Wisconsin Statutes Organization of State Government (Ch. 13 to 22) § 16.415. Certification of payrolls

(1) Neither the secretary nor any other fiscal officer of this state may draw, sign, or issue, or authorize the drawing, signing, or issuing of any warrant on any disbursing officer of the state to pay any compensation to any person in the classified service of the state unless an estimate, payroll, or account for such compensation, containing the names of every person to be paid, bears the certificate of the appointing authority that each person named in the estimate, payroll, or account has been appointed, employed, or subject to any other personnel transaction in accordance with, and that the pay for the person has been established in accordance with, the law, compensation plan, or applicable collective bargaining agreement, and applicable rules of the administrator of the division of personnel management in the department and the director of the bureau of merit recruitment and selection in the department then in effect.

(2) Any person entitled to be certified as described in sub. (1), as having been appointed or employed in pursuance of law and of the rules pursuant thereto, and refused such certificate, may maintain an action of mandamus to compel the appointing authority to issue such certificate.

(3) Any sums paid contrary to this section may be recovered from any appointing authority making such appointments in contravention of law or of the rules promulgated pursuant thereto, or from any appointing authority signing or countersigning or authorizing the signing or countersigning of any warrant for the payment of the same, or from the sureties on the official bond of any such appointing authority, in an action in the circuit court for any county within the state, maintained by the administrator of the division of personnel management in the department, or by a citizen resident therein, who is assessed for, and liable to pay, or within one year before the commencement of the action has paid, a state, city or county tax within this state. All moneys recovered in any action brought under this section when collected, shall be paid into the state treasury except that if a citizen taxpayer is plaintiff in any such action he or she shall be entitled to receive for personal use the taxable cost of such action and 5 percent of the amount recovered as attorney fees.