range of ethnic communities in the city, with a focus on the Asian-Pacific Islander population. The center’s credo is that peace building is critical to the livelihood of Los Angeles.

An intermediary who makes a sincere effort to understand the viewpoints of both parties involved can greatly aid that process, Chang said. The goal is nice enough, but mediators face a tough problem in L.A., where the differences in languages and cultures can readily lead to conflicts.

Chang believes an honest embrace of the differences is the key. “Little nuances in culture dramatically affect communication,” he said. “If you can’t get in the other’s shoes, you’re never getting anywhere.”

As an example, he cited a recent case the center handled in which a younger white landlord of an apartment building wasn’t communicating with his older Asian tenants in a manner the tenants deemed respectful.

“In Asian culture, the issue of respect between generations is paramount. It was an easy and apparent cultural difference, but maybe one side didn’t see that,” Chang said.

The center, which has seven full-time and two part-time employees, resolves about 150 conflict cases a year out of the more than 300 potential claims it is presented with. The most common disputes involve consumer-merchant disagreements.

“Most people are looking for their money and apologies,” Chang said. “What we’ve come to find out is when you get two people in the same room with a third party, it’s a lot easier to recognize their faults.”

The center’s youth division, Youth Mediators United, provides mediation training to students and faculty at several Los Angeles high schools and middle schools, such as Jefferson High. And the center reports great success. For example, in the four years that it has offered mediation services at Le Conte Middle School in Hollywood, the campus’ suspension rate has dropped 50%.

Chang said the center’s school program, which currently has 30 peer mediators, is vital for the kids and the schools. “We are sort of an all-encompassing presence in these schools, in the classroom and out,” he said

The Los Angeles Times Family Fund awarded a $25,000 grant to the center in 2007.

Of course, mediation doesn’t work in every case. When it fails, Chang said, the center works hard to determine the reasons.

“Why didn’t our mediation work? What could’ve we done differently? With that attitude, you don’t look at the failure but the opportunity to do things differently in a similar situation,” he said. “You get a greater understanding of human communication.”

Chang said that at one time the center “relied perhaps too much on ‘shuttle diplomacy’ ” -- trying to solve the disputes through phone discussions. “Now we realize how crucial it is to get people face to face,” he said.

For Patterson, who will soon work as a counselor at the Media Arts Academy at Centinela High School overseeing discipline and coordinating the mentorship program, the organization’s success is directly related to its unrelenting, gung-ho attitude.

“I’m the last person who’s going to say a kid is a lost cause,” he said, “because that kid will grow up to create serious problems, and then who’s going to lose? Everyone.” The center “is here to stop nonsense in its tracks.”

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shazia.haq@latimes.com

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