The Politics of Remote Work and Wisconsin State Employees

Frederica Freyberg:
A political debate is brewing at the Capitol over whether state employees should be allowed to work remotely or be required to return to the office. “Here & Now” reporter Steven Potter has details.

Amanda Nedweski:
We want to get the most out of our state workforce, and this should have been done a long time ago.

Steven Potter:
State Representative Amanda Nedweski is pushing for big changes to how, or more importantly, where state employees work.

Amanda Nedweski:
The Return to Work bill simply requires state employees who worked inside an office building for the state prior to March 1st of 2020 to come back and work in person.

Steven Potter:
The Republican lawmaker from Pleasant Prairie has several reasons why she thinks state employees should be working in state office buildings instead of at home.

Amanda Nedweski:
It’s been five years since this temporary solution to the COVID response was instituted. There hasn’t been an effort to evaluate productivity outside of the office. So it just sort of was we’re all going to go home and work remotely, and no one ever has to come back. It’s become sort of a permanent solution to what was a temporary problem.

Steven Potter:
Last week, the state Assembly debated and ultimately passed Nedweski’s bill, with all Republicans voting for it and all Democrats voting against it.

Amanda Nedweski:
As amended, it requires most state employees to be in the office at least 80% of the work month, roughly four days a week, allowing for some flexibility.

Steven Potter:
Nedweski says she wrote the Return to Work bill to rein in a state government remote work system that lacks proper oversight of its employees.

Amanda Nedweski:
People are very concerned about efficiency, fiscal management or mismanagement and fraud. And I’m — you know, this is an accountability issue.

Steven Potter:
And she says her constituents are asking for this bill.

Amanda Nedweski:
A lot of money comes out of your taxes. If, you know, if you’re a teacher or a nurse, or maybe you’re a small business owner, you’re paying a lot into the system. You want to know you’re getting the most you can out of it. And that’s, that’s what we’re hearing from constituents around the state.

Steven Potter:
Representative Mike Bare, a Democrat from Verona, says he’s hearing very different things from his constituents.

Mike Bare:
I’ve not heard from one single constituent, one single state worker who thinks this bill is a good idea. We heard over and over from, from the state government, from secretaries and managers and state government that they don’t need this bill. What they’ve been doing is working.

Steven Potter:
He says remote work is effective, which is why it’s still in place so many years after the pandemic began.

Mike Bare:
There’s no evidence that suggests that this would be helpful to state workers, that this would be helpful to our state government. No evidence to suggest that this would save any money or make us more efficient. In fact, it will cost more money and make us more inefficient.

Steven Potter:
To that point of cost, if this bill becomes law, finding office space for state employees to return to would be a challenge. Over the last few years, many state agencies have realized savings in rent and building maintenance by shrinking or even eliminating their needs for physical office space. In fact, the state is currently emptying and getting ready to sell three of its largest office buildings in downtown Madison.

Amanda Nedweski:
The fiscal impact of the bill at the time I introduced it was something like $200 to $400 million to bring employees back because they’ve closed buildings without evaluating telework performance.

Steven Potter:
Representative Bare says that remote work has allowed many state employees to move away from the state’s larger cities, a benefit they appreciate.

Mike Bare:
They’ve moved out into the state, across the state, out into Assembly districts that aren’t as close to Madison as mine is. So that means that those workers will have to come back, and that has a tremendous cost to it in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Steven Potter:
Both lawmakers note that cybersecurity issues for remote working state employees is a concern that needs to be addressed. Bare and Nedweski also agree that ending or limiting remote work for state employees will have a significant effect on hiring and retention.

Mike Bare:
There would be a bleed of good, talented, skilled people from state government that we wouldn’t want to see.

Amanda Nedweski:
Well, I expect there’d be some turnover.

Steven Potter:
In all, there are about 70,000 employees working for various state agencies and the Universities of Wisconsin system. Estimates range that from 19% to 75% of those employees work remotely or have hybrid work schedules, depending on the agency. Representative Nedweski says her bill doesn’t mandate that all state employees can never work remotely again.

Amanda Nedweski:
All the bill says is you have to come back, reevaluate, and if you — it’s determined by your business unit or by your department that you’ve been working effectively in your remote work situation, you can reengage in a remote work agreement.

Steven Potter:
Representative Bare, however, says offering public employees remote or hybrid work options keeps the state competitive in the job market.

Mike Bare:
I don’t think that this is special treatment. I think this is treatment that’s consistent with what the private market is doing. And, and I think that managers have been holding them accountable for being good, productive workers who are working for the taxpayers as they’re expected to do.

Steven Potter:
While the Republican majority in the Assembly passed the bill last week, it must still go to the Senate. And if approved by the Republican majority there, it will go to the desk of Democratic Governor Tony Evers, who will almost certainly veto it. Reporting from the Capitol, I’m Steven Potter for “Here & Now.”