Wisconsin Watch says that Col. Leslie Zyzda Martin was fired from the Wisconsin National Guard and wants to know why.
In its story, Wisconsin Watch says that Col. Leslie Zyzda Martin was the leader of Volk Field and faced false complaints before being fired by David May, who is now the interim Adjutant General.
“First, let me say that this is a one-way conversation,” Gen. David May, who was her boss at the time and is now the interim head of the Wisconsin National Guard, read from a piece of paper.
I’m Colonel Zyzda Martin. As of right now, I am taking you off of charge. I no longer trust your ability to lead because of what I learned in two reviews that were ordered by you.
May and Zyzda Martin were sitting across from each other in the air traffic control tower meeting room at Volk Field on November 8, 2021.
They were both shocked and confused. She wasn’t allowed to say anything, and she was led off the station she briefly led and to her office to get her things.
She knew that several complaints had been made against her, but she said that May had never asked her about them or shown her any proof to back up the claims.
Martin, 56, said of May’s writing, “Some of the things I didn’t even know what he was talking about when he was reading it.” “It seemed very strange.”
The one-way discussion is still going on after three years. Public records and Zyzda Martin say that the Wisconsin National Guard hasn’t shown much proof of wrongdoing while she was in charge of Volk Field.
Zyzda-Martin, who lives in Sioux City, Iowa now, says she has never been given a good reason. She has now sued the National Guard Bureau’s Office of Information and Privacy.
As a follow-up, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that her lawsuit says the office broke the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) by not replying to her request for employment records by the due date.
The lawsuit says that when Zyzda-Martin was demoted, all she got were letters of reprimand and admonishment that were based on “unsubstantiated allegations” against her and didn’t give any specific reasons for the demotion.
The lawsuit asks a federal court in Madison to say that the National Guard broke FOIA by not responding to Zyzda-Martin’s request and not giving her the records she asked for, and to order that the records be given to her right away, for free.
Lili Behm of Hawks Quindel, S.C. in Madison is Zyzda-Martin’s lawyer. Behm says that the case over the records came after a discrimination claim was made against the Wisconsin Department of Military Affairs with the state’s Equal Rights Division. The Wisconsin Air National Guard is part of the department.
The lawsuit says that Zyzda-Martin and other women in the same situation were passed over in favor of certain male officers from the same state.
It also says that May and the ANG’s treatment of women officers is a pattern of sex discrimination and that May does not treat male ANG officers in a way that hurts their careers like Zyzda-Martin did.
The Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development is still reviewing that report as part of its administrative review process.