Lawyer joins East Meadow firm

The ranks of Long Island workers grew by one when Kevin R. Toole joined the law firm Thaler Gertler in East Meadow at the end of January as a senior associate attorney.

Toole, who previously worked in Manhattan, wanted to do more work in bankruptcy, an area where Thaler Gertler was looking to beef up its growing practice. Helping "a company get through the bad times and reorganize, I knew, would be coming into play more and more as the economy turned around," Toole said.

Professional and business services such as law had the strongest employment gains in January, according to the New York State Labor Department.