Spice Conference Speaker Bios

8:20am-9:20am 

Let’s Get Political

Abortion Funds 101- Our Justice         

 Our Justice is a Minnesota-based reproductive justice organization and abortion fund. Our Justice was founded in 1967 by a small group of doctors, clergy, and community members to assist Minnesotans in accessing abortion. Over 50 years later, we continue their legacy with our direct aid and advocacy programs, working to meet people’s immediate financial needs for abortion care while fighting against laws and policies that make abortion care inaccessible.

Shayla Walker (all pronouns) is the Executive Director of Our Justice, leading the organization since 2019. She is a Black Dominican American, surviving and thriving on Dakhóta + Anishinaabe land. Before coming to Our Justice Shayla managed a national abortion clinic call center, and served as volunteer co-executive director of SPIRAL Collective, a practical support group.

Leah Soule (she/her) is the Development Director at Our Justice and dedicated to community centered, relational and ethical fundraising.

She lives in south Minneapolis with her cats, and enjoys painting and spending time outside!

Community Building 

 Why Faith? Why Church?
Natalia Terfa is a Pastor, Author, and Creative Director. She is the co-creator and co-host of the Cafeteria Christian podcast. She is the author of two books, It All Counts, and Uplift, and writes the weekly e-devotional The Friday Uplift on Substack. As the Creative Director of Church Anew, she gets to make the lives of pastors easier through resources and events, and regularly contributes to the Church Anew Blog and the Wonder Anew Blog. She lives in Minneapolis with her husband, teenager, two cats, and one ornery gecko, and her favorite things are nerd clusters, trees, and Turkish television. 

Emily Holladay is Senior Pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Frankfort, Ky. She has served churches and denominational organizations in Kentucky, Maryland, Georgia, and Alabama. In 2024, she received her Doctor of Ministry degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, following a research project implementing community organizing practices within the local church to embrace diversity and deepen relationships. She is wife to Scott, a middle school english teacher, mom to two human children and one canine who probably stole her breakfast this morning. 

Outside of Politics 

RSS: Control Your News, Cut the Noise – Norma Stary

Norma is a web content and accessibility professional living in New York City. She is a lifelong cinephile with a degree in radio/TV/film and is a former television news producer. She hopes to someday have her own IMDb credit.

9:40am-10:40am 

Let’s Get Political

Cultivating Collective Liberation 

Dana Thompson is a social impact entrepreneur working at the intersection of food systems, regenerative agriculture, and community wealth-building. A lineal descendant of the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate and Mdewakanton Dakota tribes, Dana co-founded Owamni, the James Beard Award-winning Indigenous restaurant in Minneapolis, and the nonprofit NĀTIFS. In 2024, she launched Heti, a hemp-forward beverage brand supporting sustainable housing, and in 2026 she launched AFARE (Alliance for a Regenerative BioEconomy) to build an industrial hemp supply chain in Upstate New York. Across every venture, she builds enterprises rooted in Indigenous knowledge that create real economic opportunity.

Community Building 

Creativity, Community and Crisis

Emily Olson

Yvette Vandermolen

Caitlin Lowans, Artistic Director, Ten Thousand Things

Bios pending

Outside of Politics 

 Belonging Redefined – Jen Saraceno

Bio Pending

11:00am-12:00pm 

Let’s Get Political

Water, Land and Legacy -Janille Baker  

Janille Baker is the controller for Baker Ranches, Inc., a multi-generational cattle and hay operation in Baker, Nevada. The daughter of a veterinarian and dairyman, she grew up immersed in agriculture long before marrying into ranching herself. Beyond day-to-day ranch operations, she manages H-2A agricultural guest worker compliance and has become an active voice in agricultural advocacy, representing farmers and ranchers on immigration reform through the American Business Immigration Coalition. She has taken those issues directly to Capitol Hill, meeting with numerous U.S. Senate and House offices on the challenges facing Western agriculture. Janille lives and works in Baker, Nevada, with her husband Tom.

Community Building 

 A Peak Behind the Stacks- Lisa McLaughlin, Callie Ann, Sarah 

Lisa McLaughlin, she/her, Owner, The Bookshelf on Church, Kilmarnock, VA

Launched my pop up bookstore in 2022, opened as a full storefront in 2024. I'm a creative entrepreneur at heart and when we moved to a rural, small town during COVID, my Hallmark dream of owning a small-town bookstore took hold!  I read pretty widely but love a good historical fiction or family drama.

Callie Ann Starkey (I go by Callie Ann), she/her, Children's Librarian, Nashville Public Library, Nashville, TN.  I've been in libraries for 14 years. I taught preschool for a few years in my 20s and I loved being a part of early literacy, but did not love being in the classroom. So I went back to school and got my library degree and have been in public libraries ever since!   I am particularly passionate about diverse books and promoting them to everyone, not just whoever the book is about. I work hard to help parents and caregivers choose adequate and accurate diverse books for themselves and their kids. I was even a part of a team at NPL who created a curriculum kit designed to help parents and caregivers do just that! 

Sarah Stewart Holland, she/her, owner Meander Bookshop Paducah KY.  I've had the shop since June 5 and I got into it because a bookstore owner in Versailles told me someone had Paducah had reached out to her to franchise and it lit a fire in me to make it happen before someone else did! Honest answer. I am really proud of our Bookstore Romance Day event that was my first official author event with listener Kalyn Gensic.

Outside of Politics 

Your Money Questions Answered - Elizabeth Pennington, CFP®      

Elizabeth Pennington is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ and partner with Fearless Finance, which works to make financial planning more accessible by offering fee-only, hourly financial advice virtually to clients around the U.S. Elizabeth loves working with clients at all stages of their financial journey, and she particularly enjoys helping clients in underserved communities, as well as those going through significant life transitions. Elizabeth also firmly believes that effective financial planning incorporates behavioral science and an understanding of the important role of emotions and mental health. She’s passionate about working with clients on both the math and the emotions of money.

Elizabeth holds a Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University, where she studied International Political Economy and took her first class on personal finance. She currently lives in Des Moines, Iowa, with her two cats, and she’s expecting her first child in October. In her free time, Elizabeth enjoys traveling, photography and gardening.