BAINBRIDGE — Coughlin & Gerhart, L.L.P. has combined its Afton and Unadilla branches into one new location at 29 N. Main St. in Bainbridge in the former offices of attorney David DeClue.

Lowell Seifter plans to leave Green & Seifter, Attorneys, PLLC to become general counsel at St. Joseph’s Hospital Health Center.

Seifter will surrender his ownership stake in the law firm that bears his name at the end of January. He expects to start work in what is a new position at St. Joseph’s in mid-February.

Upstate New York pays the state less in taxes and other revenue than it receives back in state expenditures, according to a report from the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government at the University at Albany. 

Increased government scrutiny of the misclassification of workers, the outcome of the payroll-tax extension debate, and the Supreme Court’s decision on the federal health-care reform law are among the top 12 potential regulatory issues small businesses may face in 2012.

That’s according to Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ: PAYX), a Rochester–area based provider of payroll, human-resources, and employee-benefits outsourcing services to small- and medium-sized businesses.

VESTAL — The legal profession is often associated with a grueling work schedule.

Not long ago a young friend, who is about to enter the 2nd grade, asked me what I do. I think he was trying to understand why I was "dressed up" at the swimming pool. As I struggled to put my response in simple terms I realized I had only a few momen