Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard said goodbye on Tuesday to 10 attorneys and 10 other employees from his office. This press photo shows him at an unrelated event in September. Photo courtesy of AG’s office.
The state’s top law enforcement official announced today he’s cutting another 20 employees from his already slim staff. The move by Attorney General Terry Goddard despite the fact that his office recently has been short as many as 150 employees from a hiring freeze and other budget woes. All in all, it adds up to the office missing more than 21 percent of its budgeted employees.
I asked Goddard’s spokeswoman, Anne Hilby, for a breakdown of the positions that are being purged, but she said the office isn’t quite there yet. “We are still in the process of notifying people,” Hilby said. “All I can say at this time is that approximately 50 percent of those being laid off are attorneys.” Luckily, Hilby said, her own job is safe for now.
All of this comes just a day after the state treasurer said Arizona government could be broke by February if it doesn’t borrow huge wads of cash to make up for a shortfall. In a statement widely released to the media, Goddard said the cuts “will maximize savings” in spite of the fact that his office is “needed more than ever” in the economic downturn with fraud investigations and the like. In other words, if you’re an employee of the AG’s office, there’s a good chance you’ll be asked to do even more with less.
In fact, if that’s the case, HEAT CITY wants to hear about it. If you work for the office or have recently been laid off from it, e-mail me about how the work there will be affected. I’m not looking for inside information that could hurt any ongoing investigations, just accounts of what it’s like inside the office with such a small staff. If you’d like anonymity, it can be provided.