District Attorney Richard Goldinger acted quickly, decisively — and correctly — in firing an employee of his office for working on a political campaign during office hours.

It was wrong for county taxpayers’ money having been used to benefit a candidate for a public office, rather than for work serving the interests of the county government and the people whose money keeps it operating.

Goldinger, a candidate for re-election this year, wasn’t the beneficiary of the former employee’s efforts. Regardless of whether that person’s political work on county time was for another county position or a municipal office, law forbids county employees to engage in such efforts while on the county’s clock.

A similar prohibition is the basis for which state Sen. Jane Orie, R-40th, and her sister Janine are facing retrial, their first trial having been declared a mistrial. In the first trial, former and current Orie employees testified that they routinely did political work during their regular workday.

Political work by some state employees while on the state’s clock also is a key element in the presumably ongoing Bonusgate investigation.

With the Bonusgate and Orie cases so prominent in the news for so long, most county taxpayers would have presumed that such a problem wouldn’t evolve regarding this county’s time clock. Instead, a nearly 11-year employee of Goldinger’s office, by way of her illegal work on county time, revealed that she either didn’t understand the rules of her employment — or just chose to ignore them — or, didn’t pay attention to the news.

Goldinger said that while the former employee, Mary Betts, the victim witness advocate coordinator, didn’t refute the allegation, she claimed ignorance that she was doing anything wrong.

“We had an allegation of political activity conducted on county time and on county equipment,” Goldinger said. “As the district attorney, I have to have zero tolerance for that.”

Nonetheless, it is an embarrassment for the district attorney that such an incident occurred within his office.

Meanwhile, the candidate for whom Betts had been working on county time claimed to have no knowledge of Betts working on the campaign during her workday.

After learning of the activity, Goldinger did the right thing on March 23 when he suspended Betts without pay. Betts was fired after a hearing on March 31 during which Betts had the opportunity to present her side.

Goldinger would have opened himself to justified criticism if he had handled the Betts issue any other way. At the same time, the Betts case should serve as a clear message to all county employees to avoid similar situations.

It is to be hoped that county row officers and department heads, upon hearing about Betts’ problem, reviewed the prohibition with their employees.

It’s too bad that the county had to lose an employee with such a long record of service. However, while her illegal work was minor in terms of the scope of her overall work responsibilities, the seriousness of the violation is beyond question, and Goldinger’s response properly reflected that.