Before signing on to lead the health and tax practice at Dow Lohnes Government Strategies in late July, Ken Bowler's Washington career took a slightly unconventional turn. Since mid-2005, Bowler, a former staff director of the House Ways and Means Committee who spent 16 years running Pfizer's Washington office, has been the vice president for international and governmental relations with the Church of the Latter Day Saints.

Bowler, a fourth generation member of the church, said the job involved more work with foreign ambassadors and less lobbying on Capitol Hill. But in the end, he says, the lure of the health care issues he followed since the mid-1970s was overpowering. "I discovered that I missed being involved," he says, and "felt left out of this big important debate going on right now."

So when Bowler was approached by Dow Lohnes Vice President Mike Scrivner -- an old friend and colleague from Capitol Hill, where Scrivner was a top aide to then-Rep. Norm Lent, R-NY -- about helping build the firm's health care practice, Bowler says, he readily agreed. See Dow Lohnes press release here: http://www.dowlohnes.com/files/upload/Bowler.pdf

                                                                                               -- Julie Kosterlitz