When Gracia Kasoki Katahwa was deciding on a career, her father encouraged her to study medicine.

“At the time, my father said, ‘Why don’t you become a doctor?’ And I said, ‘I don’t want to be a doctor. I want to be a nurse and take care of people’s overall well-being. I want to accompany them in their daily lives and empower them,’” she recalled. “We had that discussion for a while and I was always like, ‘No, it’s nursing that I want to do. I want to advocate for patients, for people.’”

It’s for those same reasons that Katahwa jumped into municipal politics four years ago, becoming the first Black mayor of Côte-des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, Montreal’s biggest borough by population and one of its most diverse.

Katahwa also served on outgoing mayor Valérie Plante’s executive committee,

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