Wendy Spillane
Deputy Director of Communications
and Outreach

Wendy Spillane, Deputy Director of Communications, Outreach, and Healthcare Payment Integrity of Ripple Effect Communications, brings 20 years professional experience focusing on health care programs and environmental protection, providing strategic solutions, project management, data analysis, and communications support to the federal government.  

Ms. Spillane received an M.S. in Environmental Science from Indiana University, School of Public and Environmental Affairs in May 1996. Ms. Spillane earned her Project Management Professional (PMP) Certification in April 2019.

From 1996 to 2014, Ms. Spillane worked in a variety of positions with increasing levels of responsibility at federal consulting firms including task lead and project manager. As a project manager in support of EPA, she successfully managed budgets up to $1M annually, coordinated a nationwide technical assistance team responsible for state and local community engagement, and oversaw communications and meeting support to 10 EPA regional offices. Ms. Spillane demonstrated her adaptability, reach, and excellence in collaboration with a diverse client profile including EPA’s Community Engagement Initiative, CNCS’ AmeriCorps, DOD’s Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs, and CMS’ Premium Stabilization Programs.

In 2015, Ms. Spillane began supporting the Enrollment Assistance Program (EAP), a $50M CMS Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight (CCIIO) contract as a senior manager and outreach lead. She helped develop the community outreach strategy and helped lead daily operations of its effective dissemination and implementation in nine state EAP markets, resulting in nearly 50,000 consumers enrolling in the private health insurance Marketplace.

Since 2017, Ms. Spillane has been a senior manager and technical lead for the Marketplace Program Integrity Contract (MPIC), a CMS Center for Program Integrity (CPI) contract supporting the ACA and the implementation of private health insurance initiatives. She served a primary point of contact for CPI and managed a diverse team of researchers, data analysts, and developers to process fraud information in a database for which she developed the requirements. This database tool is instrumental in identifying data trends in agent/broker noncompliance to conduct education and investigation in support of CPI program goals. Ms. Spillane used this tool to develop additional process improvements resulting in project-wide efficiencies.

Fun facts: Ms. Spillane has one son (a teenager!), one dog (a counter-surfer!), and one husband (who is thankfully neither a teenager nor a counter-surfer 😉). She loves meeting up with friends wherever they are, HomeGoods is her happy place, she will NEVER turn down a cup of coffee, and she is incredibly happy Stranger Things is coming out soon with its next installment!

Scott Catey
Deputy Director of Digital Transformation

Dr. Scott Catey, Deputy Director, Digital Transformation for Ripple Effect Communications, brings 15 Years professional experience managing complex federal, state, and international projects involving IT, health equity, and evidence-based policy. Dr. Catey has co-managed projects in excess of $5 Million per year and over 35 people with diverse policy and programmatic responsibilities.

Dr. Catey earned his Ph.D. and J.D. (with honors) concurrently from the University of Florida in 2011.

From 1996 to 2001, Mr. Catey was Associate Program Director and then Program Director for a highly successful communications cluster in Missoula, Montana. Following this experience, he returned to graduate school to complete a second master’s Degree, and then his doctorate and law degrees, which he completed with honors. Following graduation, Dr. Catey had faculty appointments at Georgia State University and Agnes Scott College. Looking for a greater challenge, in 2012 he took a position with the Montana Department of Corrections to direct the agency’s implementation of the Prison Rape Elimination Act.

Following his brief but successful tenure at the Montana Department of Corrections, Dr. Catey transitioned to national-level PREA implementation work at the National PREA Resource Center, where he led the project’s digital growth and expansion, managed the development of the PREA Online Audit System, and managed complex data sets and analytics for Federal partners at the USDOJ. Most recently, Dr. Catey held the role of Associate Director at the PRC and managed a complex portfolio with four division heads and teams of eleven downstream reports.

Dr. Catey joined Ripple Effect Communications in June 2022, as the Deputy Director, Digital Transformation. He looks forward to providing excellent support to the organization and its clients.

Paul Edwards
Chief Financial Officer

Paul brings 25 years of government contracting knowledge and over 10 years of senior management team experience to Ripple Effect.  He has worked in a variety of industries including IT services, secure networks, engineering, and shipbuilding.  Businesses he has worked with have ranged in size from $20M to $1B in annual revenue.

Most recently, Paul was CFO of Converged Security Services, a private equity backed business that was built through the acquisition of two government contractors specializing in IT services and security & access control. As the CFO, Paul was part of the team that grew the business by 40% over a two-year period.  He led the business in all aspects of finance, accounting, treasury, reporting and audit, as well as several company initiatives post-acquisition to streamline and improve business processes and compliance.

Prior to that, Paul worked as CFO for a small Rockville-based defense contractor called Ultra Electronics 3eTI, a subsidiary of a UK-based publicly traded company.  During his tenure there, Paul was responsible for all finance, HR, and IT functions.

Paul spent 19 years with General Dynamics in a variety of positions including CFO of their UK subsidiary, as well as Director of FP&A at GD’s Corporate Headquarters.  He started his finance career with 14 years at GD’s shipyard in Bath, Maine.

Paul graduated from Clarkson University with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering & Management.  He also has an MBA with honors from Clarkson University. He lives in Broadlands, VA with his wife, Kim.  He has three daughters in college at VCU, JMU and South Carolina.