The primary goal of The Center is to compassionately and professionally help couples avoid the prolonged conflict involved in court battles. Instead we guide you through constructive negotiation processes resulting in workable solutions for you and your family.

Divorce may be inevitable, but how you choose to get divorced can make all the difference in the world. It will not only affect how well you will move through the divorce itself but how you will transition into your new life afterward. The court process in divorce invariably fails to meet clients’ expectations, with costs and expenses accelerating out of control and emotions becoming overwhelming and destructive. For too long, people have assumed that the only way to get divorced is to battle it out in court while demoralizing and destroying one other.

The fact is that there are emerging, out-of-court alternatives for resolving family disputes. More and more couples are choosing either to mediate without attorneys present (pro-se mediation) or to engage in the Collaborate Process in which each participant is represented by separate collaboratively trained legal counsel who commit in writing not to take the case to court. The objective is divorce without litigation, divorce without destruction, divorce without war. Whether through mediation or the Collaborative Process, you can tailor and produce an outcome that will work best for your individual family.

Enid Miller Ponn

Enid Miller Ponn  is a collaborative family law attorney, a supreme court certified law mediator and the Director of the Center for Collaborative Divorce and Mediation. Throughout her more than thirty years of practice, she has specialized in the areas of divorce law, collaborative family law, family law mediation, post-nuptial agreements, pre-nuptial agreements and wills and probate.  She received her certification by the Florida Supreme Court as a family law mediator in 1993 and since then has experienced a very high degree of success in settling cases within her mediation practice.

Although Enid litigated divorces for fifteen years and was quite successful in what most would call “winning cases,” she never felt that either spouse came out a winner, and the children were always the clear losers of all high conflict litigated divorces.  Then, in the year 2000, she decided to limit her practice exclusively to non-adversarial dispute resolution techniques and processes.  She facilitates settlements out of court, specifically suited to each family’s needs.  Cases are resolved with as little conflict as possible, and always without litigation.  Enid brings her more than thirty years of experience as a family law attorney and her extensive mediation background to the Center to guide you through your separation , divorce or civil union dissolution with compassion, and an understanding of the complicated legal and financial issues. She considers herself to be a healer of conflict and a peacemaker and works hard to assure that her clients walk out as better people than when they walked in.

Enid received her undergraduate degree from UNC Chapel Hill, phi beta kappa, her Master’s degree from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in 1979, and her J.D. in 1984, cum laud from the University of Miami, School of Law.

She has completed extensive formal and advanced trainings and workshops as a collaborative family lawyer and has lectured to national, state, and local audiences on the topics of Collaborative Family Law and mediation.  She is a founding member and served on the board of directors of the Collaborative Family Lawyers of South Florida for over a decade.  She is on the board of directors of the Collaborative Council of Florida, and a member of the Collaborative Family Law Institute, and the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals.  Enid is also on the Legislation Committee of the Family Law Section of the Florida Bar and the Mediation and Collaborative Law Committee of the Family Law Section of the Florida Bar.  She has published articles and has co-authored chapters and essays on collaborative law-related topics in educational journals and books.

Your Real Estate Needs

Most often in cases of separation, divorce or the civil union dissolution process there are real estate related issues to work through and resolve. Many questions are raised about who will keep the real estate, who will continue to reside in the marital home, how will title be transferred, what will happen regarding the liability on the mortgage and note once title is transferred, is it possible to refinance, etc. At The Center we have a highly experienced real estate attorney available to help answer all these questions and if needed, to prepare any related documentation.

Your Estate Planning Needs

There are many reasons why you should address your estate planning as part of the divorce process. During happier times in your marriage, you may have created estate planning documents leaving everything to your spouse. Presumably, you may want to change this.

Also, in Florida as long as you are married and you do not have a will, your spouse will receive 100% of your assets. If there are children of the same marriage, and you are married, your spouse will still receive a substantial part of your estate if you don’t have a will.

If you have minor children and you die, your ex-spouse will very probably become the guardian of your children. You may be comfortable with your ex-spouse caring for your children as their guardian, but may not want him or her to have control over monies you want to leave to them. Therefore, as part of your will, you must create trusts for the children and name trustees and successor trustees who will be in charge of the money to be utilized for your children’s benefit.

We have many years of experience in the preparation of estate planning documents to assure that your assets are distributed according to your wishes and to protect your children.