Darlene Wink

UPDATE, January 26, 2012: Two former Walker aides charged with illegally doing campaign work

Two new sets of charges have come down Thursday against two former staffers for now-Governor Scott Walker when he was Milwaukee County Executive.

Each staffer reportedly engaged in political activity and fundraising while on the job at the County Executive's office.

Kelly Rindfleisch faces four charges of misconduct in public office.

Rindfleisch, 43, was then-County Executive Walker's deputy chief of staff.

The complaint alleges that Rindfleisch illegally worked on Rep. Brett Davis' campaign at taxpayers' expense.

Darlene Wink also faces two misdemeanors of political solicitation by a public employee.

She worked as a constituent coordinator for Walker.

John Chisholm, get to work.

You have hundreds, maybe thousands, of public employees to investigate and charge.

Confiscate the work computers of public school teachers.

You'll be busy, busy, busy!
________________

Daniel Bice outs an online commenter on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel articles.

Bice's revelation is significant because the individual was a staffer for Scott Walker.

Walker staffer quits after admitting she posted Web comments while at work

Ever wonder who has the time and motivation to go online and post all those highly partisan comments about Journal Sentinel stories?

Here's one:

Darlene Wink, constituent services coordinator for County Executive Scott Walker.

Using a pseudonym, Wink has posted about 70 comments on Journal Sentinel blogs and stories since October - most of them praising her boss, touting his gubernatorial bid or ripping his two opponents, Democratic Mayor Tom Barrett and ex-U.S. Rep. Mark Neumann, a Republican. And she was becoming increasingly prolific, offering nearly 25 comments in April, according to a routine check of online search engines.

But here's the kicker:

The vast majority of these were done while she was on the clock for the taxpayers and the county.

That's certainly not the kind of message a self-described penny-pincher like Walker wants to be sending to voters.

Just hours after being interviewed by No Quarter on Thursday, Wink - vice chairwoman of the Milwaukee County Republican Party - abruptly resigned her job in Walker's office. On the county payroll since 2002, the year Walker was elected county executive, Wink was paid nearly $40,000 a year in 2008, the most recent year for which data was available.

"No one in our office had any knowledge that Darlene was posting any comments during work hours," said Walker spokeswoman Fran McLaughlin. "The county executive and chief of staff (Tom Nardelli) expressly forbid staff participation in any campaign-related activity while on county time."

Bice goes on to provide a few of Wink's posts.

He mentions her candidness when he contacted her and asked her to comment on her online politically-related activities during work hours.

...Reached Thursday afternoon, Wink was surprisingly candid. No Quarter contacted her after receiving a tip regarding her online activity.

First, she acknowledged that she was the individual posting comments under the moniker "RPMCVP" - a reference to her position with the county party. She uses the same initials in her e-mail address listed on the county Republican Party Web site.

She also agreed that nearly all of her online comments could be described as political. She even conceded that she was going online and defending her boss on the Journal Sentinel Web site while at her county job. Asked if that was a good idea, she said, "Probably not, no."

"I never gave it a thought that it was going to be an issue," Wink said.

She did say that she brings a personal laptop to work and that she posts most - and perhaps all - of her comments using it, not a county computer. In addition, she said she tries to put in extra time doing her real job, helping fix problems raised by individual county residents, when she takes time out to read and reply to stories about Walker or other gubernatorial candidates.

...No Quarter asked Walker's office for Wink's payroll records on Thursday to determine whether she was doing political work on county time.

Wink, 59, announced her resignation two hours later.

Now she can post as many comments as she wants at any time of day - without costing taxpayers a dime.

I don't condone Wink's behavior in any way.

Making political posts on county time is inappropriate.

Bice's work on Wink's online activities raises an interesting matter.

What Wink was doing is not unusual.

On my site, I have received highly partisan, Leftist comments in support of Democrats from city and county employees.

In some cases, when the commenting was excessive and harassing in nature, I've called out the "anonymous" individuals, asking how they have the time to be commenting on blog posts on the taxpayer's dime. I raise the question of the appropriateness of their behavior while on the job.

Other times, most often, I don't mention anything to the individual poster but I do take note of the IPs and the source of the politicking.

Perhaps Bice could follow the online trails of Left-leaning commenters and out them.

He could do for a significant number of individuals from City Hall and MPS what he did for Wink.