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The San Diego Restorative Justice Mediation Program (RJMP) was founded in 1993 as the Victim Offender Reconciliation Program (VORP). Pearl Hartz, a retired school teacher and guidance counselor, was trained in the VORP program in Fresno, California and came to San Diego to start a similar Program.
The program was accepted well by the community, and by 1999, using a team of volunteer mediators, it was receiving as many as 140 case referrals a year. In 1998, the program hosted a Restorative Justice conference in San Diego, featuring Police Chief Jerry Sanders (now Mayor of San Diego) and Presiding Judge of Juvenile Court James Milliken (now retired), and Alan Crogan, Chief Probation Officer (now retired).
In 2003, Ms. Hartz retired as Executive Director of the RJMP. For the next four years, the Program went through many transitions of leadership, both in the office of Executive Director and on the Program's Working Board. By the summer of 2007, relationships with county officials were almost non-existent.
In the fall of 2007, the Board asked Ms. Hartz to come out of retirement to re-start the Program. A consultant was hired to help re-establish relationships in the communities of San Diego and to raise the necessary funds to hire an Executive Director, Case Manager, and a Fund Raiser.
By Spring of 2008, the Program was able to establish its first Advisory Committee. Through that Committee, an alliance was forged with National University. The university has for several years wanted to host a Center for Alternative Dispute Resolution, and the RJMP is to be the first part of that Center.
By mid-2008, the Program was stable enough that Ms. Hartz was able to step down from the position of Executive Director. Ben Conarroe was contracted as Interim Executive Director in June, and the organization began its search for a permanent leader.
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