Helen Jones-Kelley Bio

HELEN JONES-KELLEY
Executive Director of the Alcohol, Drug Addiction and Mental Health Services Board

Montgomery County, Ohio

Helen is a licensed attorney. She earned her Juris Doctor from the University of Dayton School of Law, her Bachelor of Science degree in Secondary English Education from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio and received graduate training there in the fields of Sociology and Gerontology.

She currently serves as the executive director of the Alcohol, Drug Addiction and Mental Health Services Board for Montgomery County, Ohio. Before moving to that position, she was Special Assistant to the President of Central State University where she was responsible for External Relations and assisted as interim General Counsel and University Secretary to the Board of Trustees. Jones-Kelley is also a member of the faculty for Georgetown University’s Center on Juvenile Justice Reform and is engaged with implementation of its Cross-Over Youth Practice Model.

Jones-Kelley is currently on the Governing Board of the Dayton Foundation where she chairs the Marketing Committee, co-chairs the Parity, Inc. Steering Committee, Chairs the Education Linkages Committee for the Central Area Links, Inc. Board, serves on the Special Wish Foundation Advisory Board, the Miami Valley Catholic Education Council, Montgomery County’s Family and Children First Council and the University of Dayton Law School Advisory Board. She is also a member of the Dayton Chapter of the Links, Inc. and of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. In 2003, Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice, Tom Moyer, appointed her to co-chair the Advisory Council on Children, Youth and Families where she completed a six-year term.

She has received several honors over the course of her career, including being selected as one of the “Ten Top Women” in Dayton in 1996 and one of the Ten Top African American Women in 2002. She was featured in Essence Magazine in June, 1997. In 1999, she was honored by the YWCA of Dayton as a “Woman of Influence” and received their Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007.