Jessika Hepburn
administrative and executive assistant
Jessika Hepburn (she/her/any) is a multiracial mix of Black American, Ashkenazi Jewish, and Scottish diasporas with decades of experience in organizing from the margins, designing equitable and effective systems, community care, and building across difference to nurture just and intersectional futures.
Jessika comes to JLF with a background in non-profit, small business, and organizational development along with a commitment to radical diasporism, collective liberation, and the pursuit of Justice.
Since 2019 Jessika has been supporting her mentor Louise Delisle in addressing environmental racism and discrimination in their rural Black/African Nova Scotian community. An active member of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ), Jessika is also a facilitator of Dismantling Racism from the Inside Out (DRIO) and Fight Like a Mensch programs with Kirva Institute working to dismantle racism, resist authoritarianism, and strengthen multiracial democracy.
Jessika is an award winning entrepreneur; former cafe and bookstore owner; the only woman of colour to run in the 43rd Canadian Federal Election for the province of Nova Scotia in 2019; a mother of two fabulous Queer youth; and an experienced public speaker and writer.
Originally from Downtown East Vancouver, often referred to as Canada’s poorest zip code, Jessika is now located in the forests of Birchtown, Mi’kma’ki (Nova Scotia) on the unceded lands of the Mi'kmaq (L’nu) who have lived here since time immemorial. Mi’kma’ki is governed by the Peace and Friendship Treaties of 1760-61, it is also the home of African Nova Scotian and Black Canadian history, once the largest free Black settlement outside of Africa in 1783 and site of the first known race riots in North America.