Husch Blackwell bulks up staff
Firm known for health care adds dozen lawyers
A law firm with an already strong health care practice announced Monday it has added a dozen more lawyers poached from two other large Wisconsin law firms.
Husch Blackwell said the new members will practice primarily from its Madison office.
Former partners Tom Shorter, Jed Roher and Jon Anderson left Godfrey & Kahn and took five other lawyers with them — Peggy Barlett, Kelsey Anderson,
Bill Foley, Tom O’Day and Matthew Ludden.
The group does a range of work, from mergers and acquisitions to labor and employment to health care-related matters with educational institutions and business cooperatives.
Husch Blackwell’s “health care team is on a very short list of those that can address practically every issue a health care operation will face,” Shorter said. “We are very pleased to join such a stellar group of professionals.”
A second group joined from Reinhart Boerner Van Dueren and will focus on hospice and palliative care, according to Husch Blackwell. It includes partners Meg Pekarske and Bryan Nowicki, along with Erin Burns and Andrew Brenton.
The firm said this group will have a national scope, representing hospices in regulatory compliance, contracting issues and care program development.
“Bryan and I have developed a highly specialized practice that is capable of addressing practically every legal issue hospices face,” Pekarske said. “To grow the practice we need a platform capable of serving clients on a national basis and that can add value to clients.”
Pekarske called Husch Blackwell a good fit.
Husch Blackwell is a business law firm based in Kansas City, Missouri, with more than 700 lawyers in 18 offices around the U.S. In 2016, it absorbed the former Milwaukee-based firm Whyte Hirschboeck Dudek, which also had offices in Madison, Waukesha and Chicago.