Georgia McMillen

Georgia K. McMillen, Esq., is a mediator specializing in the resolution of disputes throughout the State of Hawai’i. Legal counsel, their clients and other mediators consistently hold her in high regard for her knowledge of the law and subject matter of a case, as well as her ability to listen, keep everyone focused, and assist in building lasting agreements. As a mediator she is known for her skill in helping floundering parties articulate the problem and find solutions, her stamina during negotiations, her ability to provide reality-checks in challenging situations and her pursuit of settlement.

In her mediation she has settled numerous cases in the following areas: business and commercial disputes; family law, divorce, child custody, division of assets; insurance disputes; employment; real estate, quiet title, foreclosure and condominium disputes; trusts and estates. In addition, she is an arbitrator for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the largest independent regulator for all securities firms in the U.S. Ms. McMillen is a former per diem judge for the Family and District Courts on Maui. Her extensive training includes study in advanced mediation at the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution, Pepperdine University School of Law.

Ms. McMillen brings to every mediation her 35-year litigation background. She has represented clients in family law litigation including divorce, child custody, division of assets & debts, spousal support and termination of parental rights. She has represented clients in litigation including insurance disputes, business and commercial law, and employment law. She has represented hundreds of clients in appellate litigation before both federal and state appellate courts. The fundamental take-away from three-decades of litigation is that parties to a dispute should make every effort to seek an out-of-court settlement through mediation or some other form of dispute resolution that is confidential, controlled by the parties, less costly and less stressful. In contrast, a litigated outcome is adversarial, often destructive, a matter of the public record, extraordinarily costly, extraordinarily stressful, and the final result is controlled not by the parties but by strangers, that is either a judge or a jury.

Ms. McMillen is committed to serving both the local community and the legal community. In the legal community, she currently serves as a lawyer representative to the U.S. District Court for Hawai`i. Previously, she served as Appellate Lawyer Representative to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit's Judicial Conference. She has served on the board of directors for the Hawai’i State Bar Association and the Native Hawaiian Bar Association. She is a lifetime fellow of the American Bar Foundation and a founding fellow of the Hawai`i Bar Foundation. She is a member of the dispute resolution sections for both the American Bar Association and the Hawai’i State Bar Association. She is a mediator with Dispute Prevention & Resolution in Honolulu, and the Mediation Center of the Pacific's ACCESS ADR in Honolulu. She regularly provides pro bono mediation service to the Hawai’i Supreme Court’s Center for Alternative Dispute Resolution and to Volunteer Legal Services of Hawai`i. On Maui, she serves on the parish relations committee and as a trustee for Keawala’i Congregational Church.

Ms. McMillen was raised on O`ahu, California and in Bangkok, Thailand. She graduated from the Kamehameha Schools and the University of Hawai’i. She graduated with honors from New York Law School then clerked for the New Jersey appellate courts. She began practicing law at Lowenstein Sandler in New Jersey, then Ross & Hardies in New York (now McGuire Woods). In 1998 she returned home to Hawai’i and soon opened her own legal practice. She is a resident of Wailuku Maui where she lives with her husband and five cats, while maintaining offices in both Honolulu and Wailuku.