Dr. Shelley Hearne brings an extensive track record of leadership, policy impact, institution building, and teaching in health advocacy. At the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, she is the inaugural Alfred Sommer & Michael Klag Decanal Professor of the Practice for Public Health Advocacy and director, Center for Public Health Advocacy. In addition, she runs the Forsythia Foundation, an environmental health philanthropy, as a consultant.
Previously, Dr. Hearne was the president of CityHealth, which catalyzes city policies for healthier living; founder of the Trust for America’s Health, a national organization dedicated to preventing epidemics, protecting health, and the managing director of The Pew Charitable Trusts’ Health group, which included its biomedical research, food, pharmaceutical, and financial security programs. She has also led the Big Cities Health Coalition, which represents the thirty largest cities’ health officials, served as the acting director of NJ’s pollution prevention program, and was the executive director of the Pew Environmental Health Commission.
She is experienced running advocacy campaigns that successfully helped pass and implement important public health policies, such as the model N.J. Pollution Prevention Act, Nationwide Environmental Public Health Tracking Network, the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act, and the U.S. Food Safety Modernization Act. She has served in numerous national leadership positions, including chair of APHA’s executive board and vice president of the Council on Education for Public Health.
She has been widely covered in the press, covering topics ranging from pandemic preparedness, public health infrastructure, ranking systems for states and cities on public health issues, including obesity, emergency response, and key policy issues, such as early education, tobacco control, healthy food procurement, earned sick leave policies, and financial security. She has substantial experience testifying before and engaging with policymakers at the federal, state, and local level.
Shelley has received numerous awards for her advocacy efforts, including the Senator Lautenberg Award for lifetime achievement in public health, the APHA’s Executive Director Citation, and Bowdoin College’s Common Good award. She received her B.A. in chemistry and environmental studies with honors from Bowdoin College and a DrPH in environmental health science from Columbia University’s School of Public Health.