MIAMI—Burson-Marsteller has hired Jorge Ortega as executive vice president and managing director of the agency's Miami office, which serves the Florida market and is the headquarters for Burson-Marsteller's Latin America regional business. Prior to rejoining Burson-Marsteller, he was founder and managing partner of Newlink America, a Hispanic marketing and consulting firm he started in 2010. Before that, Ortega served as president of JeffreyGroup.

SACRAMENTO, CA—Ogilvy Public Relations has hired Vicky Waters  as vice president and leader of the firm's West Coast Latino offering, based in the firm's Sacramento public affairs group. Most recently, Waters worked with Governor Brown as the deputy director of public affairs for the California Department of Parks & Recreation. She also served as director of media relations at the California Charter Schools Association, the political correspondent for La Opinión and a reporter for the international news agency Agencia EFE. 

NEW YORK—Turner Public Relations has opened an office in Chicago led by the firm’s longtime director, Melanie Dennig. The firm also hired Jeff Maldonado as vice president of digital communications in New York from FleishmanHillard; Deborah Park as senior director in Denver from Visit Denver, the Convention & Visitors Bureau, and Jessica Stollberg as in-house graphic designer. 

TAMPA—Fetching Communications, the PR and marketing agency for the pet and veterinary industries, has added new clients including Bark Busters Home Dog Training, the Charleston Veterinary Referral Center, Reach-in Technologies and its iPet Companion product.

NEW YORK—The Halo Group, a branding and marketing communications agency, has hired Mandy Cudahy as senior social media strategist, responsible for developing both paid and unpaid social media programs and curating, creating and sharing multimedia content. Cudahy was most recently social media and content marketing manager at Sharp Electronics and before that was an account director at Likeable Media.