ACGIH 2021 Election Results

10/07/2021

Cincinnati, Ohio – October 7, 2021 – ACGIH is pleased to announce new members for its Board of Directors and 2022 Nominating Committee.

ACGIH’s membership elected three (3) members to serve as Directors on the Board of Directors, each for a 3 year term. They are:

Lilia Chen, CIH, MS. Lilia Chen is a Certified Industrial Hygienist with over 15 years of professional EHS experience in the public sector, academia, and private industry. She is currently the EHS manager for GE Aviation’s headquarters site in Evendale, Ohio. Her EHS responsibilities include 6000+ GE Aviation employees at a 400-acre site with 6 million ft2 under roof that includes manufacturing operations, R&D labs, and engine test cells.  She previously served as the Agency Health and Safety Director at the New York State Thruway Authority. Lilia spent 6 years with the NIOSH Health Hazard Evaluation (HHE) Program out of Cincinnati, OH. She earned her Master of Science in Public Health, Industrial Hygiene, from the University of Illinois at Chicago and her Bachelors of Science in Biology and Environmental Studies from Tufts University. Lilia currently serves as a director of the AIHA Ohio Valley Local Section.  She was a founding board member of the AIHA Eastern Upstate New York Local Section and served as secretary from 2014-2016.  She was awarded the 2011 ACGIH Bloomfield Award and is a graduate of the AIHA Future Leaders Institute.

COL(Ret.) Mary S. Lopez, PhD, CPE. Dr. Lopez retired from military service after 33 years as an Army officer. She currently serves as the Chair, ACGIH Board of Directors and is the past Chair of the ACGIH Threshold Limit Values for Physical Agents (TLV-PA) Committee. Dr. Lopez was an active member of the Physical Agents Committee from 2004 to 2018, serving as a subject matter expert in Ergonomics and Human Factors, Vice Chair (2005-2010) and Chair (2010-2018). She was elected to the ACGIH® Board of Directors in 2019 and has served as Chair (2020 and 2021).  She is a Certified Professional Ergonomist (CPE) and a licensed Occupational Therapist. Colonel (Retired) Lopez graduated from San Jose State University with a B.S. degree in Occupational Therapy (OT) and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the United States Army. She completed her OT internship at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Washington, DC. Dr. Lopez holds a Master of Health Administration (MHA) degree from Baylor University and a PhD in Industrial Engineering – Human Factors and Ergonomics from Texas A&M University.  Dr. Lopez served as Chair of the DOD Ergonomics Working Group and has held numerous positions on Army and DOD Occupational Safety and Health Committees and Working Groups. She has held academic appointments at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences and Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health.

John L. McKernan, ScD, CIH, CAPT. John McKernan, Sc.D., CIH is the Chief of the Emerging Contaminants and Technologies Branch in the U.S. EPA’s Office of Research and Development in Cincinnati, OH. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in physics and minor in mathematics from the U. of North Carolina Wilmington, a Master of Science in Public Health degree in industrial and radiological hygiene from the U. of North Carolina Chapel Hill, and a Doctor of Science from the U. of Massachusetts at Lowell.  He is certified in the comprehensive practice of industrial hygiene (CIH) by the American Board of Industrial Hygiene, and is an Elected member of the American Institute of Physics, National Honor Society (Sigma Pi Sigma). For over 22 years, Dr. McKernan has combined occupational hygiene field practice, environmental health research, and engineering into a comprehensive management approach for occupational and environmental hazards nationally and globally.  Dr. McKernan worked for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health for 10 years, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for the past 12 years. In addition to his assigned work duties, Dr. McKernan is also involved with volunteer committees in ACGIH. He has been a member of ACGIH since 1995, and served on the Construction Committee and Industrial Ventilation Committee, editing and writing numerous chapters in the highly regarded Industrial Ventilation Manual. John was the primary author for the chapters on nanotechnology and heated process ventilation.

The 2022 ACGIH Nominating Committee includes three elected members who will serve a one-year term. They are:

Joaquin M. Diaz, CIH, CSP, CHST, OHST. Mr. Diaz has over 22 years of occupational safety and health management experience. He is currently the Environmental, Health, and Safety Director for Skanska USA Building – Portland Office. He has overseen the development and implementation of Health, Safety, and Environmental Management Systems for other contractors. Joaquin is responsible for the professional development, mentoring, and training of Safety Professionals in and out of his organization. Joaquin’s work experience includes 17 years in a leadership position for three top 150 ENR contractors. He served honorably in the United States Marine Corps. He has two bachelor’s degrees from different universities and a masters in management. He is currently enrolled in a doctorate of public health program. He continues to pursue the highest level of credentials and education. He has the CIH, CSP, CHST, OHST credentials.

Torey Nalbone, MS, PhD, CIH.Dr. Nalbone is Chair of the Departments of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Construction Management at the University of Texas at Tyler. His degrees are from Baylor University, University of Texas at Dallas, and Texas A&M University where he earned his PhD in Interdisciplinary Engineering with a focus on Health Protection Engineering. Dr. Nalbone has been a member of ACGIH since 1985 and has practiced industrial hygiene for over 35 years in a variety of settings including field/lab work, regulatory enforcement, regulatory oversight/management, teaching, and consulting. Dr. Nalbone has served on scientific committees of ACGIH in both member and leadership roles and his volunteer experience includes Director positions on the Academy of Industrial Hygiene (AIH) as Secretary Treasurer; four years on the American Board of Industrial Hygiene (ABIH), two as Chair; and most recently, three years on the ACGIH Board, with prior term of service on the ACGIH Board of Directors with two as Chair. For the last five years, he has been most involved in the continuous improvement of industrial hygiene education through ABET. He is a member of the Executive Committee for the Applied and Natural Sciences Accreditation Commission (ABET – ANSAC. He is an AIHA Fellow and 2017 recipient of the ACGIH Meritorious Achievement Award. Presently he serves on several AHIA committees and is active on the Joint Industrial Hygiene Ethics Education Committee (JIHEEC) a shared committee between organization AIHA, ACGIH and BGC-ABIH.

Anthony Oliveri, PhD, CIH. Anthony Oliveri leads the Environmental Epidemiology and Analytics Section within the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) Division of Environmental Health. Prior to this, he was an Assistant Professor in the Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Michigan State University (MSU). He earned his PhD in toxicology and environmental health from Duke University and his MPH in industrial hygiene and exposure science from the University of Michigan School of Public Health. He is a certified industrial hygienist and safety professional. As a public health practitioner and researcher, Dr. Oliveri broadly focuses on environmental and occupational health surveillance. At MDHHS, he oversees multiple state-wide surveillance programs, including those tracking opioid overdoses  and child blood lead levels, and is developing a program for tracking occupational exposure compliance data. While at MSU, he served as the project coordinator for the Michigan Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (MIFACE) program. Dr. Oliveri is active in occupational health professional and research bodies, currently serving in leadership positions within the AIHA Government Relations and Toxicology Committees, and is a member of the Occupational and Environmental Epidemiology Committee and the “Defining the Science” Advisory Group. He has been a member of the NIOSH Traumatic Injury Prevention and Cancer, Reproductive, Cardiovascular, and Other Chronic Disease Prevention NORA Councils. He has collaborated with and contributed to multiple local and state groups, including MIOSHA, local health departments, labor and trade associations, the Michigan Industrial Hygiene Society and Michigan Safety Conference, and was appointed to the governor’s Public Health Advisory Council.