When Felicia Value sits down at her desk on Monday, Jan. 3, she’ll no longer be a solo practitioner.

She’ll be an employee of Barron Smith Daugert PLLC of Bellingham, which recently purchased her law practice.

“I feel like I’ve been invited to sit at the cool kids’ table,” said Value. “I’m also glad for our community, because they are such a good firm, with a deep bench in probate and estate planning.”

Three lawyers will join her Morris Street office. Jessica Carr will be the primary partner. Aaron Rasmussen, who has practiced in Anacortes, will also see clients in La Conner. Andrew Heinz will be available for “exceptionally complicated” situations, Value notes. “They have a broader pool of talent than one person can offer and extensive expertise in business, non-profits and estate taxation.”

Selling her practice and becoming a staff lawyer is the first step on a journey toward retirement. Value loves her work, but knows that supporting the mental work that law requires takes physical stamina.

While Value has energy and stamina in spades, “I’ve seen people work too long and I don’t want to be one of them.”

Value gained a unique skill set during her 31 years in law. Three years as a trial assistant for the public defender’s office in Portland, Oregon, taught her how to organize and maintain files, interview defendants and talk to prosecuting attorneys about sentencing alternatives.

Following law school, she learned how to fight hard for clients and not take setbacks personally while practicing insurance litigation for two years and criminal defense for three.

“I was good at criminal defense and I absolutely hated it,” she said. “That was an eye opener, because I had always thought if you were good at something you would like it.”

Joining a family law practice in Beaverton, Oregon, was a much better fit. “In law school, I loved estate planning classes,” she said. “Heads were hitting the desks all over the room and I was thinking ‘oh, that’s so cool!’”

Value came to La Conner with her spouse Gem Tartaglia in 1996.While studying for the Washington State Bar exam, she worked at Georgia Johnson’s bakery. Her first law office was inside the La Conner Realty building.

“Between Georgia’s bakery and Kirby Johnson and Dan O’Donnell of La Conner Realty, I got a great introduction to La Conner,” she remembers. “And the longer I’ve lived and worked here, the more I love La Conner. There is a true community feeling in this town and fine people of all kinds.”

Gary and Betty Miles became her landlords when she moved to North Third Street in 2006. In 2019 she opened in her present location at 413 Morris Street.

Looking back over her career, Value is grateful for the changes in law that safeguard domestic partnerships – especially the right to marry.

“During the AIDS pandemic, I would write wills for clients at the Cascade AIDS clinic,” she remembered. “Gay couples could create rights similar to married people if they had the documents in place, like wills and health care powers of attorney. Without those documents, you had no right to advise on medical treatment or even bury your partner.”

Because same-sex couples now have full marriage rights in Washington State, Value no longer has to witness what she saw in those days: surviving partners of longtime partnerships thrown out of homes by the deceased partner’s family, “which would stand on the lawn and watch every stick of furniture that the surviving partner took out.”

“When you get married,” said Value, “hundreds and hundreds of laws just click into place. That’s the law at its best - protecting what’s important to everyone.”

Until the end of 2022, Value will continue drawing up estate plans and probating wills with lawyers from Barron Smith Daugert.

She has two plans for 2023, when she stops going into the office.

First, she will figure out her natural wakeup time. And, when she wakes up, “I’ll start re-reading all of Dickens’ novels in the order in which they were written.”