Zenna Faraj Elhasan is the general counsel at The Kresge Foundation and serves as secretary for the foundation’s board of trustees. She is responsible for managing the overall legal affairs of the foundation, supports the development and enforcement of foundation policies and practices, supports the board on governance matters and manages outside counsel relationships. She joined the foundation in 2018.

Previously, Zenna served as corporation counsel for Wayne County, where she led commercial litigation, federal civil rights compliance, labor and employment law and real estate and tax matters. In this role, she also oversaw major projects and restructuring efforts, including the Wayne County jail project, the county’s consent Agreement with the State of Michigan and transfers of the county’s major sewer systems.

Prior to her work in Wayne County, she served as a judicial magistrate and director of probation for the 20^th District Court in Dearborn Heights, Michigan, and was a partner at Allen Brothers, Attorneys and Counselors, PLLC, where she served as assistant city attorney for the city of Hamtramck from December 2005 through July 2011. She was also a legal assistant in the State of Michigan Attorney General’s office from 2002 to 2004 and served as a Michigan Supreme Court judicial intern to Hon. Chief Justice Robert Young in 2004.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from University of Michigan-Dearborn, a juris doctorate from University of Detroit Mercy School of Law and participated in the Young American Leaders Program at Harvard Business School.

Zenna has been recognized as one of Crain’s Detroit Business Notable Women Lawyers in 2017, and Notables in Corporate Counsel in 2022,  and honored by DBusiness magazine as Top Corporate Counsel in 2018 and 2019. She is an active member of the State Bar of Michigan, the State Bar’s Access to Justice Committee, the Detroit Bar Association Foundation, and the Michigan Muslim Bar Association. In January of 2020, she was appointed by the Governor of Michigan to serve as a Commissioner on the Michigan Civil Rights Commission.