This
week culminated in yet another Republican bill being passed that
consolidates political power, opens the door to corruption, and ensures
cronyism will run rampant. In the past 7 days, we’ve
seen Republicans exempt themselves from corruption investigations, take
us back to the Elections and Ethics Commissions that ignore political
corruption, open the flood gates to more secret corporate money in
elections, and allow individuals to conceal carry
knives. And now, Assembly Republicans voted to gut Wisconsin’s civil
service system in order to game the formerly objective public employee
hiring system.
Wisconsin
was a leader when it created its civil service laws in 1905. AB 373
overhauls the state’s civil service system for Wisconsin’s 30,000 public
employees. It eliminates objective civil service
exams and replaces them with a subjective system for hiring. It
increases the probationary period, allowing employees to be fired for
any reason for up to 2 years. Included in the definition of “just cause”
is “personal conduct” that is “unsuitable,” which
leaves too much discretion in the hands of state agencies to discipline
employees for manufactured reasons.
If
the Walker Administration wants, as Governor Bob La Follette’s slogan
says, for “the best to serve the state,” there are proactive steps that
must be taken, and gutting civil service protections
isn’t one of them. If the Republicans really want to attract the best
and the brightest, they shouldn’t have cut take-home pay and eliminated
collective bargaining rights. Governor Walker and legislative
Republicans should be working to repair the damage they
inflicted on Wisconsin’s workers, not destroying civil service
protections.
Additionally,
we’ve already seen the corruption that can occur in state employment
when civil service standards are removed. This is what happened when the
Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation
(WEDC) was created. Without the civil service process, WEDC has seen
unprecedented levels of corruption and unethical behavior. One analysis
of the $975 million WEDC doled out from 2011-2014 found that 60% of the
funds went to those that contributed directly
to Governor Walker or the Republican Governor’s Association. Taxpayer
money has been irresponsibly loaned to Walker donors who need to make
their Maserati payments.
Even before the civil service system was ransacked, we’d already begun to see cronyism seeping into our government:
If
you signed the recall petition, you’re weren’t appointed to a board you
were otherwise extremely qualified to be on. If you conducted research
based on science, not politics, you were fired,
just like the 18 scientists at the Department of Natural Resources. If
you were a long time civil servant and you disagreed with one of the
agencies, your job was turned into an unclassified position, causing you
to lose all job protections.
Representative Chris Taylor
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