Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, BrickStreet Mutual Insurance Company
by Jennifer Jett
IT HAS BEEN a long journey from T.J. Obrokta’s first job at McDonald’s to his current position as senior vice president, general counsel and secretary at BrickStreet Mutual Insurance Company. That first job cooking hamburgers over a hot grill taught him the valuable lesson that pushed him towards success: to stay in school.
T.J.’s first life-changing experience occurred when his parents put him on a plane to New York City to attend Columbia University after growing up in a small West Virginia suburb. “I realized then,” he says, “that I had been given a great opportunity and life would be what I made of it.”
This native of Ona, WV, originally had ambitions to be a doctor but changed his mind because he felt a law degree would allow him to be more involved in the political and public policy issues facing his home state. After graduation, he practiced labor and employment law for Jenkins Fenstermaker, PLLC in Huntington where he learned the delicate balance between the interest of management and the interests of employees, particularly in a heavily unionized state like West Virginia. The grandson of a coal miner who died of black lung before the two had the chance to meet, T.J. uses the memory of his grandfather as a constant reminder of the true purpose of workers’ compensation insurance: to care for those employees who are truly injured or sick.
It was during the next phase in his career that T.J. accomplished what he considers his greatest professional success: his role in the privatization of workers’ compensation in West Virginia. A member of the team led by Greg Burton, BrickStreet’s president and CEO, that involved all three branches of West Virginia government as well as state business leaders such as the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce, T.J. had a front-row seat—and imperative role—in this victory for West Virginia.
“Workers’ compensation had been the largest impediment to economic growth in our state for decades,” T.J. explains, “until Governor Bob Wise and the Legislature passed significant reforms in 2003 and the Supreme Court upheld those reforms. I was fortunate to argue for those reforms at the Supreme Court. With the 2003 reforms enacted and upheld by the court, Governor Joe Manchin and the Legislature were able to then pass privatization legislation in 2005. I will be eternally grateful to have been given the opportunity to be a primary drafter of this privatization legislation that created BrickStreet and the private workers’ compensation insurance market. BrickStreet is a West Virginia success story and I am proud to have played a small role in its creation and development.”
As a native of West Virginia, T.J. feels both ownership and responsibility to do his small part to move the state forward. As an active member of Our Lady of Fatima, he participates in various community and church activities and has volunteered with Habitat for Humanity, United Way, Branches Domestic Violence Center and little league baseball. As the primary drafter of the privatization legislation that created BrickStreet and as a founding officer of the company, T.J. is motivated every day to see what BrickStreet can become. “With the leadership of our CEO and the support of our board of directors and our Insurance Commissioner’s office, BrickStreet will become a dominant player in the workers’ compensation insurance market throughout the Eastern United States,” T.J. says with certainty. “BrickStreet will continue to evolve into a great West Virginia company that can successfully compete with global insurance carriers.”
Photography by Tracy Toler on location at Stonewall Resort
