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Paul is best known as a communications and public affairs strategist. He has over 20 years of experience working to engage and influence policymakers and other decision-makers on key issues ranging from health care to racial equity to homelessness to early childhood education.

From strategic planning, stakeholder engagement, campaign management to message development, Paul has acted as a consigliere to several prominent funders throughout the country.

He has been a senior consultant to the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in its efforts to improve the health, living conditions and economic security for children and families living in New Mexico, and to improving public schools in Michigan. He acted as a lead communications strategist for a collaborative of the nation’s most prominent foundations, Executives’ Alliance to Expand Opportunities for Boys and Men of Color, including coordination with President Obama’s My Brother’s Keeper Initiative. He partnered with the Silicon Valley Community Foundation to plan a campaign to engage California’s gubernatorial candidates to support early childhood development. And was a longtime senior policy advisor to the Blue Shield of California Foundation in its efforts to support the successful implementation of the Affordable Care Act in California.

He has also served as a trusted advisor to public and nonprofit sector organizations such as the Advancement Project, Los Angeles County Chief Executive Office, and Oakland Unified School District.

Prior to joining Fenton, Paul spent more than eight years with The California Endowment, the state’s largest private health foundation. He led efforts to build alliances and generate support for the foundation’s health priorities and was a key strategist in crafting and implementing a multi-million-dollar campaign to advance statewide health reform in 2007.

He is also a veteran of local government and politics, having served as a legislative deputy to Los Angeles County Supervisor Gloria Molina, where he acted as the Supervisor’s chief advisor on law enforcement, public safety and transportation issues.

Outside of the office, Paul serves on the Boards of the Liberty Hill Foundation and Community Health Councils and is a proud alumnus of U.C. Berkeley and Coro Southern California. And he can also point you to the best restaurants and cocktail bars in Los Angeles.

Ujala is an award-winning communications expert with nearly 15 years of experience and a proven track record of social change. An attorney and former journalist, Ujala’s unique background informs her expertise in integrated communications strategies, training and capacity building, messaging, media relations, counsel and campaigns.

As a vice president at Fenton, Ujala’s clients have included Stop AAPI Hate, Center for Popular Democracy, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Fight Back Table and RAICES, among other leading nonprofits and foundations. She received PR Week’s Best in Nonprofit 2022 Award for her leadership on Stop AAPI Hate. A believer in empowering organizations of all sizes to maximize their impact, she also helps lead and design Fenton’s training and capacity building programming.

Prior to joining Fenton, Ujala served as the communications director for a number of human rights organizations, including ACLU New York, the Knight First Amendment Institute, and the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund. At ACLU New York, Ujala led the organization’s public response to Trump’s instatement of the “Muslim ban,” and co-authored “State of Injustice” (on the right to public defense) and “Dignity for All?” (on discrimination against transgender youth).

With significant expertise across a range of issue areas, Ujala has led or participated in high-profile strategies that successfully advocated for ensuring reproductive rights, reducing solitary confinement, protecting labor rights, providing access to education and legal rights for immigrant youth, increasing educational equity, challenging discrimination against LGBTQ teenagers, redrawing voting districts, defending free speech, reforming discriminatory policing, and shining a spotlight on technological advances that infringe on privacy.

Ujala graduated with high honors from Carnegie Mellon University and from the University of Michigan Law School with awards in critical race theory and legal practice. After practicing regulatory law at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP in New York City, she worked as a journalist for several outlets including The Atlantic and Insider.

Jania Palacios Azami is a Vice President at Fenton, specializing in marketing and branding, multicultural media relations and nonprofit communications. With more than 17 years of strategic communications experience to promote and advocate for key policy issues impacting California, she has provided support to government agencies, nonprofit organizations, healthcare providers and elected officials, among many others.

Jania previously served as Director of Communications for California Forward, a statewide nonprofit organization leading a movement to ensure the economy and government work for everyone. She led the organization’s cohesive communications efforts and secured extensive news coverage on policy issues critical to Californians’ prosperity, including economic mobility, broadband access, housing, wildfire preparation and regional, inclusive economic development.

Following its’ formation, Jania played a critical role in establishing First 5 California as a leader in early childhood development among the Latino community. She has conducted public education campaigns to promote the benefits of DACA and other policies to help immigrants.

Alex is an Associate Vice President at Fenton. He joined the Fenton team in 2016 from the environmental advocacy nonprofit Greenbelt Alliance, where he managed marketing and communications. Greenbelt Alliance was a past client of Fenton’s, and while there, Alex saw firsthand the lasting impact our work can have on an organization, even years later.

Since starting at Fenton, he has serviced clients in environment, sustainability, community development, social justice, education, philanthropy and corporate social responsibility. Alex uses his experience in advocacy, digital marketing and PR to help organizations that work on progressive issues but are short on capacity or expertise.

Born and raised in the Bay Area, Alex grew up in South Bay, graduated from UC Berkeley and now lives in San Francisco with his television and Playstation 4. When not working, he spends most of his waking hours in search of the Bay Area’s best fried chicken and Korean BBQ.

Emily Smith is an Account Director at Fenton, where she leverages her strategic communications skills to advance clients’ social change goals.

Emily is passionate about ensuring all communities’ rights are upheld and respected through thoughtful advocacy. Her prior experience at the communications firm Finsbury Glover Hering led her to Fenton.

Emily graduated cum laude from Princeton University, with a degree in politics and a minor in American studies, and she earned a master’s degree in human rights at University College London.

Kayla Butler is a Senior Account Executive at Fenton, where she utilizes her previous political advocacy and communications experience at a public affairs firm, political research firm and communications advocacy firm to implement thoughtful strategies that make lasting change with clients.

Kayla has dynamic professional experience ranging from political campaigns to exploratory research and public affairs. Prior to joining Fenton, she worked at JCI Worldwide, a public affairs firm where she managed several accounts and key advocacy and coalition and engagement projects, also managing a team of associates to ensure that clients’ varying needs are met. She was central to a dynamic statewide effort to educate Californians on the importance of energy stewardship and energy efficiency along with a statewide grant program to help disadvantaged and at risk communities prepare for brown-outs and cutbacks of power.

Kayla graduated from American University with a degree in CLEG (Communications, Law, Economics and Government) and a minor in justice and law.

Isabel Morales is a Senior Account Executive at Fenton, where she brings her previous global human rights experience and progressive communications skills to implement strategies that make lasting change with clients that range from ecological restoration to immigrant and refugee rights. Isabel supports the account teams in many ways, particularly in the realms of digital and earned media, as well as coalition building, to move the needle on the issues she cares about most.

Isabel’s work has always been to use storytelling to create meaningful change. Her prior experience as a PR Associate at Public Good PR, a progressive environmental communications firm, and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) led her to Fenton.