In 2010, Josh Whitehead was appointed by Mayors A C Wharton, Jr. and Mark Luttrell, Jr. to serve as the Director of the Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development (OPD).

Prior to this appointment, he served as the Assistant City Attorney assigned to OPD, and before that as the Planning Director of the City of Germantown, Tennessee. Whitehead also works as an adjunct professor in the graduate program of city and regional planning at the University of Memphis.

He earned his Juris Doctor from the University of Memphis and his Masters of Community Planning from the University of Cincinnati and is a member of American Institute of Certified Planners.