Sue Sena, Principal
Prior to founding Sena Consulting in the Fall of 2007, Sue worked for 13 years as a fund-raising and communications executive in the non-profit sector. Ten of those years were spent in the mental health advocacy and service field, as the Director of Individual Giving and Communications for Fountain House, and the Development and Communications Manager for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. She also served as the Associate Director of Major Gifts for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and managed a diverse team of urban youth volunteers with the inaugural NJ Youth Corps/AmeriCorps program in Jersey City, NJ. She has experience managing multiple fund-raising and communications campaigns for organizations with budgets ranging from $300,000 to $15 million.
In 2002, Sue and a group of New York City activists founded the award-winning non-profit organization, Swish, which provides opportunities for straight allies to make a difference in the global LGBT rights movement. She has served on several non-profit Boards of Directors and is a founding board member of Melodia Women’s Choir and Swish in New York City. She serves on the Communications Committee of the Anti-Violence Project and is a member of the Direct Marketing Fundraiser’s Association, Association of Fundraising Professionals, Women in Development NY.
Sena Consulting was the recipient of an Honorable Mention prize in the 2007 Queens Start Up! Business Plan Competition sponsored by the Queens Economic Development Corporation and The Citi Foundation.
Associates
Michael Washburn
Michael Washburn, President of Washburn Carmichael, is a 30-year veteran of nonprofit consulting. He has worked with more than 225 local, national, and international organizations in legal services, arts and culture, human services, mental health, youth and education organizations, and human rights. A former executive director of two international affairs organizations, Mr. Washburn is known for his analytical skills, creative and strategic thinking, and his understanding of organizational culture. Specialties include board and staff development, governance, major gifts and capital campaigns, financial planning, and communications. He is a former Vice President, Chair of the Governance and Public Policy Committee, and chair of strategic planning for the Association of Fundraising Professionals, Greater New York Chapter. He is president of the American Center for Photography. He received his BA from Harvard and an MPA from Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.
Amy Tripi
Amy Tripi, President of Tripi Consulting, LLC, has been helping non-profits raise funds for nearly 20 years. Amy wrote her first direct mail piece while serving as a Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras, and since then has dedicated her professional life to direct marketing fundraising. Amy has worked with many international, national, and local non-profits, including: City Harvest, Coalition for the Homeless, EngenderHealth, Fountain House, Girls Incorporated, Grand Street Settlement, Guttmacher Institute, Helen Keller International, International Planned Parenthood Federation/Western Hemisphere Region, The Legal Aid Society, ORBIS International, Population Communications International, Project Renewal, and Starlight Children's Foundation.Amy recently completed eight years of service as a member of the Board of Directors of the Direct Marketing Fundraisers Association (DMFA), an alliance of more than 400 non-profit organizations, consultants, and industry suppliers. She served as DMFA's President from 2002-03. Currently Amy co-chairs the Direct Mail Track of Fundraising Day in New York, America's largest one-day conference on philanthropy. She frequently writes articles and speaks at workshops and seminars about direct marketing fundraising. With a focus on excellent customer service, Tripi Consulting, LLC offers a broad range of fundraising services from direct mail copywriting, design, and production, to strategic planning and analysis.
Erin O’Toole
For the past ten years, Erin has dedicated her career to strengthening and expanding the fundraising capacity of New York City-based non-profit organizations. Producing strategic plans, development plans, mail campaigns, special events, board development and donor cultivation initiatives as well as foundation, corporate, and government grant proposals, Erin has won considerable funding, including six and seven figure grants, for the organizations she has had the pleasure to work with. To date, Erin’s client list consists of 20 of New York’s non-profit organizations, from start-up groups to non-profits with operating budgets ranging from $600,000 to $20 million. Clients have included, Latino Commission on AIDS, Right to Vote Campaign, Art Start, Art for Progress, The Girls and Boys Projects, Fountain House, Brennan Center for Justice, Housing Works, and the Institute for Labor and the Community. In the capacity of grant writer, Erin has won funding from every leading New York-based foundation, including The Rockefeller Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, New York Community Trust, and The Atlantic Philanthropies.