County HR Director Resigns After Health Care Scandal

Margo Franklin (left) addresses county supervisors during a Feb. 2 meeting of the Personnel Committee. Screenshot from county livestream.

Milwaukee County’s Chief Human Resources Officer Margo Franklin resigned Wednesday after her department was rocked by a contracting scandal in February.

In February, it was revealed that one of her staff directors had allowed the county’s contract for administering the employee health plan to expire. It is one of the most important contracts in county government, representing about $450 million in employee health plan costs over the next five years.

The lapse rattled the county’s civil service, whose members were worried they would lose access to health care, and led County Executive David Crowley‘s administration to rush a deal to the county board for approval, despite unanswered questions about what the pending contract included, how it was developed, and how the previous agreement was allowed to lapse without a new one in place. The Crowley administration moved quickly to fire the employee responsible for the lapse.

In an email announcing her resignation, obtained by Urban Milwaukee, Franklin did not indicate why she was resigning.

“It has been an honor to serve Milwaukee County and to work in partnership with each of you to support the county’s mission, vision and strategic priorities. A commitment to public service has guided my work, and I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute in this capacity,” Franklin wrote.

Franklin joined the county in 2018 as the director of employee and labor relations. Crowley appointed Franklin as chief human resources officer shortly after he took office for his first term in 2020. Prior to her work at the county, Franklin had experience working in human resources and labor relations at several large companies and institutions, including Kohl’s, Goodwill Industries of Southeastern Wisconsin and the Medical College of Wisconsin.

After the contract debacle came to light, Franklin told county supervisors she had been unaware her department had allowed the contract to lapse until weeks after it expired. She laid the blame on the staffer, Tony Maze, who oversaw the contract, telling supervisors, “My job is not to do the job of my employees. We bring them in, we hire them. We trust their expertise. We trust them to do the jobs that we hire them to do.”

Since then, however, the scandal has reverberated across county government and state politics. In the days and weeks after it came to light, there was speculation that the screw-up had prematurely sunk Crowley’s campaign for Wisconsin governor. Republican Tom Tiffany and Democratic rival Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez both jumped on the issue.

In March, the county board passed a handful of resolutions aimed at the county’s contracting processes, requesting an audit of the county’s contracting practices; the creation of a contract transparency tool; and a report breaking down the “policies, practices and internal controls” for contracting.

The county executive’s office told Urban Milwaukee that Franklin made the choice to resign. Former department heads and top county officers have accused the Crowley administration in the past of asking them for their resignation and forcing them out of their roles, including former medical examiner Brian L. Peterson and, more recently, the former head of the county’s Behavioral Health Services, Mike Lappen.

“I have accepted the resignation of Milwaukee County Chief Human Resources Officer Margo Franklin, effective Friday, May 1, 2026,” Crowley said in a statement. “During her time managing the Milwaukee County Department of Human Resources, Margo led several key initiatives that have produced meaningful reforms to our pension, compensation and talent retention systems. I want to thank her for her years of service to Milwaukee County employees, retirees and residents.”