After investigating all UW System employee files in the State Audit Bureau, a recent audit showed the UW System currently employs 40 convicted felons. According to Doug Bradley, UW System spokesperson, 27 are employed UW-Madison's campus.
Due to this report, state Rep. Scott Suder, R-Abbotsford, and state Sen. Rob Cowles, R-Green Bay, announced their intentions to draft legislation requiring mandatory background checks for all UW System faculty and staff Tuesday.
While Suder said the UW System does perform background checks, he said these checks are 'sporadic and certainly not uniform' from campus to campus and department to department.
'If the UW had uniform, comprehensive background checks for their faculty and staff, I would hope we wouldn't be paying for child molesters and murderers to be on payroll,' Suder said.
State Rep. Samantha Kerkman, R-Burlington, said she is also calling for a public hearing to ask the UW System specific questions, including how much interaction convicted felons have with students.
According to Kerkman, 16 percent of currently employed felons are violent in nature and have been convicted for crimes such as child abuse, sexual assault and homicide. She said other employees have been convicted of less serious crimes such as forgery, drug possession and driving under the influence.
Kerkman said system officials are not always notified when employees hired with clean records commit crimes, an issue she said should be addressed in new legislation.
State Sen. Fred Risser, D-Madison, said he believes 'there is nothing wrong with hiring felons in certain instances, unless the felony relates to what type of job they have.'
Bradley also said the convicts should not be discriminated against in hiring practices as long as they do not have jobs relating to the type of crimes they committed.
While Bradley said the university is taking the audit very seriously, he contends the UW-Madison campus is currently safe and secure.
'We're not trying to mitigate the fact that this isn't a critical issue, but its one-tenth of one percent of all the employees,' Bradley said.
While Suder said he does not believe all current convicts on campus should be dismissed, he does believe their records should be public knowledge.
'At the very least both students, staff and, frankly, taxpayers have a right to know who they are employing and have a right to know whether or not those individuals have been convicted of a felony,' Suder said.
