Tom Conroy for State Representative

Tom Conroy has served as state representative for Middlesex’s 13th District since January 2007.  In the legislature he is the House Chair of the Joint Committee on Labor and Workforce Development.

Tom's interest in public service began in high school, and after receiving a B.A. in Russian and East European Studies from Yale College during the height of the Cold War, Tom started his public service in Washington by helping craft a more effective and less expensive alternative to the Reagan military budgets. He then worked for Senator Gary Hart (D-CO), and served as a foreign policy and national security assistant for Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD). His passion for helping those who were not in a position to help themselves led him next to Thailand, where he managed a refugee resettlement program for Vietnamese, Lao, Cambodian, and Burmese refugees fleeing persecution in their home countries. He spent time in Laos, Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines, and Japan before working in Cambodia during the United Nations occupation of that country in 1992. During 1993, he helped establish an in-country refugee interviewing center in Haiti for the Clinton Administration in order to prevent the further loss of life by stemming the tide of Haitians fleeing the country in risky boats.

Tom then received an M.A. in International Economics from Johns Hopkins in Washington, DC. For the next sixteen years, from 1995 to 2011, Tom worked in the business sector in Massachusetts at small and large companies. At Public Consulting Group, based in Boston, he helped state agencies around the country maximize their non-tax revenues and manage their finances with best practices. At Mercer Management Consulting he helped firms develop growth strategies and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their operations. At Marsh, Inc. he helped companies develop risk management solutions for their ongoing strategic, financial, operational, and other challenges. While working, Tom received an M.B.A. in Finance from Boston University.

Tom was elected state representative for Lincoln, Sudbury, and Wayland in November 2006 and took office in January, 2007. In the Massachusetts legislature, he has served on various committees, including the House Ways and Means Committee and as Vice Chair of the Joint Committee on Health Care Financing.

In Tom's first term, he successfully crafted a new and innovative section to the 2008 Life Sciences Law that creates a self-funding mechanism for the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, so that more entrepreneurial biotechnology companies can create new jobs.  He also authored several budget changes that have helped improve the state's credit rating, which helps save taxpayer dollars by lowering our borrowing costs.  Since 2009 Tom has served as the House appointee to the Governor’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Science (STEM) Advisory Council.  Tom has authored detailed reports on issues such as expanded gambling and post-retirement benefits for state employees.  For more on Tom's achievements, please see this list of accomplishments in the pull down menu.

Tom is currently focused on increasing the minimum wage, channeling more funds toward workforce training and job creation, passing the carbon tax bill he introduced earlier this session, reducing gun violence, and creating an anti-poverty commission.

Tom lives in Wayland with his wife, Sarah Sewall, a national security expert, and four daughters, 16 year old triplets and an eleven year old.