
Ava currently serves as the Sustainability Director in the Baltimore Office of Sustainability along with an amazing team to advance a more sustainable and equitable city. She has over a decade of experience leading public health initiatives, advocating for environmental policies, and managing programs designed to address social, racial inequities and environmental justice. She previously served as the Sustainability Manager and a Food Matters Technical Advisor in the office, where she led the implementation of special projects, supported the Commission on Sustainability, and helped to pilot new sustainability programming such as the Farmer’s Market-based food scrap collection pilot. During her time with the city, Ava also served as the ReCAST Project Director at the Baltimore City Health Department, advancing efforts to address decades of trauma in west Baltimore. At her core, Ava is an advocate for systems change applying her program management and analytic skills to advance policies and initiatives in harmony with social equity, environmental sustainability and economic prosperity. She holds a Bachelors in Science in Biology, a Masters of Public Health and is currently obtaining a Doctorate of Public Health with a focus on Environmental Health and Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health where her research interests center on wasted food prevention, food rescue and ways to improve organic/food waste management systems.