Amy Miles was awarded the 2023 Kathryn J.R. Swanson Public Service Award for her dedication to preventing drug-impaired driving through her work in forensic toxicology. Miles has been actively engaged in roadway safety for more than 20 years and plays a crucial role in connecting forensic toxicology and traffic safety. She began her career in 1999 at the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene working as a chemist, where she also served as the laboratory liaison to the Drug Recognition Expert program. Over the years, Miles rose through the ranks at the state lab to become the Forensic Toxicology Section Director in 2014, a position she still holds today.
While Wisconsin remains her home base, Miles has graciously and unselfishly shared her extensive forensic toxicology knowledge and expertise with traffic safety, law enforcement and forensic partners around the country. She has accomplished an enormous amount in support of highway safety, including her most recent achievement: creating the National Toxicology Resource Liaison program. Her work led to the creation of three new Regional Toxicology Liaison positions, which bring critical resources to laboratories across the country. This first-of-its-kind program has been extraordinarily successful, as it provides much-needed guidance to state labs working to handle the uptick in drug and multi-substance impaired driving. Miles embodies the same dedication that Kathryn Swanson was known for in highway safety – her depth of knowledge and understanding of highway safety programs, particularly impaired driving.