THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18 - CONFLICT RESOLUTION DAY - 11:45 AM - 1:15 PM. The fall program will be a brown bag luncheon seminar on Public Policy Collaboration and the Maine Revives Civility Project. 

Mark Hews and Ann Gosline will describe two areas of work that support a culture of effective citizen engagement in addressing tough societal challenges. 

Ann Gosline will describe the evolving landscape of public policy collaborative processes, in the context of a continuum from one-time public hearings to multi-year collaborative processes Ann will describe typical phases and elements of public policy collaborative processes, her experience with these processes in Maine, and her observations of skills needed by process facilitators and the overlap with the mediation field.  

Mark Hews will describe the Maine Revives Civility Project and its role in helping people foster an open exchange of ideas and expression of values that can lead to better problem-solving, more effective government, and inclusive and engaged communities. Learn about the tools and resources available to increase awareness about the role of civil discourse in community life, teach skills to further constructive conversations, and support efforts to use this framework to address self-identified community issues. 

Ann and Mark will comment together on the strong relationship between these areas of work.

This program is FREE to MAM members and Maine Law students. All others $15. 

1.0 hrs CLE and .5 Ethics CLE is pending for this event.

BRING YOUR LUNCH. MAM will provide coffee, drinks and dessert.

Biographical Information

Ann Gosline After practicing law as an advocate and later as a mediator for 15 years, Ann began focusing on collaborative processes to bring the public, private and non-profit sectors together to address tough problems.  Over the past three decades, Ann has designed and facilitated collaborative processes involving all levels of government to address natural resource and land use issues such as watershed restoration, transportation planning, wind-power siting, wetlands regulation, agricultural practices, fisheries management and trans-boundary marine protected areas, and carbon emission reduction strategies, as well as health care system reform, access to health care and legal services, and other issues. These processes have ranged from one-day meetings to multi-year projects. Ann also continues to mediate and arbitrate.

Ann is currently focusing on two collaborations to advance landscape-level land conservation initiatives to support thriving human communities and ecosystems in Maine and in the American Southwest.

J.D., Northeastern University School of Law, 1976

B.A., Stanford University, l971

Mark Hews is President of M E Hews and Company, LLC, specializing in project coaching and facilitation, rural community and economic development, and strategic planning. He is also co-founder of Total Crowd Solutions, an open innovation approach to project planning and resourcing for small towns and rural areas. Mark has 37 years’ experience in community development and project management working with small towns, businesses, and nonprofits. The Company also contracts with organizations to provide leadership and organizational development services and community capacity building. Mark is currently serving as the State Coordinator for Maine Revives Civility, a program of the National Institute for Civil Discourse to help people restore civility and respect in their public discourse.