Dependency mediation began in the Fourth Judicial District in 1995. Program growth was fast and steady during the first year of operation, and the program is expected to serve about 450 court-referred mediation cases during the year 2000. To evaluate the program, data were obtained from interviews with professionals who participated in mediation, 146 cases for which mediation was completed between September 1998 and April 1999, court records of 97 cases mediated between November 1997 and May 1998, and court records of 48 comparable cases in a jurisdiction without mediation. Mediation families were fairly evenly divided between those who had been the subject of previous dependency filings and those who were in the court system for the first time. Reactions of primary professional groups participating in mediation clearly changed in a positive direction with exposure to the program, mediation proved to be cost-effective, issues involved in about 70 percent of cases sent to mediation were resolved during mediation sessions, and many types of cases and disputes were settled in mediation. In most respects, mediated and non-mediated treatment plans were quite similar. 7 endnotes and 4 tables