Emma M. Torres, MSW, Executive Director/Founder, Campesinos Sin Fronteras

Emma Torres is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Campesinos Sin Fronteras, a community-based grassroots organization serving farmworkers and their families in the
U.S.-Mexico border communities of Yuma County, Arizona, since 1999. Emma Torres holds a Master’s in Social Work and is a UCLA Johnson and Johnson Health Executive Program
graduate.

Ms. Torres, a former farmworker, has dedicated her life to addressing health disparities within the farmworking community, aiming to reduce the daily socioeconomic, educational, and linguistic barriers they face. Her leadership has guided Campesinos Sin Fronteras in providing and facilitating multiple services to agricultural families, helping them overcome obstacles and become self-sufficient. Ms. Torres began her work as a pioneer of the community health
worker/Promotora model in 1986 with the Comienzo Sano/Health Start Perinatal Program in Yuma County. Since then, she has been a strong proponent of the model as one of the most effective strategies for reaching and serving low-income Hispanic Latinos and migrant farmworker families. Ms. Torres has trained hundreds of Promotoras over her 38 years of service in community and public health.

Zelalem Adefris, MPH, Chief Executive Officer, Catalyst Miami

Zelalem Adefris has served as the CEO of Catalyst Miami since April 2023. Zelalem joined Catalyst Miami in 2016, and has a deep passion for achieving climate, social, and racial justice. Zelalem has been recognized as a 2024 Saltwater Fellow, 2023 Fellow for Liberated Futures, 2023 Rockwood Leadership Institute Fellow, 2020 Grist 50 Fixer, 2020 Florida International University Emerging Leader Finalist, and 2017 Miami Times New Generation of Dreamers awardee. In addition to her role at Catalyst Miami, Zelalem serves as a co-chair of the Miami Climate Alliance and as a philanthropic trustee of the Solutions Project. Zelalem holds an MPH in Global Environmental Health from Emory University and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Community Health from Brown University.

Annajane (AJ) Yolken, MPH, Director of Strategy, Project Weber/RENEW

Annajane (AJ) Yolken is the Director of Strategy at the Rhode Island non-profit Project Weber/RENEW, where she leads program development and evaluation across a range of harm reduction, recovery, and community health initiatives—including the nation’s only state-sanctioned overdose prevention center. A recognized leader in drug policy and public health, Annajane has spent over five years advancing transformative legislation at the intersection of substance use, health equity, and criminal justice reform in Rhode Island. She played a key role in the coalition that successfully passed the first U.S. law authorizing overdose prevention centers, and has worked on multiple other policy victories focused on supporting people who use drugs. She is the co-founder of the Substance Use Policy, Education, and Reform (SUPER) PAC, which champions evidence-based policies that uphold the rights, health, and dignity of people who use drugs and those in recovery. Annajane holds an AB from Brown University and an MPH from Harvard University.

Dr. April Shaw, Deputy Director, Network for Public Health Law—Health Equity Team

April Shaw, PhD, JD, is the Deputy Director in the Network’s Health Equity Team. She has expertise in breaking down the policy impacts of laws and illuminating how theory can inform practice. She also has expertise in racial health equity and is especially interested in thinking through how multiple inequities intersect to create systemic disparities. Some of her areas of focus include mental health, suicide prevention, cultural healing and safety, and climate justice. April has worked as the Research Scholar at the Center for Public Health Law & Policy at ASU’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law and at the Project on Predatory Lending at the Legal Services Center of Harvard Law school, writing white papers to assist with defrauded students’ defense to student loan repayment claims. She has also worked as a senior law clerk at the Arizona Court of Appeals drafting court opinions and memorandum.

April earned her Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Colorado at Boulder, specializing in social and political philosophy with a focus on gender and racial justice. She wrote her dissertation on severe global poverty and human rights. April received her J.D. with distinction from the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law, winning first place in the 2015 Sara Weddington Writing Prize for New Student Scholarship in Reproductive Rights Law, a national writing contest.