Schimel Reacts to Proposed Cutback in ADA's Time

Waukesha County District Attorney Brad Schimel offered his comments on the proposed cutbacks to assistant DAs hours.  Last week about 350 ADAs throughout the state received a letter from the Office of State Employee Relations asking them to take six additional furlough days by June 30th, on top of their five biannual ones.  The option if they don't accept the furlough days would be a 20 percent reduction in weekly hours, which means they would lose benefits as they become part-time employees.

Shimel said, "we're hopeful we can work out something with the state, and convince the administration that we can't afford to have our assistant DAs reduced to 80 percent employees...we'll go under; we're already too short-staffed."

Shimel also felt the request was unfair, stating, "it's just not equitable to have them take an additional hit.  They've never received the kind of compensation that many other of the state unions have - they're not in a union, they've never had the kind of bargaining power."

The head of the state prosecutors’ group, David Feiss, has been reviewing the state’s notice. He said no meetings have been set yet to discuss the matter with employment relations officials.