Erika moved to the Las Vegas valley nearly 15 years ago and instantly integrated herself into the community. Working for many years as a journalist for the only African American newspaper in the state of Nevada, she came to appreciate and understand the inner workings of Nevada politics.
Currently, as the Executive Director for the Make It Work Nevada and Make It Work Nevada Education Fund, she is striving to redefine the traditional idea of what organizing looks like. Since 2015 she has sought to refocus old strategy ideas and adjust the view through both a gender and cultural lens. The organization is successfully organizing Black women and their families around important economic, racial, and environmental issues through a reproductive justice lens that will have a long-lasting effect on the political and cultural landscape of Nevada.
She believes and has proven that by amplifying the narrative of folks living at the margins and building infrastructure to expand opportunities and engagement that can build bridges across groups for the long term.
She is currently Board Chair of the Family Values @ Work Board of Directors; 6-term appointed board member for the city of Las Vegas Community Development Recommending Board; Board Chair for Michigan-based Mothering Justice; board member 9to5, National Association of Working Women; state appointed to the newly established Nevada state Maternal Mortality Review Committee, and the Medicaid Managed Care Reinvestment Advisory Committee and former board member for the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada; and former 1st Vice Chair of the Clark County Democratic Party.
When she is not working to build a better community, she devotes her time to her almost grown daughters, her super supportive husband, drinking tea, and discovering good books.