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26 verbatim mandatory provisions from 19-32-s.
Eighteenth Judicial Circuit. Check the order's own effective and rescission dates before relying on it. Procedural information only; not legal advice.
Verbatim from the order's own text layer, harvested 2026-07-24; whitespace normalised only. No OCR was used. Only sentences containing mandatory language (shall, must, may not, no later than, within N) are reproduced — the full document is in custody and is the controlling text. • WHEREAS, pursuant to Florida Statute 44.102 (2) (c) quoted in pertinent part “A court, under rules adopted by the Supreme Court; in circuits in which a family mediation program has been established and upon a court finding a dispute, shall refer to mediation all or part of custody, visitation, or other parental responsibility issues as defined is s. 61.13. • Upon motion or request of a party, a court shall not refer any case to mediation if it finds there has been a history of domestic violence that would compromise the mediation process.” WHEREAS, pursuant to Florida Statute 61.183 (1) “In any proceeding in which the issues of parental responsibility, primary residence, access to, visitation with, or support of a child are contested, the court may refer the parties to mediation in accordance with the rules promulgated by the Supreme Court.” WHEREAS, pursuant to Florida Statute 44.102 2 (b) quoted in pertinent part “A court, under rules adopted by the Supreme Court, may refer to mediation all or any part of a filed civil action for which mediation is not required under this section”. • WHEREAS, a Family Mediation Program is required under F.S. 44.102 (2) (c) in order for the courts in the Eighteenth Judicial Circuit, Seminole County, to mandatorily refer all family law matters with disputed or contested issues regarding children to mediation. • This Order adopts and establishes procedures to set the standards for operation of this court based program. -- 1 of 6 -- 2 WHEREAS, all mediators serving in the Seminole County Family Law Mediation Department must be Florida Supreme Court Certified Family Law Mediators. • Mediation must be completed before any hearing on temporary or final matters by the presiding judge. • Mediation for all pending family law cases is required before any court hearing on any temporary matters or trial is scheduled before the presiding judge. 4. • Unilateral selection of a mediator over the other party’s objection will not be honored. • If the parties disagree on selection of a mediator, designation of the mediator must be determined by the court. • The parties shall also bring to mediation their pay stubs or other pay records covering the month preceding the date of the mediation session. 8. • No party making a proper appearance is required to wait more than 15 minutes after the scheduled start time when the opposing party has made no appearance. • Each party must pay all applicable mediation fees regardless of the other party’s failure to appear. -- 3 of 6 -- 4 b. • Sanctions for failure of a party to appear are governed by Florida Family Law Rule of Procedure 12.741 which provides as follows: “If a party fails to appear at a duly noticed mediation conference without good cause, or knowingly and willfully violates any confidentiality provision under section 44.405, Florida Statutes, the court upon motion shall impose sanctions, including an award of mediator and attorneys’ fees and other costs, against the party”. c. • No party or the mediator is required to wait for counsel delayed and unable to appear at mediation within 15 minutes after the scheduled session start time. • A decision not to proceed will not be treated as a failure to appear but the refusal to proceed is a unilateral cancellation with assessment of costs as addressed herein. e. • Appearance of a party by telephone or electronic device is allowed by stipulation of the parties prior to the mediation or by court order. • The program administrator must be able to confirm in advance the party appearing electronically must have continuous access to a fax machine requiring not more than 5 minutes time per transmission. 9. • Absent court order, the courts allow that a scheduled mediation with the Seminole County Family Law Mediation Department may be cancelled or reset without cost or court sanction upon receipt to the program administrator, a signed stipulation from both parties not later than three (3) working days prior to the scheduled mediation date. b. • All mediation fees must be paid to the Clerk of Court before the scheduled mediation session or the session may be cancelled. -- 4 of 6 -- 5 10. • The following mediation session fees shall be collected by the Clerk of Court: 1. • Any person who is determined to be indigent by the Clerk of Court will not be charged a session fee. • If subsequent sessions are scheduled or if the scheduled session exceeds three (3) hours the parties are required to pay an additional session cost at the applicable rates described above. g. • If a mediation session is not cancelled or reset by joint stipulation within three (3) working days from the scheduled session date, the party initiating or making the reset or cancellation request must pay the cost for the scheduled session and the session costs for any reset mediation session. • The family mediation program administrator must receive the joint stipulation signed by both parties no later than 5:00 p.m. within the three (3) full business days prior, and not including, the original scheduled mediation date for fees to be waived. h. • All mediation fees must be paid in advance of the scheduled session pursuant to the uniform Order of Referral to mediation. -- 5 of 6 -- 6 i. • Mediators in the Seminole County Family Mediation Program shall conduct mediation in accordance with the Florida Rules for Certified and Court- Appointed Mediators and the Standards of Professional Conduct promulgated by the Florida Supreme Court. b. • For each mediation session the mediator shall report the mediation results, attendance of parties or failure to appear, full settlement, partial settlement or continuance on the court approved report form.
WHEREAS, pursuant to Florida Statute 44.102 (2) (c) quoted in pertinent part “A court, under rules adopted by the Supreme Court; in circuits in which a family mediation program has been established and upon a court finding a dispute, shall refer to mediation all or part of custody, visitation, or other parental responsibility issues as defined is s. 61.13.
Reviewer note: Document sha256: 63fea372d58e94ce97f6560513718412e133d7b18d206c34d9f1a208bde87128 (171860 bytes). BenchPath harvested this circuit itself because no research corpus existed for it. Extraction is conservative: mandatory-language sentences only, so this rule is a faithful subset of the order, never a summary of it.
Judge Shull requires ALL motions set for special-set hearing to go to mediation before the hearing is held.
Judge Burkhart will not schedule a temporary-relief hearing until mediation has been held ON the temporary relief sought — mediation first, hearing second.
Judge Sharrit refers ALL cases to mediation (exceptions only by leave) and openly encourages Special Magistrates under Rule 1.490(b) to beat the hearing-time bottleneck.