New Findings: Turnover Rate Very High for Wisconsin Prosecutors
By: Steve Grumm
They carry much of the workload in Wisconsin’s criminal justice system, and a study found that many assistant district attorneys, or ADAs, are leaving their posts at an alarming rate.
The study called “Public Safety and Assistant District Attorney Staffing in Wisconsin”surveyed past and present ADAs and found that while an overwhelming majority of these state workers went into the field to perform a public service, for several years most are leaving for better paying jobs with better benefits in the private sector.
“There were a lot of people who just seem to be leaving after a relatively short period of time,” said Dennis Dresang, a University of Wisconsin professor emeritus, who worked on the study.
So Dresang set out to study what appears to be a revolving door among the state’s ADAs.
He found that out of 330 Wisconsin ADAs, 246 left their jobs between 2001 and 2007. The annual turnover rate among ADAs since 2005 is 18.4 percent, and half of Dane County’s ADAs have less than five years experience