Legislation Gives New Life to Massachusetts Programs
Since
the move from the Executive Branch in 2004, MODR’s two-pronged
goal was to amend its enabling statute to relocate the program to U-Mass,
and to secure a line item from the university for 2006. For step one,
Jeghelian said, MODR worked successfully with Administration and Finance,
where the program was housed previously, to draft an amendment making
MODR an entity of the university. Step two was more complicated.
Because the governor’s budget does not break out line items for individual campuses, nor for individual university programs, MODR got no funding under the U-Mass budget. “The governor approved our transition to the university, but essentially said ‘let UMB deal with funding it,’” Jeghelian said. Within the university, MODR was considered a service provider and ineligible for line item funding, she said.
So MODR returned to the House and Senate seeking a new U-Mass line item for the program, and they were successful in getting it into the budget.
When the administration vetoed the operating money, MODR scrambled again. “We got on the phone with nearly every representative, and convinced the House to take up the override immediately,” she said. But it was an uphill struggle, she admitted. “The house is where a lot of our support was last year, but our initial allies are gone now. So the effort was much harder this year.”
In the end, the struggle paid off. Both the House and Senate voted overwhelmingly to override the veto, and from its new home at the university, MODR’s new business plan is underway. “One of our primary goals is to become a cutting-edge innovator throughout the Commonwealth in the field of conflict resolution,” Jeghelian said.
According to its Five-Year Plan, “MODR will establish a national image for leadership in dispute system research, design and training through economic and policy research and through practice.” In addition, it “will promote and support widespread use of the full spectrum of conflict management and dispute resolution practices in branches of government, in large corporate organizations, and in municipal projects. MODR will function as a catalyst for expanding the use of dispute resolution by working with affiliated dispute resolution practitioners and academic colleagues to open new markets.”
With the stressful transition phase behind them, MODR staff is focusing on the positives of their new home, and the process that got them there. “In all this, we made great contacts in both the House and Senate,” Jeghelian explained. “We got them excited about MODR and the work we can do. MODR plans to capitalize on these contacts, she said, and will continue to work closely with legislators and the university as an “engine for continuous improvement and accelerated diffusion of conflict management practices.”
For more information visit the MODR website.