Ashley Anson

Ashley Anson focuses her personal practice on Environmental Law, Agricultural Law, Family Law, Criminal Law, and Estate Planning.  James D. Taylor, P.C. has extensive experience in Municipal, Government, Real Estate, Personal Injury, Dispute Resolution, and Employment law, among the others previously mentioned.  As an associate, Ashley can dabble in an extensive and varied practice.  We do transactional as well as litigation.

Ashley is a graduate of the University of South Dakota School of Law where she served on the Board of Editors for the South Dakota Law Review. She also earned her Masters of Environmental Law and Policy, magna cum laude, from the Vermont Law School, generally considered the country's premier environmental law program.

While attending law school, Ashley interned at the Midwest’s leading public interest environmental legal advocacy organization - the Environmental Law and Policy Center in Chicago, IL - focusing her research on South Dakota hardrock mining and reclamation issues and Bureau of Land Management oil and gas leasing. She continues her environmental advocacy in South Dakota by serving on the South Dakota State Bar Association’s Environmental and Natural Resources Committee.  Ashley is an active member of the South Dakota Bar Association, Minnesota Bar Association, and American Bar Association. Locally, she serves as an advisor to municipalities, local boards, and the South Dakota Municipal Attorney’s Association.

With deep roots in Wessington Springs, she participated in South Dakota State's Rural Attorney Recruitment Program, finishing out that contract in May 2022, and establishing a practice as a general practitioner in her small town.  She brings plenty of rural experience to a larger metropolitan firm out of Mitchell, South Dakota and looks forward to the mentorship and comraderie that a larger firm brings to the legal experience.

Ashley grew up in Wessington Springs and attended Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis, earning her Bachelor of Arts Degree in English and Creative Writing.    She also minored in French, and has a basic conversational knowledge of Spanish.  Ashley is currently studying Spanish in hopes to offer multi-lingual services to her Spanish-speaking clients in neighboring communities. 

Ashley has three children, Adelyn, Charlee, and Oakley. She is a single mom to them and two cats in the rural town of Wessington Springs down the road from where she grew up. Her hobbies include oil, watercolor, and acrylic painting, fictional reading, singing for community events, creative writing and blogging, DIY crafting, digital photography editing, scrapbooking, and most of all playing with her kids. 

Recent Publications

• With Sean M. Kammer, "Smoking Out Forest Fire Management: Lifting the Haze of an Unaccountable Congress and Lighting Up a New Law of Fire," 60 South Dakota Law Review 41 (2015)
• 12 Tips for an Eco-Friendly Life(January 2017)
• Six Questions that Every Person Needs Answered About Environmental Law (February 2017)
• Farm Drain Tiles - Legal Issues Hiding Beneath the Surface (February 2017)

Professional Activities

• South Dakota Bar Association
• Minnesota Bar Association
• American Bar Association
• South Dakota State Bar Association - Environmental and Natural Resources Committee
• South Dakota Municipal Attorney's Association
• South Dakota Young Lawyer's Society Mentorship Program