Isabel Sepúlveda-de Scanlon

Isabel Sepúlveda-de Scanlon, President, emigrated from her native Chile to Chicago and then California, in 1980, and has lived on the East End since 1991. She started the first local bilingual television show in 1999 called Vida en los Hamptons/Life in the Hamptons. In 2000 she was a member of the East Hampton Hispanic Advisory Board. In 2002 Isabel and other members of the EH Advisory Board founded OLA of Eastern Long Island, Inc. OLA advocates at the town, county, and state levels to achieve policies that create a more just and equitable East End--thereby strengthening immigrant rights throughout Suffolk County, Long Island.

A year later, together with the Southampton Press, she helped to launch the East End’s only Spanish-language newspaper, Nuestra Prensa. In 2003 she founded the OLA Latino Film Festival. In 2004 Isabel was named Grand Marshall for the Chilean Delegation at the New York Hispanic Day Parade representing the Chilean community in the USA. In 2005, she founded the first and only Bilingual Newspaper on Long Island Voz Latina, which is still the only East End-based bilingual newspaper in English and Spanish.

A 2009 as a graduate of Long Island’s well-known leadership program, the Energeia Partnership, she was appointed to the Suffolk County Hate Crimes Task Force. In addition to her long tenure as OLA’s President, Isabel has served as a board member of the Long Island Immigrant Alliance, the Bridgehampton Child Care and Recreation Center, the SUNY Multicultural Advisory Board, and the Latino Jewish Committee, among others. 

Currently Isabel is a member of the Community Board of The Watermill Center, a Rogers Memorial Library Trustee, and a board member of the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, Shelter Island, and Nork Fork. (LWVH/SI/NF). In 2019 she co-founded the Mamalluca Chilean Film Festival at the prestigious Instituto Cervantes; the festival received the highest grade of 100 from the Chilean government. She also belongs to the local Drawdown group, working to reverse global warming. Since 2015 Isabel has held the position of Latino Community Liaison for the Southampton School District. In 2021 she was appointed to the Southampton Stakeholders at the Southampton Village. Isabel lives in Southampton, NY.