Staff

Jd Michaels, Executive Director: Ethnic and Community Media and Citywide Marketing 

Jd Michaels brings over 25 years of New York City advertising experience to his position as MOECM’s Executive Director of Ethnic and Community Media and Citywide Marketing. 

In his previous dual role as BBDO New York’s EVP of Creative Engineering + EVP Co-Director of Diversity, Jd was responsible for concepting and producing award winning creative work in print, outdoor, event, and digital executions, earning top industry awards (including a Titanium Cannes Lion), and worked with clients to insure advertising messages were authentic and inclusive. Original educational initiatives were engineered for NYC youth, including an all-borough partnership with MARVEL Comics and the New York City Police Athletic League.

For the last decade, Jd has teamed with national policy leaders within the American Disability community to deliver creative career workshops; this combination of instruction and mentorship led to employment for many students and demonstrated the power of equity in creative industries.

He is a graduate of Yale University and a proud resident of Brooklyn.

Orchida Harizaj, Associate Director of Communication / ECM

Orchida Harizaj graduated from Hunter College with a double major in Media with a concentration in Journalism and English. As a native of Albania, Orchida and her family sought asylum in the United States to avoid the hostility in her home country. While completing her undergraduate studies, Orchida was the Vice President for The Envoy, Hunter College's student-run online news site, and revived the publication after a two-year hiatus. Orchida initially joined the team as a Project Manager in September 2022 in a role was inherently clerical.

Over the last two years, Orchida absorbed tasks beyond her original assignment, adding the responsibilities of being the lead contact for community engagement and outreach (including organizing roundtable meetings, press release distribution to ECM outlets, coordination of weekly ethnic media engagement interviews with the Mayor (including scripting of interview briefs), direct contact with media outlet publishers to negotiate flat rate print media space pricing, and managing translation service for all City Hall releases). As a result of these efforts, Orchida was promoted to her current role as Associate Director of Communication for Ethnic and Community Media outlets.

Yesenny Fernández – Associate Director of Data Management / ECM

Attaining her Bachelor’s of Science in Computer Information Technology from St. Joseph's University and a Master’s of Science in Data Analysis and Visualization from the Graduate Center led Yesenny to work for organizations like The United Nations Children's Fund, DonorsChoose, Queens Public Library, and now the Mayor's Office Ethnic and Community Media.

Yesenny is an effective data analyst; in her less than two years with MOECM, Yesenny has engineered original strategies to collect financial and media placement information from City agencies, media placement vendors, and outlets, which have proven comprehensive and successful. She is solely responsible for creating our annual citywide marketing spend aggregate dataset - with tens of thousands of lines of information.

Yesenny is enthusiastic about the work being done by the Mayor's Office of Ethnic and Community Media and feels proud to work with a team whose goal is to ensure minority groups receive accurate information about New York City’s programs and services in their language through local ethnic media outlets.