K-12 Tax & Spending Climate: Pay shenanigans hurt public trust

The Wisconsin State Journal:

Don’t blame retiring Madison Area Technical College president Bettsey Barhorst or state Capitol Police Chief David Erwin for scoring a sweet payout and raise, respectively.
Blame their bosses — the MATC District Board and the Walker administration, respectively. They’re the ones who offered and agreed to these deals, which are bad for taxpayers.
The State Journal reported Sunday that Barhorst, who announced her retirement in January, will receive about $88,000 for four and a half months as an on-call consultant to her successor, Jack E. Daniels, and other top MATC officials. After the first month of her consulting gig, Barhorst doesn’t even have to be available in person. She can phone it in.
That doesn’t justify the same pay as she was making before Daniels arrived on the job Monday. Yet that’s what she’ll get, courtesy of the MATC District Board. The $88,000 for 19 weeks of on-call help is based on her regular annual salary of nearly $240,000.