Kelly Bratton wants to help Coshocton residents with important legal matters
COSHOCTON − Providing needed legal services to locals so they don't have to trave; outside the community is the goal of attorney Kelly Bratton.
Bratton Law recently opened at 1415 Orange St. Kelly is focusing on estate planning, elder and special needs law and business law, including contracts and probate. Amanda Crossley is the office manager and paralegal. Their building was once the medical office of Dr. Alfred Magness. Bratton's husband, Jerad, did the remodeling.
Bratton is a graduate of Coshocton High School and has a bachelor's degree in business administration from Ohio State University. She earned her juris doctor from Capital University Law School. She passed the bar on her first try in February 2022.
She was originally working at a local bank, but found it wasn't for her. Then she learned about a law firm in Newark that needed a paralegal and she landed the job without having a background in the field. She worked mainly in probate for five years.
However, she wanted to be local to be more involved in the community and to spend more time with her family. This led to her becoming a deputy clerk and overseeing the guardianship program at the Coshocton County Probate Court.
She said many people would ask her advice in that role, which wasn't something she could really give. That encouraged her to return to school to practice law. She served as a paralegal for the Gottlieb, Johnston, Beam & Dal Ponte law office in Coshocton and began serving as an attorney with them after passing the bar.
"I just wanted to be in control of my own future, essentially," Bratton said of starting her own firm. "I like being here and being local. When people come to me, they know me."
Even though she's only been a lawyer for a short time, she's seen some worst case scenarios where clients had to put much more time, effort and money into something than if they had been more proactive. One example was a couple where Bratton had to file for guardianship as the husband had Alzheimer's disease and couldn't sign power of attorney over to his wife, something that could have easily been done earlier.
"I joke I feel like I'm a doomsdayer. I've got to tell people the worst of the worst," she said. "I feel like attorneys get a bad rap for being expensive. But, honestly, having the preparation, doing your estate planning now, getting your ducks in a row now is by far cheaper in the long run than not doing that and having everything pass through the probate process."
Bratton would like to add more lawyers to her firm. She sees the key to that as encouraging natives who left for law school to return to Coshocton.
"We need to have younger attorneys fulfilling the roles of those attorneys that have retired or are close to retirement," Bratton said.
For more information, call Bratton Law at 740-202-9557, find it on Facebook or go to its website.
Leonard Hayhurst is a community content coordinator and general news reporter for the Coshocton Tribune with more than 15 years of local journalism experience and multiple awards from the Ohio Associated Press. He can be reached at 740-295-3417 or llhayhur@coshoctontribune.com. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) at @llhayhurst.
This article originally appeared on Coshocton Tribune: Bratton Law office focuses on estate planning and probate matters
