Dane County airport director ghosted employees, lied to officials

The director of the Dane County Regional Airport was routinely unavailable to make key decisions about the airport, neglecting messages from her staff as well as representatives of Southwest Airlines who had reached out about starting service at the airport, according to documents obtained by the Wisconsin State Journal.

Kim Jones’ leadership of the airport grew so poor in recent years that three top airport officials complained to county leadership, leading to a 3-month investigation in 2023 that corroborated 12 complaints against Jones.

At a time when the airport was working to rebound from the pandemic, airport staff often waited weeks to get responses from Jones on airport business and never got a response while she was purportedly working from home, according to the investigation.

“There is a high level of frustration due to lack of communication, lack of time management, lack of vision, lack of organization, a status quo attitude and because no one feels heard,” the airport officials wrote in their complaint. “When staff have tried to move the airport forward, it is always met with resistance.”

The investigation took place under former county executive Joe Parisi. After County Executive Melissa Agard took office in November, the county announced that Jones would retire in April. A nationwide recruitment process is underway to find a new airport director.

At a salary of $228,000, Jones is the county’s fourth-highest-paid employee.

In emails to investigators, Jones denied all of the complaints against her.

“Frankly, the entire process felt very hostile from the start with a 5-hour interrogation that I felt started with a prejudgment against me,” Jones wrote.

When Jones was working from home, investigators concluded she showed an “unresponsiveness to nearly all forms of communication” and that while the airport continued to run well, deadlines were unmet because she was not available to make decisions.

At the same time, Jones barred other airport staff from remote work without proper explanation, a policy that airport officials described as “hypocritical” and a violation of the county’s work-from-home policy, which permits employees to work remotely if they are productive and it doesn’t interfere with county business.

“When pressed for an explanation, she has said ‘because I just don’t like it,’’ airport officials wrote of Jones’ stance on remote work.

In an email, Jones questioned how investigators proved that she was not doing her job while working from home.

“My staff have no idea of my work output, nor, respectfully, for that matter do those involved in this investigation,” Jones wrote. “This industry is very dynamic and I have an enormous number of documents that must be read on a regular basis, from draft public notes to pending legislation to congressional records to local business news to keep up on the changing operational atmosphere in which the airport functions.”

After corroborating the complaints against Jones, the county responded by making written recommendations for how Jones could improve her job performance. Jones declined to comment on how she implemented the recommendations of investigators or how she improved her leadership of the airport.

As for her response to Southwest, Jones told the State Journal she had no recollection of not responding to the airline. But she said airport leaders are visiting Southwest headquarters in March with the goal of securing the airline’s service in Madison.

County Director of Administration Greg Brockmeyer declined to comment on whether Jones’ leadership of the airport improved after the 2023 investigation.

“To do so would risk jeopardizing any progress that was made, the relationships between those involved and potentially exacerbate the nature of the concerns,” Brockmeyer said. “The county’s number one priority is ensuring that every department, including the airport, provides excellent service to the public.”

Allegations of favoritism

Along with Jones’ productivity at work, investigators probed Jones’ management of airport staff, finding that she intervened to stop the discipline of problematic employees and undermined some staff while showing favoritism to others.

According to investigators, the employees Jones protected were ones with whom she had a personal relationship.

One employee, whose wife was a friend of Jones, allegedly called airport passengers racial slurs, showed a dirty hypodermic needle to a passenger and falsely accused coworkers of stealing his wallet, according to documents. Another employee — whom investigators said was a friend of Jones, often giving the airport director quail eggs, coffee and preserves — threatened to bring a gun to work but was not disciplined.

When the decision to discipline the employees reached Jones, no further action was taken, according to documents.

Investigators also found that Jones lied to staff, county officials and investigators about a position that appeared to be tailor made for a former airport official Jones favored.

That official, Brent Kyzer-McHenry, had worked as the airport’s marketing and communications director from 2011 until 2020, when Parisi named him director of the Alliant Energy Center. Kyzer-McHenry resigned less than two years into the job.

Soon after he left the Alliant Center, Jones began lobbying to create a new director job that was tasked with expanding air service at the airport and working as the main liaison with airlines.

According to documents, investigators confirmed that Kyzer-McHenry created a position description for the job, which he applied for, despite not working for the county. Airport employee Tomasz Pajor eventually took the job amid the county’s investigation in April 2023.

Investigators could not prove that Jones created the job for Kyzer-McHenry, but her handling of the issue pushed airport officials to go to the county and complain about her job performance.

Jones’ falsehoods about the position included telling the Airport Commission that smaller airports had similar positions. She also falsely claimed that county officials were holding up the position from being filled, when in reality Jones had stopped trying to hire someone after Kyzer-McHenry found work elsewhere, according to documents.

It’s a very “status quo” airport.

The WiFi is often unusable. And they still don’t have good cellular service over there for A&TT/T-Mobile for some reason. This always made for stressful arrivals for me.