Zakhary, Joseph R.

I have spent most of my life in the St. Louis area, so my bio must start with where I graduated high school: Crossroads College Preparatory School, which was (1984) and still is located in the City’s Central West End. After that, I left my parents’ home in the City to attend the University of Missouri at Columbia, where I earned a bachelor of arts in political science in 1987. Before attending graduate school, I provided direct community-based support services to consumers for the Missouri Department of Mental Health, where I developed a deep understanding and compassion for those living with serious and persistent mental illness, addiction and developmental disabilities.

In 1995, the year my son was born, my daughter and I both started school. While she went off to kindergarten, I started in the evening program at St. Louis University School of Law. I graduated in January of 1999 – in the top 30% of my class – with a JD and Certificate in Health Law Studies.

Since becoming a member of the Missouri Bar in 1999, I have worked as an attorney and counselor at law in both the public and private sectors. In private practice, I focused primarily on domestic/family law, insurance defense, employment and professional licensing. On the public sector side, I served as an Assistant Attorney General (1999 to 2001) in Jefferson City before returning to the metro to serve as an Associate County Counselor for St. Charles County for over 10 years – concurrently serving as the Interim Collector of Revenue for the County in 2006 and 2007.  At the County, my legal work encompassed regular practice in such areas as tort and personal injury, civil rights, property taxation, debt collection, family law, guardianship, annexation and zoning, labor and employment, and the enforcement of property maintenance and animal welfare ordinances.

In addition to appearing before state and federal judges in courtrooms in St. Charles, Cole, St. Francois, St. Louis and Jefferson Counties and the City of St. Louis, I have broad experience litigating in front of administrative decision-makers such as hearing officers, referees and commissioners (or ALJs). I have taken matters to hearing before the Missouri State Tax Commission and the Missouri Administrative Hearing Commission. I have handled employment disputes in the Missouri Department of Labor and Industrial Relations Appeals Tribunal, the Missouri Human Rights Commission/EEOC, and the St. Charles County Merit System Commission. And I have handled professional conduct and competency related matters for the State Board of Nursing, the Missouri Board of Nursing Home Administrators and the State Board for Registration of the Healing Arts.