Video: Stu Webb’s Collaborative Divorce & Jazz

Stu Webb is an attorney from Minnesota who one day decided that he no longer wanted to be involved in the destruction of divorce court, and so he created collaborative divorce.  Collaborative divorce is a private process where spouses become teammates rather than opposing parties, and attorneys focus on problem-solving rather than fighting.

Oftentimes accountants, psychologists, financial planners, therapists, and others are used to make sure that not just the legal needs, but also the emotional and financial needs of the spouses are met.

Collaborative Divorce has become more common here in Tampa Bay as families and attorneys realize that the court system should be seen as a forum of last resort, rather than first resort, to resolve personal issues.

Now, as it turns out, Stu Webb is not only the founder of collaborative divorce, but he is also an avid fan of Jazz.  You can find a short video he helped create comparing collaborative divorce to jazz after the jump.

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Cordover Guest Speaker at Nova Southeastern University

Tampa Collaborative Family Law Attorney Adam B. Cordover was a guest speaker at Nova Southeastern University’s 3-Day Collaborative Training, held November 6-8.  Adam spoke on the topic of “Troubleshooting the Collaborative Divorce Roadmap.”

Attorneys, Mental Health Professionals, and Financial Professionals attended the training, though there was also a large contingent of mental health students.  This conference was meant to kick start a groundbreaking program/clinic where the students would team up with professionals and offer collaborative divorce services to veterans.

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Client Review: Name Change in Tampa Bay – Helpful and Thorough

A Tampa name change client of mine recently left a review of our legal services on Avvo.com.  You can find the testimonial after the jump.

FLORIDA BAR DISCLAIMER:  Please note that every case is different, and you may not receive the same or similar results.

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Money Talk 1010 AM: Mediation Divorce and Collaborative Divorce

I recently had the opportunity to appear on Money Talk 1010 AM on the “Let’s Talk Law” Radio Program.

I was joined by Pasco and Pinellas family law attorney Audrey Jefferis, and we discussed, among other things, the similarities and differences between mediation divorce and collaborative divorce.  The radio program, which you can listen to after the jump, was recorded in the St. Petersburg studios of Beasely Broadcasting.

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Radio: Can Therapy Save A Marriage?

I recently attended the 16th Annual Forum of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals, and I had the opportunity to attend a workshop led by Gary Direnfeld, a social worker and collaborative professional in Ontario, Canada.  He was an excellent speaker and was discussing cutting edge ideas on helping families.

Gary was recently on a radio program to discuss an age-old question: Can therapy help save a marriage?

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Video: 25 Years of Collaborative Divorce

Collaborative divorce and family law began 25 years ago, in 1990, when a Minnesota attorney named Stu Webb decided that he simply no longer wanted to be part of an adversarial divorce process.  He strongly felt that divorce did not belong in the court system: decisions about where children should sleep at night should be made by the parents, and discussions of financial issues should happen around a private conference room table rather than in a public courtroom.

And so, he developed collaborative divorce, where parties agree from the very beginning that their collaborative attorneys cannot be used to fight it out in the court system.

The International Academy of Collaborative Professionals has put out a video commemorating 25 years of collaborative practice.  You can find the video below the jump.

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Mixed Orientation Marriages

As LGBT rights have gained acceptance in Florida and throughout the U.S., it has become more common to learn about a spouse in an opposite-sex marriage – sometimes a long-term marriage – come out as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.  There is a term for marriage where one spouse is straight and the other spouse is lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender: Mixed Orientation Marriages.  The term can also be applied to same-sex marriages where one of the spouses is bisexual or gender fluid.

Transcending Boundaries, which is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that provides education, activism, and support for persons whose sexuality, gender, sex, or relationship styles do not fit within conventional categories, has published a brochure that discusses and provides resources for those spouses in Mixed Orientation Marriages.

The brochures says the following about Mixed Orientation Marriages:

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China Marriage Idea: One Woman, Many Husbands

The Tampa Bay Times is reporting a proposal by a Chinese economics professor to deal with the fallout of the country’s decades’ long One Child policy: allow marriage between one woman and multiple husbands.

Below are some excerpts about Professor Xie Zuoshi’s idea:

By 2020, China will have an estimated 30 million bachelors — called guanggun, or “bare branches.” Birth control policies that since 1979 have limited many families to one child, a cultural preference for boys and the widespread, if illegal, practice of sex-selective abortion have contributed to a gender imbalance that hovers around 117 boys born for every 100 girls.

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Former Florida Supreme Court Justice: Divorce Doesn’t Belong In Court

Rosemary Barkett, the first female Chief Justice of the Florida Supreme Court and former federal judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit believes that the court system is not an appropriate place to resolve divorce-related matters.

[PORTRAIT: Justice Rosemary Barkett]

Below are excerpts from a series of interviews of Justice Barkett conducted between 2006-2009 and recorded as part of the American Bar Association Senior Lawyers Division Women Trailblazers in the Law program:

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Anti-Gay Language Stripped From Florida Adoption Laws

Up until recently, chapter 63 of the Florida Statutes, which contains the state’s adoption laws, was explicitly anti-gay.  Chapter 63 and adoption case law stated that whether prospective parents could adopt a child should be based on the best interests of the child, with one exception.

LGBT flag

That exception was laid out in Florida Statutes section 63.042(3) (2014), which provided that “No person eligible to adopt under this statute may adopt if that person is a homosexual.”

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