Director of Health - Location Flexible

Trust for Public Land (TPL) seeks a Director for our Health Program.  Health is one of TPL’s four core strategic commitments (alongside equity, climate action, and community).  The Health Program is TPL’s platform for incorporating and advancing health across our national and local program initiatives.

About the organization:
Trust for Public Land creates parks and protects land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come.  At TPL, we don't just save land—we create places to advance health, equity, climate action, and community, from the scale of neighborhood schoolyards to the scale of national parks.  Every park, playground, trail, and public space we create is an open invitation to explore, wonder, discover, connect with others, and play.  We're proud to say that we've been connecting communities to the outdoors—and to each other—since 1972.  Today, millions of Americans live within a 10-minute walk of a park or natural area we helped create, and countless more visit every year.

The newly formed Land and People Lab is an internal “think-and-do tank” that advances TPL’s work through the power of evidence.  The Lab generates and analyzes evidence using a broad range of disciplines and tools—from geospatial science to ecology, from economics to epidemiology, from urban planning to landscape architecture—and works to propel that evidence into policy and practice.  The Lab is also home to TPL’s content experts in climate action, health, and community strategies, who help guide TPL’s strategic commitments to maximizing the multiple benefits of equitable access to parks and greenspace.  

About the Health Program:
Trust for Public Land believes that park equity equals health equity.  We ground our work in evidence that parks and greenspace benefit physical and mental health, that access to parks and greenspace is inequitably distributed, and that substantial public health gains may be realized when communities gain access to high-quality greenspace and programming.  Our Health Program works across TPL and with external partners including park agencies, health departments, community-based organizations, and elected officials, to advance the organization’s commitment to health.  We express this commitment by:

• incorporating health into our park, trail, schoolyard, and land projects;
• devising, implementing, and sharing tools that spotlight health outcomes and that help promote health on public lands and in the communities we serve;
• measuring and evaluating the health impacts of our projects;
• assembling and disseminating evidence regarding the health benefits of these projects and of nature contact more broadly;
• partnering with other organizations and agencies to advance health-promoting initiatives on public lands; and
• actively contributing to national dialogue on the nature-health connection.

• be a champion, within TPL and across the national land protection and outdoor recreation sectors, of the role of public lands for health; 
• provide thought leadership, programmatic direction, and inspiration regarding the nature-health connection within the Lab, across TPL, and externally;
• develop new health initiatives within the Lab, including securing external funding to support these initiatives, and manage the successful implementation of these initiatives;
• collaborate closely with colleagues across TPL, including in the field offices, government affairs, marketing, and philanthropy, in advancing TPL’s health portfolio;
• represent TPL externally in health-related coalitions, meetings, and similar governmental, professional and community forums;
• actively contribute to national discourse through meeting presentations, webinars, publications, social media, and other channels.

• a commitment to TPL’s mission (creating parks and protecting land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come) and values (belonging, creativity, collaboration, impact, and hope);
• a minimum of 5-10 years’ professional experience in public health, including significant project and/or program leadership experience;
• formal training in public health, including in epidemiology, health policy, and behavioral science, with an advanced degree preferred;
• content area expertise in health aspects of the built environment including public spaces, and in health aspects of contact with nature including parks and greenspace;
• a highly collaborative workstyle and a strong track record of collaboration, including collaboration with colleagues in related fields such as urban planning, landscape architecture, and parks and recreation;
• strong organizational skills including the ability to manage several workstreams simultaneously;
• a strong track record of strategic planning and management, program-building, and team leadership;
• a strong track record of securing financial support for projects and initiatives, including private philanthropic support, foundation support, and/or government support;
• excellent oral and written communication skills, including effective public speaking; and
• willingness to travel to collaborate with TPL colleagues in advancing the organization’s health agenda.