Finn Gorski makes her mark in long career

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The proudest moment in Liz Finn Gorski’s career, she said, required only six words.

When a Milwaukee County department leader told then-County Executive Tom Ament about plans to offer one of Ament’s budget analysts a position, the executive set one condition, Finn Gorski said: “‘You can take anyone but Finn.’”

At the time, she was working in the Milwaukee County Department of Administration. Finn Gorski also has worked in the county’s Parks and Health and Human Services departments, and, for the past 18 years, as judicial operations manager at the county’s Vel Phillips Juvenile Justice Center, where she manages the daily operations of the Children’s Court.

One of her mentors, Judge Mary Triggiano, presiding judge in the Children’s Court, called Finn Gorski “brilliant, courageous, undeniably focused, tenacious, and relentless.”

But Finn Gorski said people such as Triggiano and fellow Children’s Court Judge Marshall Murray give her reason to work so hard.

“Judge Mary Triggiano and Judge Marshall Murray,” she said, “inspire me every day as they continue to move the professionals within this community to work towards a more therapeutic approach for individuals and families within our court system, not just a punitive approach.”

Finn Gorski, who has three college-age sons and lives in Wauwatosa with her husband, Tom, said she wants the court to be a place that best serves families’ needs.

“Her compassion for children is enormous and without end,” Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge John DiMotto said. “She does everything for the good of the people who come through the (Children’s Court Center) but does not seek any recognition for her contributions to justice.”