Peter Taillie, Executive Director of Mid Shore Community Mediation Center, has been elected Vice President of Community Mediation Maryland (CMM).

CMM provides support and training for the seventeen community mediation centers serving the state of Maryland. The statewide organization sets standards for mediation center policies and performance. Its encouragement of individual community mediation centers to provide a wide range of mediation services is a model looked to by similar organizations nationwide.

Mid Shore Community Mediation Center provides no-cost mediation for individuals, businesses and organizations in Caroline, Dorchester and Talbot Counties. The services it offers cover virtually all areas of conflict resolution, such as parenting plan, parent/teen, workplace and elder mediation. Anyone with ongoing unresolved disputes may contact the center for help from its trained volunteer mediators.

Taillie has served on Community Mediation Maryland’s board of directors for almost four years. He described his service as an opportunity for community mediation center leaders to share their challenges and successes, encouraging each other to maintain the highest standards of quality.

CMM’s “co-mediation” model is unique, according to Taillie, and also promotes increased quality of service. Instead of a single mediator facilitating each session, two volunteers conduct the mediations.

The mediators decide in advance what skills they will each work on during the session, in effect creating a training opportunity out of every mediation. Afterwards, they provide feedback to each other. “This raises the tide in performance of all of our mediators,” explained Taillie.

Expressing his respect for Community Mediation Maryland and its work, Taillie said, “I’m proud to have been elected Vice President of this organization with its exceptional leadership and amazing staff of trainers.”

For more information on mediation, to make a contribution, or to volunteer as a mediator, call Mid Shore Community Mediation Center at 410-820-5553 or visitwww.midshoremediation.org.