Bauman gets a job with state
11:13 PM 4/17/03
Dean Mosiman City government reporter

Days after leaving office, former Madison Mayor Sue Bauman has landed a state job.

Gov. Jim Doyle today will announce Bauman's appointment to the three-member Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission, which promotes collective bargaining and peaceful labor relations in the public and private sectors.

Bauman, who will start June 1 and complete an unfinished six-year term ending March 1, 2005, will be paid $78,000 annually. She was paid $101,324 as mayor.

"I'm very excited about it," she said. "It really brings together the years I practiced labor law with the years I provided management with the city. And I like to have a new challenge."

Bauman, who holds multiple advanced degrees including a master's degree in industrial relations and a law degree, was on the City Council for 12 years and was mayor from 1997 through Tuesday. She finished fourth in a six-person primary on Feb. 18.

"Sue Bauman brings tremendous qualifications to the job," Doyle press secretary Dan Leistikow said Thursday.

Bauman supported Doyle in the crowded Democratic primary for governor last year.

But the appointment is about qualifications, Leistikow said. "The governor believes former Mayor Bauman can make an outstanding contribution to the state. That's what this is about."

Bauman said Doyle raised the job prospect when the two met by chance two days after the primary.

"There's no question Governor Doyle does try to help his friends," she said. "However, I'm very qualified for this job."

Doyle will also appoint Terry Craney as executive director of the Work Based Learning Board, which pays $80,000, and name Robert Glaser to the Labor and Industrial Review Commission, which pays $70,000.