Nominations Slate for 2008-2009 Bar Year The Section…

                  Nominations Slate for 2008-2009 Bar Year
The Section of Dispute Resolution's Nominations Committee met in late April and
recommended the following slate of candidates:

       The following Officers were nominated with unanimous support:

       Homer LaRue:          Chair Elect
       Wayne Thorpe:         Vice Chair
       John Phillips:        Secretary
       James J. Alfini:      Section Delegate

       The following Council Members-at-Large were nominated with unanimous
       support:

       Four Council Positions: (Three Year Terms to Expire 2011):

       Robert Grey
       June Lehrman
       Carl Ver Beek
       Nancy Welsh

       One One-Year Council Position: (One Year Position to Expire 2009 for the term
       vacated by John Phillips):

       Roger Deitz

The Section will vote on this slate of nominees for Officers and Council members at the
Section's annual meeting on Saturday, August 9, 2008, in New York City in conjunction
with the American Bar Association Annual Meeting.

A short biography for each nominee is listed below.



Chair-Elect: Homer La Rue
Professor La Rue has a Masters degree in Industrial & Labor Relations and a JD from
Cornell University. He has a BA from Purdue University. He is Professor of Law and
formerly the Director of the Clinical Law Center at the Howard University School of Law
in Washington, D.C. As a clinical law teacher, Professor La Rue teaches in the law
practice training curriculum of the law school. He directs the Law School's first
Alternative Dispute Resolution curriculum for the Law School. Professor La Rue also
teaches traditional law school courses.

Professor La Rue has served as a Council member and Budget Officer for the Section of
Dispute Resolution. Professor La Rue has had extensive experience as a labor and
employment law attorney. For the more than twenty years, he has served as an
arbitrator and a mediator in numerous labor and employment disputes, both in the public
as well as in the private sector. He is past chair of the Maryland State Labor Relations
Board. He has taught and served as a trainer for a number of years in the area of
alternative dispute resolution. He has lectured extensively in the dispute resolution field
to a variety of business, labor and bar groups, including doing so internationally. He has
served as a technical advisor and trainer for the Commercial Law Development Program
(CLDP) of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The project on which he was working is
designed to assist in the development of a regional ADR system in Central and West
Africa for the resolution of commercial disputes. As a technical consultant to the project,
he has lectured and conducted training programs in a number of countries in Central and
West Africa.

Vice-Chair: R. Wayne Thorpe
R. Wayne Thorpe is a full-time Mediator and Arbitrator whose ADR experience includes
over 1300 mediations and arbitrations beginning in 1987, including class action,
commercial/corporate, employment, environmental, IP, product liability, professional
liability, and technology cases.

Mr. Thorpe has served as the Secretary of the ABA's Section of Dispute Resolution.
Previously he was a Council member for 5 years. He was the co-chair of the Section's
Task Force on Mediation Quality from 2006 to 2008, and he was the co-chair of the
Section's 2006 and 2007 Annual Conferences in Atlanta and Washington, D. C. He also
was one of the Section's two representatives to the Joint Committee that drafted the new
Model Standards of Conduct for Mediators, which was approved by the ABA House of
Delegates in August, 2005. In addition Mr. Thorpe was one of the Section's liaisons to
the Ethics 2000 Commission, the group that last revised the ABA Model Rules of
Professional Responsibility, and he served as chair or co-chair of the Section's Ethics
Committee for five years.

Mr. Thorpe was appointed by the Supreme Court of Georgia to the Georgia Dispute
Resolution Commission, he is a past chair of the Georgia Bar DR Section, and a member
of the board of the Atlanta Bar ADR Section. He is also a member of the American
College of Civil Trial Mediators. He has taught ADR courses as an Adjunct Law School
Professor at both Georgia State University and the University of Georgia, and he has
been a frequent speaker for law and ADR professional groups, having made over 100
such presentations in over a dozen cities in North America.

His prior experience includes 17+ years as a litigator at Alston & Bird in Atlanta and a
clerkship with Chief United States District Judge Charles A. Moye, Jr., United States
District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. University of Georgia Law School,
J.D., cum laude. Georgia Law Review, Research Editor, staff member. University of
Virginia, B.A., with distinction.

Secretary: John Phillips
John R. Phillips has been Managing Partner and Practice Group Head of Blackwell
Sanders Peper Martin, a Midwest law firm with which he has practiced in the areas of
alternative dispute resolution, labor and employment, commercial litigation and
healthcare. He is a Fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers, the International
Academy of Mediators, and the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers, has been
chair of the Missouri Bar Committee on Alternative Dispute Resolution, a member of the
Missouri Supreme Court Committee on Alternative Dispute Resolution, has served as
Special Master for the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri in
Klein et al. v. Kansas City of Missouri Firefighters (sexual harassment class action), and
for the District of Kansas in Williams v. Sprint (age collective action). He is a member of
the Large Complex Litigation Panel, Commercial, and Employment Arbitration and
Mediation Panels of the American Arbitration Association, NAF, CPR, and the US-China
Mediation Panel of CPR/CCIPT, and is a bench arbitrator by agreement on union contract
issues.

He currently is on the Section Council of the ABA Dispute Resolution Section and serves
as chair of the Teleconference Subcommittee of the Section's CLE and Meetings
Planning Board. He has been on the faculty of three Dispute Resolution Section
Mediation Institutes and all but one of the Arbitration Instututes. For the past eight years
he has presented programs at the Annual Dispute Resolution Conference and has judged
or acted as a mediator in the finals or semi-finals of the Representation in Mediation
competition for the past five years. During the time he was chair of the Advocacy in
ADR Committee, the committee developed the ABA video "Mediation Madness" and the
ABA Advanced Arbitration Training Institute video "Advanced Arbitration: 20/20." He
has been in Best Lawyers in America since 1994 and Chambers USA since 2003.

Section Delegate:       James J. Alfini
James J. Aflini is the President and Dean of South Texas College of Law, previously
served as dean of Northern Illinois University College of Law and was a member of the
law faculty at Florida State University. He served as Chair of the ABA Dispute
Resolution Section, the Chair of the AALS ADR Section and has been the Section
Delegate for the ABA House of Delegates since 2002. Among his publications is the co-
authored Mediation Theory and Practice.

Council Member: Robert J. Grey
Robert J. Grey Jr., a partner in the Richmond, Va., office of Hunton & Williams, is a past
president of the American Bar Association. Grey devoted his yearlong term to creating
better justice through better juries via the American Jury Initiative. The Jury Initiative
was composed of the Commission on the American Jury and the American Jury Project.
The Commission was dedicated to educating the public on and reinvigorating the nation's
commitment to jury service. The American Jury Project modernized and consolidated
varying sets of juror standards into a single model document that reflects the demands of
contemporary trials. This work continues under the auspices of the American Jury
Project.

Grey has long been active in the ABA, as chair of the policy-making House of Delegates
in 1998-2000, the association's second-highest office, and as a member of the Board of
Governors. Throughout his ABA career, Grey has been active in strategic planning and
increasing diversity in the profession. In 2000-02 he chaired the Committee on Research
about the Future of the Legal Profession, which analyzed trends affecting the practice of
law and identified steps the profession should take to preserve and advance its
fundamental values. From 1992-1995 Grey chaired the Commission on Opportunities for
Minorities in the Profession. He also chaired the Virginia delegation in the ABA House
of Delegates from 1994-1998.

Grey's law practice is focused on administrative matters before state and federal
agencies, mediation and dispute resolution, and legislative representation of clients. Grey
earned his J.D. from Washington and Lee University in Virginia in 1976, and his B.S.
from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1973. Grey came to Hunton & Williams
from the law firm LeClair Ryan, where he was a partner. Prior to that he had co-founded
the firm of Grey & Wesley, and then joined Mays & Valentine. He also received several
gubernatorial appointments, including chair of the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control
Board, and vice chair of the Virginia Public Building Authority and member of the
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Board of Visitors.

Council Member: June Lehrman
June R. Lehrman, Esq. , a JAMS panelist since 2002 and full-time neutral since 1993,
mediates and arbitrates primarily in the areas of commercial and business disputes,
employment, and health care. She has had extensive experience mediating and arbitrating
dozens of business disputes involving HMOs, hospitals, and other healthcare providers
and payors, and is well-versed in the contractual issues that arise in the course of
healthcare business relationships. Before devoting herself exclusively to alternative
dispute resolution in 1993, Ms. Lehrman practiced law as a business litigator with the Los
Angeles firms Irell & Manella and Rosenberg & Chittum.

Ms. Lehrman is well-known for her substantive knowledge and sophisticated process
skills and is widely regarded as an expert on cutting-edge issues in arbitration and
mediation. She is author, co-author and editor of leading texts on alternative dispute
resolution, including the College of Commercial Arbitrators Guide to Best Practices in
Commercial Arbitration, the ADR Chapter of Bancroft Whitney's multi-volume
California Business Transactions Forms, and Rutter Group's Employment Litigation
Practice Guide. Among other positions of responsibility in prominent national
organizations, she is on the Council of the ABA's Dispute Resolution Section, is the co-
chair of the Section's CLE and Meetings Planning Board and is an Officer of the College
of Commercial Arbitrators. Ms. Lehrman was educated at Yale University (B.A. 1980)
and University of Michigan Law School (1985).


Council Member: Carl Ver Beek (Three Year Term Expiring 2011)
Carl Ver Beek, has focused on labor and employment relations at Varnum, Riddering,
Schmidt and Howlett LLP for 42 years. In 2001 he assumed the role of a neutral and has
been active in mediation and arbitration both as a paid and pro bono neutral on several
panels. He is listed on the FINRA arbitration panel, the National Arbitration Forum
arbitration panel, the National Center for Dispute Settlement panel and the Michigan
Employment Relations panel.

Mr. Ver Beek first began attending DR Section council meetings as the Liaison from the
Labor and Employment Law Section and continues to attend council meetings as the LEL
liason. He served a two year term as an Advisory Council member from the Advisory
Committee of DR. He volunteered to serve on the DR Section Task Force on
Communication and has served as a member of the Annual Spring Conference Labor and
Employment track selection committee. Mr. Ver Beek attended Hope College (A.B.
1959) and Indiana University School of Law (1962).


Council Member: Nancy Welsh (Three Year Term Expiring 2011)
Nancy Welsh is a Professor of Law at the Dickinson School of Law, Penn State
University where she teaches dispute resolution. She was formerly a clinic lawyer and
retains a strong interest in the theory / practice continuum. Nancy's work focuses on the
use of mediation in court and other institutionalised settings. Nancy has conducted
numerous empirical investigations - and subsequent publications - into the impact and
efficacy of mediation programs for lawyers. clients with judges. Nancy's work is widely
respected and relied upon by policy-makers, program designers and legal educators.

She has been a member of the Section for many years, for the past several years, she
served as the chair and co-chair of the Publications Board. The Publications Board has
published several excellent books during this time. She also served as the chair of the
Boskey Essay Competition. She served as the inaugural co-chair of the Legal Educators'
Colloquium, which has become a regular and robust part of the annual conference.
Finally, she has been a frequent presenter at the annual conference and the National
Conference on Court ADR.


Council Member: Roger Deitz (One year term expiring 2009)
Mr. Deitz has successfully resolved over a thousand mediations of complex and multi-
party disputes including securities, accounting, insurance, contracts, partnerships,
banking, fiduciary issues, employment, real estate, class actions, international and other
business matters. In addition, he has served as chair or panel member in seventy-five
arbitrations. Mr. Deitz served as Chair of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Committee
of The Association of the Bar of the City of New York. He is a member of the CPR
International Institute for Dispute Prevention and Resolution Panel of Distinguished
Neutrals and is a member of its Employment Disputes and Banking and Financial
Services Panels. Mr. Deitz mediates throughout the United States and internationally.

Mr. Deitz is a former Senior Trial Counsel of the U.S. Securities and Exchange
Commission and Visiting Associate Professor of Law at the State University of New
York -Buffalo Law School where he taught securities regulation and aviation law. Mr.
Deitz trained as a mediator at Harvard Law School. He is also a mediator for the U.S.
District Court for the Southern District of New York and is Special Master for the
Supreme Court of the State of New York - Appellate Division. He has chaired numerous
continuing education programs about mediation. Mr. Deitz is a Director and member of
the Executive Committee of Seeds of Peace, an international not for profit organization
which introduces conflict resolution skills to the children of nations in conflict.

Mr. Deitz has been a very active member of the Section. He is a member of the
Committee on Mediator Ethical Guidance and during the past few years he has worked
with the CLE and Meetings Planning Board. Mr. Deitz is a co-chair for the programming
for the ABA Annual meeting in August.