Robert Eckels

Robert Eckels has spent nearly three decades on the inside of Texas government: as a state legislator, as the elected leader of the state's largest county, and today as chairman of a state regulatory commission. He brings that vantage point, not just a law degree, to every governmental client David & Stephens represents.

Eckels understands how government works because he ran one. As Harris County Judge, he presided over the Commissioners Court and the Toll Road Authority, and built the county's Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management from the ground up. Before that, he spent six terms in the Texas House of Representatives shaping the statutes his clients now operate under. That kind of institutional memory doesn't come from practicing law. It comes from having practiced government.

During Hurricane Katrina, Eckels led Harris County's response alongside the Houston Mayor, coordinating shelter and services for more than 150,000 evacuees, a bipartisan partnership later held up as a national model of crisis leadership. He went on to chair the Texas County & District Retirement System, a $34 billion pension fund serving Texas counties and local governmental entities, and in 2025 the Texas Governor appointed him chairman of the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission, one of the state's senior regulatory posts.

At David & Stephens, that's exactly the kind of perspective this firm was built around: judgment that comes from having run a government, not just represented one. Off the clock, Eckels is president of K9s 4 Cops, which places service dogs with Texas law enforcement agencies. Public service, evidently, doesn't end at the courthouse door for him.