Menaka Mohan

Job Focus:

Developing community resources for Healthy Kids Healthy Communities.

Why I work at Active Living:

I believe that everyone has the right to live, work, and play in a healthy environment-it shouldn't be a privilege.  I've seen the devastating effects of poor planning in communities through my work in Roxbury, Massachusetts and the South Bronx, but I've also seen what can happen when communities partner with diverse stakeholders to change their neighborhoods.  I'm interested in continuing to be a part of that change. 

Bio:

From 2005-2007 Menaka worked as the Southern Bronx River Watershed Alliance Coordinator and developed with other SBRWA members an ongoing political and press strategy in support of decommissioning the Sheridan Expressway, a 1.25 mile highway in the South Bronx, and facilitated a four-month planning process with community stakeholders to determine land uses for the highway's 28-acre footprint.  At the same time she was the South Bronx Greenway and Active Living by Design Coordinator at Sustainable South Bronx where she worked with the New York City Economic Development Corporation (EDC), community and other partners on plans for the South Bronx Greenway, a 15-mile bike and pedestrian pathway currently in development.  She also promoted physical activity in the South Bronx community by organizing walking clubs and developing a social marketing campaign.  In addition, she met with high-level NYC and Bronx Borough politicians to advocate for policies that improve pedestrian health and safety in the South Bronx.  At Sustainable South Bronx she had an opportunity to speak in New York, various parts of the country, and even internationally about the public health challenges found in the Hunts Point community in the South Bronx.  She recently spent seven months in her mother's hometown of Dharwad, India working at small Environmental Organization.