Yiaway Yeh

{{Short description|American politician}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=May 2025}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Yiaway Yeh

| native_name = 葉亞威

| birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1978|02|17|mf=yes}}

| birth_place = San Francisco, California, United States

| spouse = Cecilia Hyun-Jung Mo

| children =

| education = American University (BA)
Harvard University (MPP)

}}

Yiaway Yeh (Chinese: 葉亞威; Yè Yàwēi) is former city councilmember and mayor of Palo Alto, California. He was elected to office in 2007{{cite web|last1=Trout|first1=Becky|title=Espinosa, Burt, Yeh, Schmid win City Council seats|date=November 9, 2007 |url=http://www.paloaltoonline.com/print/story/2007/11/09/espinosa-burt-yeh-schmid-win-city-council-seats|access-date=29 January 2015}} and was elected to mayor by the city council of Palo Alto on January 3, 2012.{{cite web|last=Green|first=Jason|title=Yiaway Yeh tapped as Palo Alto's next mayor|url=http://www.mercurynews.com/peninsula/ci_19671044|work=San Jose Mercury News|access-date=April 5, 2014|date=January 4, 2012}} Yeh is the second youngest mayor in Palo Alto history and the first Taiwanese American to hold the office.{{cite web|last=Sheyner|first=Gennady|title=Yeh, Scharff to lead Palo Alto council in 2012|url=http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2012/01/03/yeh-scharff-to-lead-palo-alto-council-in-2012|publisher=Palo Alto Weekly|access-date=April 5, 2014|date=January 3, 2012}} He was born in San Francisco, and attended JLS Middle School and Gunn High School in Palo Alto.{{cite web|title=About Yiaway Yeh|url=http://archive.cityofpaloalto.org/depts/cou/news/details.asp?NewsID=948&TargetID=133,276|publisher=City of Palo Alto|access-date=April 5, 2014}}

Yeh received his undergraduate degree in Political Science from the American University School of Public Affairs and his graduate degree in Master of Public Policy from Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Yeh volunteered for the Peace Corps in Burkino Faso developing local NGO's.{{cite web|title=Speaker Biographies|url=http://studentaffairs.stanford.edu/haas/about/peacecorps/bios|publisher=Stanford University|access-date=April 5, 2014}}

Before being elected Yeh was working for the City of Oakland as an auditor.

Yiaway Yeh moved to Nashville, Tennessee following his wife joining the faculty of the Department of Political Science at Vanderbilt University.{{cite web|last=Patterson|first=Jim|title=New faculty: Cecilia Hyunjung Mo shares her late father's passion for politics|url=http://news.vanderbilt.edu/2012/11/new-faculty-cecilia-mo/|publisher=Vanderbilt Research News}}

Yiaway Yeh was appointed by Mayor Karl Dean of Nashville to head up the new Mayor's Office of Innovation announced on April 26, 2013.{{cite news|last=Garrison|first=Joey|title=Dean's new Innovation Office aims at government efficiency, constituent needs|url=http://www.tennessean.com/article/20130426/NEWS/304260155/Dean-s-new-Innovation-Office-aims-government-efficiency-constituent-needs|access-date=29 April 2013|newspaper=The Tennessean|date=April 26, 2013}} He later took a job with Google and returned to the San Francisco Bay area.{{cite news |last1=Kennedy |first1=Eleanor |title=Former Metro official joins Google Fiber team |url=https://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/blog/2015/09/former-metro-official-joins-google-fiber-team.html |access-date=May 9, 2020 |work=Nashville Business Journal |date=September 22, 2015}}

Yeh's parents are both first generation immigrants from Taiwan that came to the U.S. for graduate school.{{cite web|last=Leung|first=Kwokshu|url=http://www.ktsf.com/en/palo-alto%E5%87%BA%E7%8F%BE%E9%A6%96%E4%BD%8D%E8%8F%AF%E8%A3%94%E5%B8%82%E9%95%B7/|publisher=KTSF|access-date=April 5, 2014|date=January 4, 2012|title=Palo Alto's first Chinese American Mayor}}

Of Hakka descent, Yeh's grandfather was born in Mei County, Guangdong, China in 1909 and moved to Taiwan in 1949 following the Chinese Civil War.