Remember when County Executive Scott Walker first ran for County Executive? Remember how he promised to give back $60,000 annually during his time in office? I remember, and I also remember Walker reneging on that promise last year. Walker’s yearly salary is somewhere in the area of $119,611, and he collects every nickel of it, but given the fact that he bought a big new house in 2007, I’m not shocked that he’d break a promise to give back salary.
However, I find it galling that Scott Walker has no qualms about collecting his six-figure salary while he threatens to lay off almost 200 county employees because their union wouldn’t accept across-the-board pay cuts, especially given the fact that even if the unions agreed to the pay cut, Scott Walker would still retain the right to layoff or furlough employee in accordance with the labor contracts in place.
If Scott Walker were a real leader for Milwaukee County – as he likes to portray himself as – then he’d lead county workers by example and take exactly the same cut in pay and benefits that he’s demanding from unionized county workers. After all, why should one group (a group largely comprised of middle class folks) feel all the pain while Scott Walker continues to collect his fat six-figure salary? The fact that Scott Walker has been unwilling to share the pain he expects county workers to feel speaks volumes about the man and the extent of his hypocrisy.
Walker took an almost 50% cut in pay his first six years in office…totalling about $360,000. That IS the definition of leading by example. Even if he continues to take the lower 10% pay cut, he’s still given back more than all the complainers at AFSCME…AND it is something he did voluntarily. He could have pulled a Lil Boy Weishan and said, “piss off…I’m keepin’ mines!“…but he didn’t. Where is your criticism of Weishan?
[...] leave it to those blue bloggers…some who collect a government salary…and, some who earn their living slinging mud to their Right…to get all twisted around [...]