Leslie Meehan
Title: Director, Office of Primary Prevention
Organization: Tennessee Department of Health
Location: Nashville, TN
Leslie Meehan, MPA AICP oversees the Office of Primary Prevention in the Commissioner’s Office of the Tennessee Department of Health. The Office serves as a hub for upstream, primary prevention policies and strategies that impact social influencers of health. Her work includes increasing physical activity through the built environment to positively impact social, emotional and physical health. Previously, Ms. Meehan served ten years as the Director of Healthy Communities for the Nashville Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) in Tennessee. At the MPO, she focused on the intersection of transportation and health, specifically transportation’s impacts on physical activity, air quality and injury. Her work has been recognized nationally and internationally, most recently by the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (2018 Vision Award), the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors (2017 Joseph W. Cullen Excellence Award) and the Institute of Transportation Engineers (2017 Transportation Achievement Award for Planning).
Ms. Meehan is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners, the Institute of Transportation Engineers, the Association of Bicycle and Pedestrian Professionals, the League of American Bicyclists and the Tennessee Public Health Association. She is co-author of the Transportation Sector of the National Physical Activity Plan, served as expert advisor on the U.S. Department of Transportation and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Transportation and Health Tool, was appointed by Transportation Secretary Peters to the National Safe Routes to School Task Force and has presented at a White House event on transportation and health. She served as a panel member on the National Cooperative Highway Research Program’s Research Roadmap for Transportation and Health and the Guidebook for Communications between Transportation and Public Health Communities. She also served as a member of the Transportation Research Board – Taskforce on Arterials and Public Health. She is the chair of the Transportation Sector of the National Physical Activity Plan.