Her research focuses on the contentious politics of urban redevelopment, especially after disasters and in periods of crisis. Leigh has recently published on comparative community resilience after Sandy on the Lower East Side and Rockaway, featured in Global Environmental Change. Her analysis of the struggle to preserve public housing in post-Katrina New Orleans is published in the Journal of the American Planning Association and Housing Policy Debate. Leigh has served as a consultant to foundations, non-profits and the public sector on urban revitalization and affordable housing, most recently to MassDevelopment, Massachusetts’ real estate and finance agency.