Business Lexington Features Alumna La Tasha Buckner of Kentucky Governor’s Office
La Tasha Buckner graduated from the University of Kentucky College of Law, now the UK J. David Rosenberg College of Law, in 2000. She currently serves as Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s chief of staff and general counsel and previously served as assistant deputy attorney general. Buckner is a native of Glasgow, Kentucky. She began her career as a state prosecutor in the office of longtime Fayette Commonwealth’s Attorney Ray Larson. Buckner is the first person to hold both the general counsel and chief of staff positions simultaneously in Kentucky. She is also the first woman, and first African American of any gender, to serve as chief of staff in the Kentucky governor’s office. She is the first African American woman to serve as general counsel for the office.
An article titled, Trials and Tribulations, will appear in the April issue of Business Lexington. See the excerpt below and follow the link to read more.
The first 10 weeks of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s administration has brought his newly appointed chief of staff and general counsel La Tasha Buckner a sense of great opportunity—along with the swift and unanticipated public health challenge of COVID-19.
In early March, the focus of the governor’s office shifted quickly to monitoring developments and crafting a coordinated response to the appearance of the novel coronavirus in Kentucky, in the effort to minimize its impact across the state. The new priority was unexpected, but maneuvering quickly to address high-stakes issues that affect large numbers of Kentuckians is familiar territory for Buckner, a Lexington resident who previously served under Beshear as assistant deputy attorney general.