Founded in 1989 as Don Martin Public Affairs, the company became Martin & Salinas Public Affairs, Inc. in 2001 to more accurately reflect the addition of Trey Salinas as a full partner. Both principals are active in state, county and city issues with special expertise in working with public policy, governance, real estate development, energy, telecommunications, and general governmental services.

The firm primarily provides consulting services for local, state, and national clients doing business in Austin and the Central Texas area. Our services are focused in the following key areas:

Government Relations – We provide consulting, strategy, and lobbying-related services for clients in the Central Texas area to facilitate governmental or public approvals for a wide range of projects and issues. Typical projects include real estate development projects and their related issues; state, county, and city governmental approval issues; addressing neighborhood concerns; organizing public involvement; and developing effective public approval strategies.

Issues Management – We provide strategic consulting to handle specific client challenges and issues. Activities include development of key messages, audience targeting, internal message discipline, media relations, direct mail, opinion leader organization, and the coordination and balance of legal issues with public relations needs. We have also handled a number of public referendums and issue-related campaigns.

Media and Communication Strategies – We provide strategic consulting, planning and execution of communications programs. We use our media relations expertise to help educate the public or officials via the press, solicit support from editorial boards and opinion leaders, and work with the local, state and national media to help ensure accurate stories and to help "manage" news coverage. We also provide crisis communications services including contingency planning, vulnerability audits, spokesperson training, and strategy development and implementation.