The Greensboro Landlord-Tenant Dispute Program

Article Date: Friday, February 18, 2011

Written By: Sherill Hayes, Ph.D., Cathie Witty, MPA, Ph.D., & Robert Nunn

In 2010, the Program in Conflict Studies and Dispute Resolution at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro began a partnership with the City of Greensboro Human Relations Department (HRD) to help landlords and tenants address and resolve disputes. The goal of the program is to improve the relationship between tenants and landlords to resolve presenting conflicts, educate the public about housing and their rights under North Carolina landlord-tenant laws, and improve the landlord-tenant relationship. Although the program has been operational for less than one year, results show some positive outcomes, especially in meeting the informational needs of residents, providing a forum for addressing disputes, and laying groundwork for developing longer term partnerships between the universities and city government in addressing social issues using dispute resolution.

Background
The City Human Relations Department first identified the need for the new program. In early 2008, Robert Nunn, HRD Division Manager, and Cheryl Gant, HRD Fair Housing Specialist, noticed the HRD receiving a larger volume of calls. They noted that the majority of these calls were not Fair Housing discriminatory matters, but they were disputes between tenants and landlords around issues like repairs and security deposits that could benefit from additional assistance. Nunn thought of the UNCG Program in Conflict Studies and believed this would be a great opportunity to form a partnership to offer both a service to residents of Greensboro and experience to Master’s students in conflict resolution.

The program development team, which included Dr. Cathie Witty and Dr. Sherrill Hayes from UNCG and Nunn and Gant from the HRD, was able to get some advice and background information from programs with similar mandates in city governments in Charlotte and Winston-Salem. A key finding from these other programs was the benefit of engaging the potential community stakeholders in the process. To address this issue, in early 2009, the program development team convened several meetings of key stakeholders, including two with landlords’ association representatives, tenant advocacy groups, Legal Aid attorneys, property management personnel, and other real estate professionals. These meetings allowed stakeholders to provide input into the program and raise some initial awareness for the future program. The team also held several additional meetings with representatives from Legal Aid and one meeting with the local Magistrates and Chief District Court judge to discuss the potential implications of the program for the courts. The program was fortunate to receive a grant from the Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro that allowed us to fund a graduate assistant, Nancy Sharpless, to serve as coordinator during the summer of 2010 and pay for some operational expenses for the program through the first part of 2011.

Design of the Program
The Landlord-Tenant Dispute Program (LTDP) is designed as a neutral, voluntary program to provide a forum for landlords and tenants to eliminate communication barriers and work together. The primary referral sources are Legal Aid, HRD Fair Housing Division, self-referrals from tenants and/or landlords, and Magistrate’s court. Referrals are received through a dedicated phone line in the HRD. The program is administered from the City by Division Manager Nunn, and staffed by a program coordinator who is a trained mediator and staff member/graduate assistant from Conflict Studies. Program mediators are trained volunteers supervised by UNCG Conflict Studies faculty.

Cases appropriate for the program are not clear matters of law and procedure, but involve problems in the landlord and tenant relationship. For a mediation to take place, both parties must agree to come together and discuss the issues. The mediator’s role is to assist both parties in defining and clarifying issues, reducing obstacles to communication, exploring possible solutions, and reaching a mutually satisfactory agreement. If parties wish, a memorandum of understanding is drawn up, documenting their agreement on how to resolve current and manage any future issues.

Initial Results
In the first eight months of the program (April 9-December 8, 2010) the program fielded 144 calls. The majority of these calls were made by tenants (n= 142; 98%). In 58% of cases (n = 84) respondents were able to give specific contact information – at least a name and/or phone number – for the other party. In contrast, 40% of the callers (n= 58) were either unable to provide specific information about the other party or chose not to provide it.

Issues in these cases were varied but a few prominent themes began to emerge, especially: financial issues such as security/damage deposit, back rent, reimbursement for repairs made (22.2% of calls); seeking information about the program, handling eviction notices, moving out before the end of a lease, issues around living in a property that has been sold/foreclosed upon (21%); repair/maintenance issues, especially air conditioning being out or insufficient (18.8%); and health/safety issues of mold, vermin, or bed bugs (10.4%). Other issues arose less frequently, like the social environment (7.7% of calls) including issues with neighbors, noise, parking spaces or being towed, and witnessing illegal activities. In a few cases, the callers did not provide sufficient information to determine the issue or to follow-up with them (8.3%).

In terms of outcomes, the data demonstrate that over half of the contacts (54.5%) made to the program result in providing clients with some resolution to their issue. In many cases that meant providing wanted/needed information (24.8%); in others, some cases were “self-resolved” (26.2%), while some reached a mediated agreement (2.1%), or a partial resolution (1.4%). “Self-resolved” cases were cases in which, through contacting the program, both parties discussed the issues over the phone with a mediator who encouraged a private resolution of the current issue. It appears that in these cases the program and mediators served as a “jump start” to a conversation and that interaction between the parties without a direct face-to-face mediation was satisfactory enough that the initiating party decided that no further action was needed.

A further 17% of cases received a direct referral to additional community resources (Legal Aid, advocacy groups, social services, etc.) that were better suited for their issues and hopefully contributed to a resolution. Mediation was refused by one or both parties in 12% of cases and only one case went to mediation and reached impasse. In 14% of cases there was insufficient information to contact the other party.

Conclusions and Implications
For a new joint university and city government program run by volunteers and graduate students, these data demonstrate some initial successes as well as some important considerations. Although the original design of the program was to conduct face to face mediation of disputes, experiences with the clients and their issues in the first few months led to a more flexible dispute resolution model. While information provision and resource referrals were initially considered a potential outcome of the process, facilitating self-resolution and resolving disputes by shuttle mediation over the telephone were not. Understanding these developments has implications for recruiting and training volunteer mediators and students to operate in the program. It also demonstrates that looking at dispute resolution more broadly than just the mediation process can have an important impact on the real issues. A consideration for the program’s future is whether or not to continue to deliver dispute resolution services using this hybrid model or to consider focusing more on bringing parties to the table for mediation sessions, especially given the success with the mediation process when it occurs.

This program also illustrates the potential for effective community engagement and collaboration between university programs and local communities in a number of areas: identifying local needs and interests; strengthening community outreach, responsiveness and involvement on the part of local governments; and facilitating active contributions by faculty and students in community issues, joint civic initiatives and programs than foster greater citizen participation and input into local government.
Irrespective of the future directions, resolutions are being reached by providing clients with access to knowledgeable, listening individuals, who are focused on managing and resolving disputes, and willing to use a full range of strategies and techniques including information and community resource networks. While this work may not be recognizable as a “mediation” program, it certainly is serving a
purpose in resolving disputes between tenants and landlords in Greensboro.

If you are interested in becoming a volunteer mediator or would like to find out more about the program you may contact Dr. Sherrill Hayes at swhayes@uncg.edu. Program information can be found here: http://www.greensboro-nc.gov/departments/Relations/landlordtenantprogram.htm

Dr. Cathie Witty is Director of and Dr. Sherrill Hayes is an Assistant Professor in the Program in Conflict Studies and Dispute Resolution, University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Robert Nunn is the Fair Housing Enforcement Division Manager for the Human Relations Department, City of Greensboro, NC.

Views and opinions expressed in articles published herein are the authors' only and are not to be attributed to this newsletter, the section, or the NCBA unless expressly stated. Authors are responsible for the accuracy of all citations and quotations.