J. Kim Wright, J.D.
J. Kim Wright
Managing Attorney
Healers of Conflicts
Law & Conflict Resolution Center
P. O. Box 306
Asheville, NC 28802
Phone: 828.253.3355
email: jkimwright@healersofconflicts.com
J. Kim Wright, JD, is a multi-tasking pioneer in a new paradigm of law based on peace-making, problem-solving, and healing conflicts. She practices collaborative law and mediation in family matters.From 1977 to 2003, Kim was raised children. Her firstborn son, Bryan, came along while she was a sophomore at Warren Wilson College. Five step-children joined her brood in 1983 and her daughter, Ayni, was born in 1984. With seven children at home, while also running the family taxicab business, she began law school in 1987. When she and her husband divorced during Kim's second year of law school, her step-daughter, Dagny, also separated from her husband, chose to live with Kim. The oldest step-son also lived with Kim during his teen years. Over the years, Kim has maintained warm connections with her other former step-children as well.
With so many children around, there always seemed to be room for one more. Run-aways, throw-aways, and homeless teens found their way to Kim's doorstep. This rotating cast of characters, mostly teenagers, blessed and enriched Kim's life with love and many learning experiences. Altogether at least sixteen young people lived with Kim and her family between 1977 and 2003 (when Ayni left home).
At the same time she was running a household and juggling complex family relationships, Kim completed first her undergraduate degree from Warren Wilson College with a double-major in International Studies (focus on Latin America) and Economics/Business then received her law degree from the University of Florida in 1989. She passed the Georgia bar exam during her last semester at law school and was admitted in 1989. She passed the Florida bar exam in July, 1989. (Her only active bar membership is now in North Carolina.) Her first job out of law school was as executive director of a domestic violence program in Florida where she became an expert in the dynamics of domestic violence, speaking and training hundreds of law enforcement officers and others, speaking to the general public, writing grant applications, and overseeing shelter operations. Kim was also a volunteer Guardian Ad Litem, representing abused and neglected children in the court system and was one of the first GAL's in the country to advocate for the children in divorces.
Around 1991, Kim had a life-changing awakening in a program offered by Landmark Education and she moved to Chapel Hill, North Carolina. At that time, she was frustrated with the adversarial legal system and didn't know how to impact it so she sought out other jobs ranging from non-profit work to telephone research. Then in 1993, she met Forrest Bayard, a Chicago lawyer who practiced what he called "divorce with dignity". It was the opening of a new paradigm of law for Kim.
Kim immediately took and passed the North Carolina bar exam and soon thereafter founded The Divorce & Family Law Center, a law firm with the first multi-disciplinary divorce team in North Carolina. With an amazingly talented team that included brilliant paralegals, a former elementary school counselor turned mediator, and a social work intern, she offered holistic services to her divorce clients. Her practice won awards from the school system for in-school support groups for children of divorce. Her law firm was the only law firm to be approved for internships for social work students of both UNC-Greensboro and UNC-Chapel Hill.
As 1999 drew to an end, Kim's new husband was offered a job on the west coast, near Portland, Oregon. After much consideration, Kim closed her law practice and the family moved across country. Not being licensed to practice law in Oregon, she had to find a creative way to apply her experience and passion for the new paradigm. She opened a coaching practice for lawyers, helping them design their lives and law practices, and she wrote a web site called "Renaissance Lawyer". The voluminous web site showcased peacemaking approaches to law and gained attention for some trends in the legal profession.
In June, 2000, a dedicated group of legal professionals traveled from as far away as Cudjoe Key, FL and Vancouver, B.C. to meet in Las Vegas, Nevada to create an organization based on the web site, the Renaissance Lawyer Society, "RLS". RLS has grown to be a membership organization focused on innovation and transformation in the legal system. It has been featured in numerous periodicals and Kim has been interviewed by dozens of journalists interested in what the Christian Science Monitor called "a movement". Kim served on the board of RLS from its creation to January, 2006. She remains a member of the Board of Advisors.
In 2002, Kim and her husband divorced. She felt her time in Portland was not yet complete so she remained in Oregon after the divorce. In 2003, just days before his death of Forrest Bayard, her beloved mentor, told Kim that he thought she should go back to working with clients. Two weeks later, she met Marty Price who offered her a mediator job at a law firm focused on peace-making approaches to divorce. It was an offer too good to refuse and she managed to juggle her coaching practice, working in the law firm, and working with RLS. After some months, she and Marty decided to strike out on their own and start their own mediation practice. The North Carolina mountains called her home in summer, 2004 and, being a bluegrass fan and outdoorsman, Marty followed. After three years of working together, Marty left to pursue his restorative justice work and Kim continued to focus her legal work on collaborative law at Healers of Conflicts Law & Conflict Resolution Center.
As managing attorney of Healers of Conflicts, Kim gets to apply her many life experiences to helping clients create new lives for themselves as they're transitioning from marriage to single life. Having lived those transitions, she is able to share compassion and practical advice, in addition to her legal knowledge. She still maintains her coaching practice, speaks, writes and gives trainings on practicing law in the new paradigm. She is the publisher of a new magazine for lawyers due out in late 2007
