James V. Kelsh has joined Bowles Rice McDavid Graff & Love LLP as special counsel in the law firm’s Charleston, West Virginia office.  He will focus his practice in the areas of public utilities, regulatory and administrative law, and government relations. 

Mr. Kelsh has been in private practice in Charleston since 2000.  From 1996 to 2000, he served as Staff Attorney for the West Virginia Public Service Commission.  He graduated from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1994 and received his undergraduate degree, cum laude, from St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

He obtained the first capacity improvement fee for a public service district in West Virginia.  He is a member of the West Virginia Rural Water Association, the Municipal Attorneys Association and the Small Public Utilities Association, and is certified by the West Virginia Infrastructure and Jobs Development Council.

Bowles Rice is a regional, full service law firm with 130 attorneys and six regional offices in Charleston, Martinsburg, Morgantown, and Parkersburg, West Virginia; Lexington, Kentucky; and Winchester, Virginia.  The firm has announced it will open two new offices, in Moundsville, West Virginia and Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, in 2012.