Down on the Boardwalk

One in three millennials who work for the government believe their agencies reward creativity and innovation, according to the latest survey of federal employees.

Sara Meyers is that one in three.

The 33-year-old has worked for Uncle Sam only since 2009, but already she’s found the nexus between ideas and their practical application—a connection that eludes many public policy wonks.

Meyers, who is director of the Sandy Program Management Office at the Housing and Urban Development Department, won the prestigious Samuel J. Heyman Call to Service Medal this year for using statistics to improve government services for people from homeless veterans to Hurricane Sandy victims.

In 2010, Meyers helped create HUDStat, a data analysis system popularized by Baltimore’s CitiStat and New York’s COMPStat, to track the performance of the department’s far-reaching and varied programs. HUD was ahead of other federal agencies, she says, in adopting the locally grown Stat system of using data to assess how government programs work in the real world and applying those results to improve public policy. 

When President Obama tapped then-HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan to lead the Hurricane Sandy rebuilding task force after the 2012 storm devastated New York and New Jersey,
Donovan asked Meyers to lead the program management office to track nearly $50 billion in recovery money, spanning 19 agencies and 60 federal programs. Meyers, a New York City native, took the HUDStat approach and now she uses it to implement federal guidance on rebuilding. 

Meyers says she plans to stay in public service for the long term. “I think I have always been, from a really young age, concerned with leveling the playing field and making sure everyone has an equal opportunity, like I’ve had in my own life.”