About Us

Meet Kaye and Wes:

Rodgers and Hammerstein … Simon and Garfunkel … Sonny and Cher … sometimes the best collaborations are formed by individuals who have built a reputation and found success on their own, but realized that, together, they could accomplish even more. It was that thought process that led to the formation of Dent Coulson Elder Law. DCEL is a combination of Wes Coulson’s practice through Coulson Elder Law in O’Fallon and Kaye Dent’s practice through Dent Law Offices in Effingham.

The new firm will keep those two existing offices, with an enhanced ability to reach and serve clients in both areas (including in Missouri) and at various points north and south of the “I-70 corridor” through south-central Illinois. In doing so, they will take advantage of new technologies that make it possible to seamlessly and efficiently operate “as one” from two physical locations.

The fit between the practices is a very natural one. Both Wes and Kaye have long focused their professional practices on the closely interrelated areas of elder law (particularly planning directed toward protecting clients’ life savings from the potentially devastating cost of long-term care), estate planning, special needs planning, estate and trust administration, probate and guardianship. If anything comes up on a client matter that may be new to one of them, it’s very likely that the other of them has experience with it. That’s also true of the firm’s three paralegals, Karen Webster, Heidi Hagen and Jo Jayasimha, each of whom has her own areas of concentration.

Education: 

Kaye earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois. She then earned her law degree from Hofstra University in 1996. Wes earned his undergraduate degree from Northwestern University. He then earned his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1978. Each started out primarily in other areas of legal practice, and over time gravitated more and more toward elder law and the related fields mentioned above. That has been the primary focus of Wes’s practice for over 20 years, and of Kaye’s for over 10. Together, Kaye and Wes have over 68 years of combined legal experience.

As Estate Planning Attorneys, Wes and Kaye are proud members of the Illinois chapter of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys. (www.naela.org) Wes is also a member of the Missouri chapter, as well as being a “CELA” – a Certified Elder Law Attorney, a designation conferred by the National Elder Law Foundation, (www.nelf.org) the only organization approved by the American Bar Association to confer such designation. He was the first attorney in Illinois south of Peoria to earn that designation, and he has held it for over 17 years.

Wes also holds the designation of Accredited Estate Planner (AEP) from the National Association of Estate Planners and Councils. (www.naepc.org) (Note: neither the supreme court nor the bar of Illinois or Missouri reviews or approves certifying organizations or specialist designations.) Kaye is a member of Elder Counsel and Wealth counsel. She serves on the board of directors of Illinois NAELA; as Treasurer on the Board of Directors of the Children’s Advocacy Centers of Illinois; on the board of the Southeastern Illinois Community Advisory Board for Effingham County; and as chair of the Fifth Circuit Pro Bono Committee of the Public Interest Law Initiative. She has also served as president of the Effingham Noon Rotary Club.

Community Involvement:

The firm’s attorneys have given numerous continuing legal education presentations, and have also given presentations to many community organizations and at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities as part of their ongoing community outreach.