Drone view shows Milwaukee’s County Courthouse
Built in 1931, Milwaukee’s historic County Courthouse is in dire need of repair and upgrades. Here’s a recent drone view of the MacArthur Square building.
- Milwaukee County renewed its employee healthcare contract after it had expired at the end of 2025.
- The Board of Supervisors approved a five-year, $450 million renewal with UnitedHealthcare and Optum Rx.
- County Executive David Crowley’s administration faced criticism for the lapse, leading to the termination of an HR employee.
- Supervisors expressed concerns about the contract’s lack of fiscal vetting and the rushed renewal process.
Milwaukee County is back under a contract for employee and retiree health care benefits administration as of Feb. 5 — just one week after human resources staff blindsided supervisors with news that the county’s previous contract had expired at the end of 2025.
The county’s Board of Supervisors voted 13-5 to renew the previous contract with UnitedHealthcare and Optum Rx, one of the county’s largest contracts, for another five years, amounting to roughly $450 million. The vote came after some supervisors issued sharp criticisms of County Executive David Crowley’s administration for allowing the lapse to occur.
The lapse had ignited concerns, on one hand, about costly out-of-network prices and access to coverage in the absence of a contract, and on the other hand, whether it was prudent for officials to extend the previous contract after the Comptroller’s Office warned it wasn’t fiscally vetted and didn’t allow for strong auditing oversight.
Since then, supervisors have been eager to resolve the lapse and reassure county employees and retirees that their healthcare access remains unchanged, since the county is self-insured and only contracts with UnitedHealthcare to administer the plan.
But they have also expressed disdain about renewing the previous contract, due to the uncertainties and limitations flagged by the Comptroller’s Office.
The five supervisors who voted against renewal, Supervisors Patti Logsdon, Deanna Alexander, Steve Taylor, Kathleen Vincent and Sheldon Wasserman, cited those ongoing concerns and the fast turnaround for a decision as reasons why they couldn’t support the measure.
Supervisors who voted in favor of renewing the contract were Steven Shea, Priscilla Coggs-Jones, Willie Johnson, Jr., Sequanna Taylor, Felesia Martin, Shawn Rolland, Juan Miguel Martinez, Caroline Gómez-Tom, Justin Bielinski, Sky Capriolo, Jack Eckblad, Anne O’Connor and Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson-Bovell.
“We need to find out what’s really behind all this,” Logsdon said, clear emotion breaking through her voice.
“We need to make certain that not only the employees but our taxpayers don’t get caught paying the price for this disheartening situation.”
Several supervisors, including those who voted for and against the contract renewal, indicated the contract lapse is indicative of much deeper issues within Crowley’s administration, also pointing to the transit deficit information withheld from Supervisors for months.
Other supervisors expressed appreciation for Crowley and his administration for their quick action in providing information to the board and terminating an HR employee tied to the contract lapse.
In a statement issued shortly after the vote, Crowley applauded the contract renewal and said he’d sign it the moment it hit his desk. Crowley is a Democratic candidate for governor.
“When mistakes are made, we must act quickly and decisively to seek out facts and identify solutions to the problem at hand,” he said. “While this situation was the unfortunate result of an employee error, I am grateful for the collaboration with County officials to quickly resolve the issue.”
Supervisor raise alarms about larger problems
However, Supervisors Martin, Rolland, Wasserman and Steve Taylor all said they felt the issue was bigger than one employee.
Taylor said, “This is not the Milwaukee County board’s fault. This is completely under the administration. And now we’re stuck having to clean up this mess.”
“There’s a lot of work that needs to be done for me to trust him and what’s coming out the administration moving forward,” he said later.
Martin also called for more accountability, saying there were multiple occasions where county employees could and should have communicated directly to figure this out.
Rolland called out Chief Human Resources Officer Margo Franklin, who told the board on Feb. 2 during an emergency committee meeting on that, while she takes accountability for the situation, it is not her job to do the job of her employees.
“As department head, it is your job to make sure the job is done,” Rolland said. “I’m not asking for any additional accountability, but I want to make sure that every department head in this county knows it is their job to make sure the job gets done.”
Rolland recognized Crowley’s actions as a “bright spot” in wading toward a solution: “He took this seriously. He directed his team quickly, and he exited the person most accountable.”
At the same time, Wasserman lamented the impact this issue will have on Crowley’s reputation in the governor’s race.
“Everyone in this room knows that this race is going to have this spectacle on it, and the future of our state could be decided on what he’s doing,” Wasserman said.
Before the contract’s passage, supervisors passed an amendment to the resolution to approve the contract, calling for further work to incorporate more auditing oversight into the contract moving forward. The amendment also cements that outside vendors contracted for requests for proposals should follow county procurement and ethics requirements.
The employee who was terminated, Tony Maze, told the Finance Committee on Jan. 29 that he did not follow county ordinances for RFPs in concert with an outside vendor, Willis Towers Watson, while pursuing a new contract at the beginning of 2025.
Contact Claudia Levens at [email protected]. Follow her on X at @levensc13.
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