Darling: Recall is Part of National Union Effort to Give Dems Control

As hundreds of volunteers throughout the 8th Senate District collect signatures to force a recall election for state Sen. Alberta Darling, the Republican lawmaker says she believes big unions are playing a role in the effort to get her ousted from office.

“I respect the voters' right to have a recall. But I hope people will look at my record and I see that I got elected on the platform that we would grow jobs and the economy, and put Wisconsin on the right track without raising taxes,” Darling said in an interview with Patch. “Unfortunately, this has become less about my record and what I’m doing. It’s become a national union initiative to take out the Republican senators who have been working for fiscal accountability.”

As chairwoman of the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee, Darling has worn a particularly large target on her back from opponents of Gov. Scott Walker's budget repair bill. Darling's committee backed the governor’s bill before it went to the Assembly, where it was passed and sent to the Senate, where it's now lingering.

Central to the recall effort is the bill’s provision that strips most collective bargaining rights from most public employees. Darling said this aspect of the bill has been misconstrued as an attack on the middle class and an assault of workers' rights.

Darling said national unions are behind the effort to frame the debate in Wisconsin as a Republican attempt to bust up unions and tear down the middle class. Darling said unions are spending big dollars on paid canvassers, direct mailings and advertising to shape the debate and spur recalls. In the end, Darling said their effort is more about flipping control of the Senate to the Democrats.

“We need to get control of government spending. The message has gotten out that this is about union busting, but it isn’t. That this is about workers' rights, but it isn’t,” Darling said. “This issue has gotten distorted to being a rights issue, but we are trying to attack government costs to balance budgets without raising taxes.”

Darling said the Finance Committee added a provision in the budget repair bill that ensures local public employees would enjoy the same civil service protections as those at the state level. These protections include merit pay and due processes for firing, grievances, safety and discipline.

The repair bill also would maintain collective bargaining for wages.

Darling, whose district includes Menomonee Falls, Shorewood, Whitefish Bay and Fox Point, said the collective bargaining process has tied state and local governments into fiscally burdensome agreements. She cited the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association attempt to include an $800,000 health plan that included paying for Viagra in the collective bargaining talks.

“Why should the school board in Milwaukee concede to the unions for an $800,000 upper for Viagra benefits and have to lay off teachers?” Darling asked.

Darling cited another case in which a teacher at MPS who was named Outstanding First Year Teacher by the Wisconsin Council of English Teachers was fired because the the collective bargaining agreement requires layoffs to be made based on seniority.

Darling said the goal of the budget and passage of the budget repair bill is to balance the budget and create a sense of certainty in the state to help attract business a grow jobs in the state.  This is something she said Democratic senators are not doing.

“We didn’t jump town when Doyle added $4 billion in increased spending and $1.8 billion in tax increases in his budget repair bill. We voted 'no' and moved on,” Darling said. ““I think we are like a family in this state. If we disagree, there are elections. Most people like a peaceful transitions of power, but our Democratic colleagues have abandoned their constitutional responsibility and have shut down government in Wisconsin.”

Those behind the recall effort need to collect more than 20,000 signatures by May 2 to force an election. Recall organizers say they have collected thousands of signatures so far, but wouldn't provide more details.

Darling could face Democrat Sheldon Wasserman, who said he would consider running, in a recall election. Wasserman lost to Darling by about 1,000 votes, or about 1 percent of the votes cast, in 2008.

Darling said regardless of the results of the recall efforts, she will continue to come through with the platform she campaigned on and was elected on.

“What I am doing is sticking to the platform I had when I was elected, which was to attack the spending, deficits, and debt and have balanced budgets in real time,” Darling said. “That’s what I was elected on, and that’s what I’m doing as a member of the Finance Committee.”