NYC-ADR Part 20, Supreme Court, New York County, 60 Centre Street
Honorable Deborah Kaplan presides in a newly created citywide Alternative Dispute Resolution Part where she mediates complex civil matters from across New York City. The types of cases conferenced include, but are not limited to, personal injury, property damage, contract disputes, wage and hour, employment discrimination, matrimonial and child victims act cases.
Cases come to the Citywide ADR part in a number of ways:
- Insurance carriers provide chambers with lists of cases that they believe have the potential of settling.
- The City of New York, NYCHA and Con Ed review their inventories and identify cases ripe for settlement.
- Plaintiffs’ and defendants’ firms provide us with cases they would like to conference and settle.
- In addition, working with the court’s ADR coordinator, judges with large inventories (such as the Motor Vehicle Part), provide lists of cases, and we receive individual referrals directly from judges – including matrimonial, wage and hour, employment discrimination, medical malpractice, and child victims act cases.
Cases can be pre- or post-note. A Request for Judicial Intervention (RJI) must have been filed. Cases conferenced in the NYC-ADR Part remain in the county and inventory of the judge to whom the case is assigned, and, absent a negotiated settlement in the NYC-ADR Part, will proceed before that judge.
This is a voluntary process. Both sides must consent to being placed on a settlement conference calendar in the NYC-ADR Part.
For more information, please email Joan Levenson or Megan Schnader, Judge Kaplan’s law clerks.