Binghamton law firm announces two new offices and hires

BINGHAMTON, N.Y. — Hinman, Howard & Kattell LLP (HH&K), a Binghamton–based law firm, has opened two new offices in Edmeston and Morris in Otsego County, the firm announced.

HH&K, founded in 1902, now has 13 offices in five states, including six locations in upstate New York. Three of those offices are in Otsego County (Oneonta is the other one).

The firm also said it has hired Timothy R. Johnson as special counsel and Meredith L. Baio as associate attorney. They both work in HH&K’s Edmeston, Morris, and Oneonta offices.

Johnson operated a private law practice in Morris and Edmeston for more than 27 years, before departing for a deputy chief member counsel position at the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association in Arlington, Virginia that he held from May 2012 to December 2014, the firm said.

At HH&K, his practice areas will include business, nonprofits, commercial real estate, estate planning, and elder law.

“He left for a few years, but this has always been home for Tim,” Stacey Axtell, the firm’s chief administrative officer, says in a phone interview. “The timing was right for everyone.”

Baio’s law-practice areas include representing business and individuals in real estate matters, trusts and estates, elder law, Medicare planning, guardianships, and adoptions. She graduated from William and Mary Law School in 2011.

Both Johnson and Baio are members of the Otsego County Bar Association.

After the new hires, HH&K has about 180 employees total, Axtell says. About 80 are attorneys.

The new offices in Edmeston and Morris have about four employees combined, according to Axtell. She says the new hires allow the firm to provide more legal services in the Oneonta office as well.

Hinman, Howard & Kattell has occupied offices in the Security Mutual Building in downtown Binghamton since 1905.