Daniel DeLisi Scandal? SFWMD Has More 'Splainin to Do

Having emerged from the shadows of a major 2011 hiring scandal and subequent agency shakeup, the South Florida Water Management District has thrown itself right back into the soup with another high-level hiring faux pas.

The board hired as its $135,000-a-year chief of staff one of its own former members, Daniel DeLisi, five days after DeLisi resigned. He was hired over53 others who applied for his job. As one SFWMD oberserver told Sunshine State News, even if DeLisi is qualified for the job, "This smells yukky."

District spokesman Randy Smith told the Palm Beach Post, Like most other public agencies and private businesses, the executive director or CEO has the authority and discretion to select their own management team by either appointment or the recruitment process.

SFWMD Executive Director Melissa L. Meeker was not available Saturday for comment.

In 2011, then-executive director Carol Wehle resigned in a swirl of scandal involving employment of her boyfriend, Bob Howard, to serve as one of the district's watchdogs.