Torkildson Katz, A Law Corporation

Focus and practice areas

Six practice areas sit on the home page: labor and employment, business litigation, real estate and business law, tax planning and controversy, administrative law, and health care. They share one focus, which is work for businesses and employers. The firm was founded in 1947 and keeps two offices, one in Honolulu and one in Hilo.

The client base runs across sizes. The firm represents individuals, closely held companies, and multi-national corporations. In my opinion that range is worth noting, because the same office handles a personnel question for a small employer and a corporate matter for a much larger client. The practice areas connect to each other, since a single business often needs help with its contracts, its taxes, and its staff at the same time.

Labor and employment work

This is the practice the firm lists first, and it acts for management. The named matters include discrimination and whistleblower claims, collective bargaining, and day-to-day personnel questions. The firm also works with the Hawaii Chamber of Commerce to produce the Chamber Desk Manual on labor and employment law, a reference guide for employers in the state.

Management-side labor work usually covers two streams. One is advice that keeps daily employment decisions inside the law, such as hiring, discipline, and leave. The other is defense when a claim reaches an agency or a court. Collective bargaining adds a further layer in a unionized workplace, since contract talks and grievances come with it. General context like this explains why a firm gathers these tasks under one heading.

Business litigation and administrative law

Business litigation and administrative law both deal with conflict, one in the courts and one before agencies. Business litigation covers disputes that grow out of commercial dealings, such as contracts, ownership questions, and conflicts between companies. These cases can settle, go to trial, or move through arbitration, and the route often turns on what the parties agreed to earlier.

Administrative law follows a different track. It deals with the rules and decisions of government agencies, and with the hearings that come when a business responds to an agency. Much of this work happens before boards and hearing officers. A business that loses a permit or faces a licensing question ends up in this arena, and the timelines there run on the agency's own calendar. Keeping administrative law in-house is a sensible fit for a firm that already advises employers and health care providers, both of them closely regulated.

Tax, real estate and business matters

The tax practice handles planning and audits, and some of the firm's attorneys are Certified Public Accountants. That CPA training carries weight in tax work, because audits turn on records, figures, and how a position is documented. A lawyer who also reads financial statements can move between the legal argument and the numbers behind it. The controversy side of the practice points to disputes with tax authorities, which is where audits can lead.

Real estate and business law is where the firm places company work. The site names business formation, growth, maintenance, and management of a business. These tasks track the life of a company. Early work covers the choice of an entity type and the paperwork that sets a business up. Later work covers contracts, property, and governance as the company grows. Real estate work in Hawaii often involves local features, such as leasehold land and land-use rules, which shape how a deal comes together.

Health care compliance and defense

The health care practice covers HIPAA compliance and False Claims Act and qui tam defense. Both sit at the point where medicine meets federal rules, which makes them steady work for a firm with the right footing. A practice that keeps both under one roof can handle a client's compliance review and, later, its defense file without bringing in outside counsel.

What the compliance and defense work involves

HIPAA compliance work generally means a review of how a provider stores and shares patient information, and the goal is to close gaps before a regulator finds them. It tends to be preventive work that runs before any problem surfaces. Qui tam cases work in another way. A private party, called a relator, brings a claim on behalf of the government under the False Claims Act, and the claim often alleges false billing. Defense here means answering that claim and any government interest behind it. As a reviewer, I read the firm's pairing of HIPAA and qui tam defense as a sign it serves health care clients on both the compliance side and the courtroom side.

Who the firm names and where it works

Five attorneys appear by name on the firm's site: Robert Katz, Ronald Heller, John Knorek, Joseph Ernst, and Jeffrey Harris. One of them, Robert Katz, shares a name with the firm itself. Their listed fields match the business and employer focus that runs through the rest of the site.

The firm's work reaches past the islands. Clients with business across the Pacific often need counsel that reads both Hawaii law and federal rules, and the firm's stated markets line up with that kind of need. Its stated client base spans Hawaii, the U.S. Mainland, Asia, and the Pacific, and the second office in Hilo places the firm on Hawaii Island as well as in Honolulu.