Fee-Shifting Litigation: Choosing the Cases That Pay and Winning the Fee Petition

Ronald L. Burdge, Founder | Burdge & Wells Law Office, Co. LPA

Ronald L. Burdge is a nationally recognized lemon law attorney who spent his career fighting for the rights of consumers, with a particular reputation for helping RV owners rid themselves of defective vehicles. As the founder and longtime managing partner of Burdge Law Office, Ron practiced exclusively in RV lemon law, lemon law, and consumer law from 1978 until his retirement, building one of the country’s most respected practices in the field and representing thousands of consumers against manufacturers.

• Education & Credentials

Ron earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Dayton School of Law in 1978 and his Bachelor of Arts from San Diego State University in 1975. He is admitted to practice in the State of Ohio, the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and before the United States Supreme Court.

• Recognition & Leadership

Ron was named to Super Lawyer status in 2005 and repeatedly thereafter—an exclusive recognition reserved for top-rated attorneys selected after thorough evaluation across numerous criteria. As the founder of Burdge Law Office (now Burdge & Wells Law Office), he built and led a firm known nationwide as a leading voice in lemon law, and he is highly rated by clients and peers alike.

• Professional Involvement

Beyond representing his own clients, Ron has been a mentor and resource to the broader consumer law bar, actively co-counseling and coaching other consumer law attorneys around the country. His firm handles cases throughout Ohio state and federal courts, all Kentucky state courts, and Indiana federal courts, and is frequently asked to assist with matters in other jurisdictions through special admission alongside local co-counsel.

• Experience

Over more than four decades, Ron represented thousands of consumers in “lemon” lawsuits involving defective automobiles, RVs of all types, and other consumer products. His career began, as he tells it, when his first clients as a young lawyer—a husband and wife with a defective car—brought him a case no one else in his firm knew how to handle; he taught himself the law, took it to trial against a billion-dollar corporation and a veteran opposing counsel, and won. That formative experience shaped a practice devoted entirely to consumer protection and lemon law, in which he became a nationally sought-after advocate, co-counsel, and educator before his retirement.

Kelsey Black, Managing Partner | Black Law P.A

Kelsey Black is the managing partner of Black Law P.A., the Florida litigation firm she launched in 2013 after concluding that large-firm practice offered everything except enjoyment. She tries and litigates complex business, fraud and securities, fiduciary, insurance coverage, real estate, and construction disputes, and her matters regularly turn on the recovery or defense of attorney’s fees.

• Education & Credentials

Kelsey earned her Juris Doctor cum laude from Suffolk University Law School in 2007, where she served as Associate Executive Editor of the Suffolk University Law Review. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington [confirm graduation year with speaker]. She was admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 2007 and the Florida bar in 2010, and is admitted before the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts (2009), the Middle District of Florida (2010), the Southern District of Florida (2011), and the District of Colorado (2025).

• Recognition & Leadership

Kelsey holds an AV Preeminent rating from Martindale-Hubbell. She was named a Florida Super Lawyer, Top Rated in Business Litigation, from 2023 through 2025, following her selection as a Florida Super Lawyers Rising Star from 2015 through 2022. She has led Black Law P.A. as its founder and managing partner since 2013.

• Professional Involvement

Kelsey serves on the Law360 Florida Editorial Advisory Board for 2026 and has sat on the 17th Judicial Circuit Professionalism Panel since 2020. She is a member of the American Bar Association, the Broward County Bar Association, and the Underwater Bar Association.

• Experience

Kelsey’s practice centers on complex business litigation, including complex fraud and securities litigation, fiduciary litigation, shareholder and partnership disputes, insurance coverage, real estate litigation, and construction litigation. Her fee-related results include a Fourth District Court of Appeal decision affirming a favorable judgment and more than $60,000 in attorney’s fees for an air conditioner repair company after four years of litigation, and an insurance matter in which she compelled a carrier to assume the defense and reimburse a homeowners association more than six figures in attorneys’ fees it had already paid.

SESSION 1 – Building a Legally Defensible AI-Assisted Reduction in Force: How the Software Actually Decides, and Who Answers for It | 1:00pm – 2:00pm

The fee petition is won or lost long before it is filed. This session examines how to evaluate prospective cases through a fee-shifting lens at intake, identifying the statutory hooks, client profiles, and case characteristics that make fee recovery realistic. Drawing on more than four decades of consumer litigation and nationwide expert witness work on attorney fee reasonableness, Ronald L. Burdge walks through structuring the engagement, the fee agreement, and the case file from the first client meeting so that every hour worked supports a defensible, well-documented fee award.

BREAK | 2:00pm – 2:10pm

SESSION 2 – Building and Defending the Fee Petition | 2:10pm – 3:10pm

This session covers the mechanics of preparing, filing, and defending attorneys’ fee petitions in federal fee-shifting cases, from lodestar calculation through appellate preservation. Attorneys will learn how to document hourly rates, structure time records, audit entries before submission, and respond to common judicial objections including block billing reductions and across-the-board cuts. Participants will leave with a practical framework for maximizing fee recovery and protecting awards on appeal.