Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke like to portray himself as a knight in shining armor who cares about the fiscal well being of Milwaukee County. Unfortunately for taxpayers, his budgetary reality isn’t matching his rhetoric.

A Deputy Sheriff who has asked me to respect his anonymity for this story, shared the scoop:

Due to severe staff shortages in the Courts and upcoming special events, Clarke has ordered that a department wide seniority list be developed and used to fill overtime spots throughout the summer. This is the first time in over 12 years the department has planned to force staff to work overtime. A directive from (Inspector) Carr just came out lifting the 40 hour overtime cap for any one officer in an 80 hr period.

Is it possible that those in command of this department overestimated the effectiveness of not NOT hiring a new recruit in over 4 years? How effective is the officer that works 80 hrs of overtime in an 80 hr period? How could Clarke, Carr and (Inspector) Schmidt not see this coming? The most upsetting fact of all this is Schmidt runs the jail so low on staff that the upcoming forced overtime costs will be hidden as normal operational costs. Therefore any complaints about costs and staffing made by deputies will be washed over.

Clarke may mask the high costs of overtime as “normal operational costs” but taxpayers are still paying time 150% more than they would need to had Clarke simply staffed to appropriate levels. Most politicians, Clarke included, like the reputation of being a tax cutter but when rhetoric trumps policy, in this case and in others, it is the taxpayer who usually loses.