ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, November 1, 1996 TAG: 9611010026
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JEFF STURGEON STAFF WRITER
ANTHONY GAMBARDELLA left the Virginia State Corporation Commission to join the Richmond office.
Woods, Rogers & Hazlegrove of Roanoke, the region's largest law firm, said Thursday it has hired the general counsel to the Virginia State Corporation Commission to work in a new office in Richmond.
Anthony J. Gambardella Jr. left the agency that regulates the state's utilities, insurance companies, telecommunication industry, banking and securities trading Oct. 15.
He will work out of a new Richmond office, created as a base for Woods, Rogers attorneys while they are doing business in the capital, the firm said Thursday. The firm has more than 70 lawyers in offices in Roanoke, Danville, Charlottesville and Washington, D.C.
Woods, Rogers had represented clients before the SCC, so its lawyers knew Gambardella. When he told them he was thinking about a job change, the seed was planted for Woods, Rogers to hire a powerful lawyer away from the state.
"It's a lawyer-to-lawyer thing, where you know people and they know you and you sort of get together," Gambardella said. "I was not seeking other employment. It was just sort of mutual meeting of the minds over time."
"Personalities meshed. Practice areas of interest meshed, and there we are," said John Monahan, the firm's executive director.
Monahan said Gambardella had built up his state pension to a point where it wasn't going to grow significantly unless he worked there many more years.
And because he wanted to practice law for a firm, this was his chance to do it, Monahan said. He had practiced in Washington, D.C., 20 years ago, before he was hired by the state. He served 12 years in the attorney general's office and, more recently, eight years as one of the top commission lawyers.
Gambardella said he won't be able to represent anyone involved in any case that he worked on at the commission.
Woods, Rogers also said Michael J. Quinan of its Roanoke office will run the new Richmond office, which is in a historic bank building a short distance from the capitol.
LENGTH: Short : 49 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. Anthony Gambardellaby CNBWill practice in Richmond
2. Michael Quinan
Will run new Richmond office