Polly Povejsil Heath, executive at Post, WETA and Holocaust museum, dies at 67

By Washington Post Staff,

Joan Brady photography

Polly Povejsil Heath, an executive with The Washington Post and the public-TV station WETA who retired in 2019 after five years as chief financial officer of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, died July 3 at her home Washington. She was 67.

The cause was complications from pancreatic cancer, said her husband, retired Post reporter Thomas Heath.

Mrs. Heath was a senior accountant with Price Waterhouse and a consultant with Boston Consulting Group before joining The Post in 1982. She held financial and management positions at the newspaper, including assistant managing editor for planning and administration. She was also involved in some of the newspaper’s earliest online efforts and was elected controller of The Washington Post Co.

She left The Post around 2000 and spent more than a decade as WETA’s chief financial officer before joining the Holocaust museum.

Polly Elizabeth Povejsil was born in Glen Burnie, Md., on April 18, 1954, and grew up in Pittsburgh. Her father was a Westinghouse executive, and her mother was a homemaker and volunteer. She was a 1975 graduate of Brown University and received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1981.

She also served on the board of CareFirst/BlueCross BlueShield, where she chaired the health insurer’s audit committee for several years.

In addition to her husband of 28 years, of the District, survivors include two sisters and a brother.

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