PITTSBURGH — Kirk B. Burkley merged his downtown law firm Bernstein-Burkley into Cleveland-based Walter Haverfield, more than twice its size, on Feb. 1. Now he’s firmwide managing partner of WH Burkley LLP, a 70-plus attorney firm with five offices across three states. Burkley, who has a national bankruptcy practice, joined then-Bernstein Law Firm in 2002. The name was changed to Bernstein-Burkley 10 years later, and he was then partner-in-charge of the bankruptcy and restructuring group. He served as co-managing partner for six years and, in 2020, became the sole leader. Although WH Burkley’s largest site and back office operations are in Cleveland, Burkley will remain based in Pittsburgh.
How did the merger with Walter Haverfield come about?
This actually started maybe seven years ago. A fraternity brother of mine, Tyler Bobes, was at Walter Haverfield [Bobes chairs the real estate group], we were in Las Vegas for the International Council for Shopping Centers conference, and we met at the pool. I was there with a couple of my partners. Tyler was with Kevin Murphy, who’d just come to Walter Haverfield [Murphy stepped down as managing partner last August]. They said, “hey, we want to expand into Pittsburgh, we should talk.” [After that] every once in a while, someone would call, but nothing really happened [at first].
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