Investing in the future of communities: 2023 Exemplary Public Servant Andréa Comer

The definition of public servant is a person who prioritizes the needs of their constituents, and who works to make their lives and community better. Andréa Comer, chief of staff for the office of the Treasurer of Connecticut, embodies this ideal.

“My mom used to always say you should never feel comfortable if your neighbor is hungry. That has had stuck with me,” Comer says. “And so, for me, being a public servant is about making sure that that my neighbors, and I say that in the broader sense, not like, who lives next to me, that my neighbors have access to the things that they need, and the ways in which I can be helpful with that.”

Andréa Comer

Her career in public service and dedication to helping her constituents, especially young people and underserved communities, is why Comer is one of American City & County’s 2023 Exemplary Public Servants.

A native New Yorker, Comer moved to Hartford, Conn., to work for the Hartford Courant, first as a copy editor, then working up to reporter, covering news in the city and surrounding area, but she admits she wasn’t feeling fulfilled. “I grew up with not a tremendous amount of privilege. But I went to private school, I grew up in the suburbs. I know that so many that look like me, particularly young people that look like me, don’t have the same advantages that I have. So, I’ve always had this drive, which comes from my parents too, to help others and to level the playing field. And that part of me was not being fed, writing stories.”

Comer went to work in media relations at Trinity College when a friend told her that then-mayor of New Haven, Conn., John DeStefano, was looking for a press secretary. Comer went in for the interview, and got the job, kicking off her career in public service. “I’ve stayed in either government, a couple of stints in nonprofit, but mostly government ever since. I credit [DeStefano] with helping me to realize the ways in which you can have businesses and communities realize the value of one or another. He was a brilliant administrator, and he was very, very good about making those connections. Yale University is in New Haven. Being able to create that kind of connective tissue between an institution like that and getting them to make real, meaningful investments in neighborhoods that have been underserved, really kind of created a blueprint for me to kind of follow throughout my career.”

One of the ways Comer helped the community was by running for office, serving on the Hartford Board of Education for four years. “My passion has primarily been young people and underserved people, so it was a great opportunity to really focus on what those children need,” she says. “We had a tremendous amount of students that we were losing to what has been termed the ‘school-to-prison pipeline,’ where [students] were getting suspended or they get expelled, and then we lose them, and where they show up, unfortunately, is in the criminal justice system.” Comer is proud that she was able to inform policies around that, particularly doing away with the expulsion process policy, except in the most egregious situations.

Now that she has been in her current position in the treasurer’s office for a little over a year, there is a lot that Comer is excited about, specifically Baby Bonds, which is a program that invests $3,200 for every child born on HUSKY, Connecticut’s state Medicaid system. “This is something I am incredibly proud of,” Comer says. “And it is because opportunity is not readily accessible to everyone. You know, I feel like everybody has talent, but being able to access that opportunity is not always there.”

Getting the Baby Bonds program off the ground was not an easy task though. The concept was developed by Darrick Hamilton, an academic who grew up in poverty, and after the legislation for the program was passed in Connecticut, it was dormant, because “the governor did not like the idea of bonding this program,” Comer says. Her office worked out a way for Baby Bonds to be funded through reserve funds, and it was approved by the governor, kicking off July 1, 2023. The program also includes a financial literacy component to help families build a foundation of financial knowledge.

The funds can be accessed once the child turns 18, and until they are 30. “They can access it to purchase a home, to start a business, to save for retirement or to go to school,” Comer says. “It really is about trying to address generational poverty. And the reason I’m proud of it is because I have talked to parents who have said, ‘I am now making different choices, because I know that my child now has a chance to go to college.’”

Connecticut’s first-in-th-nation Baby Bonds program has so far invested in approximately 8,000 babies, and Comer is working with other states who are trying to pass similar legislation. “We are being as helpful as we possibly can about identifying ways to fund it, what ground support looks like, getting advocates on board and policymakers on board. It really is a process. And so, we’re just you’re trying to, you know, take the lessons that we’ve learned and share them more broadly so that other states can benefit.”

In another effort to help underserved communities, Comer is serving on the Social Equity Council, which was established with the passage of the recreational cannabis legislation passed in Connecticut in 2021. “It’s intended to ensure that there’s equity, and what that mostly looks like is a portion of the dollars that come in from cannabis sales gets reinvested in communities that were most harmed by the war on drugs,” Comer says. “We’re really focused on trying to look at what that reinvestment looks like. Because, you know, again, money doesn’t solve every problem. So, we want to be able to have a meaningful impact with these dollars that get reinvested.”

Reinvesting in the community and helping underserved people are the cornerstones of Comer’s public service. “I think my favorite part of the job is when someone reaches out, and they’re having trouble accessing their unclaimed property, and to get them through the process to get the money that was rightfully theirs,” she says. “Or, talking to a mom again who said, ‘I’m now thinking about the possibility of my child’s going to college or, or buying a home, and that was never something I thought was possible before.’ You know, I think that’s the part of the job that I love the most, it’s just knowing that I’m making a difference and having an impact on someone’s life for the better.”