Last week, Gov. Ron DeSantis complained that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s plan to build golf courses in state parks was leaked before the “half-baked” idea was ready to be announced.
- I doubted the leak because the plan was on the FDEP website and social media, but now we know there was a whistleblower who was fired over the weekend.
The Tampa Bay Times reports James Gaddis, a two-year FDEP cartographer, leaked the information and has been fired for “Conduct Unbecoming a Public Employee.”
What we learned from Gaddis:
- He was told to rush maps for the golf courses by senior leadership the week of July 29.
- By the weekend of Aug. 17, the Office of Park Planning was ordered to drop/hold other tasks and compose amendments to the original drafts.
- The directive came “straight from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ office.”
- The liaison between the FDEP senior leadership and the governor’s office was DeSantis’ deputy chief of staff, Cody Farrill.
DeSantis denied having any knowledge of the plan at his 8/28 presser.
- “It was not approved by me,” DeSantis said. “I never saw that.”
Gaddis, a single father to an 11-year-old daughter, has started a GoFundMe while searching for a new job.