'A terrible public safety threat': Dodge County loses all full-time prosecutors [View all]

Starting this Wednesday, Dodge County no longer has either a district attorney nor any full-time state prosecutors in an office that typically houses six attorneys who handle the county’s criminal prosecutions and civil matters.

District Attorney Kurt Klomberg put in his resignation, effective this past Friday, once he realized he’d be the last prosecutor in an office after a string of retirements and resignations that the office hadn’t been able to get applicants to replace.

“I really don’t have a choice,” Klomberg told Naomi Kowles on For the Record this week.

“This has been really one of the most difficult decisions of my life. I built this office with my partners here,” he said. “We were leaders in policy, procedure, management; we had been training other offices, consulting with almost every other DA’s office in the state.”

Klomberg, who has been the county’s district attorney for twelve years, started a plan six years ago to plan for retirements of key assistant prosecutors in the office. One aspect of the plan fell apart when a key replacement for a retiring attorney had to take extended family leave. The office wasn’t getting applicants — something Klomberg attributes to the $56,000 base starting salary for assistant district attorneys, far below private attorney salaries and even many government attorney positions like family attorneys and corporation counsels.

https://www.channel3000.com/news/for-the-record/for-the-record-a-terrible-public-safety-threat-dodge-county-loses-all-full-time-prosecutors/article_767794aa-7850-5dfd-8b6a-c210ef4003ff.html