Shah served as the state’s CDO since spring 2017 when he was charged with leading MPH, which provides agencies with data and analytics to aid in decision and policy-making. Shah was instrumental in developing MPH into a stand-alone agency, according to the press release announcing his departure.
MPH spokeswoman Ashley Hungate said Shah’s last day was Dec. 20. Josh Martin, the department’s chief of staff, has been tapped as interim CDO to “assure continuity of operations moving forward.”
A recent initiative overseen by Shah was a partnership between MPH and Indiana University to create the Indiana Data Partnership (IDP), which launched in July to create visualizations of data sets collected by state departments, nonprofits and academia.
He told Government Technology at the time that the goal of the of IDP was to create cluster maps for organizations to better understand how each other is connected, thereby improving service delivery to residents. The IDP contains use cases addressing the opioid epidemic and improving education and workforce development.
“Innovation under his leadership has propelled MPH to become the envy of many, if not all, other state governments,” the release states. “He has brought a business mindset and no-nonsense outlook that has driven this growth.”
