Not the governor's office, not the trustees, no outside influence coerced Melissa Meeker to abruptly quit the South Florida Water Management District in May 2013, the former executive director insists.
"Yes, I know all the things said about me at the time," Meeker told Sunshine State News during a break in a water reuse workshop for media Sunday in New Orleans. "But the real pressure came from within myself ...
"It was hard to go into an agency and do what I did and be there for a long period of time," she said. "I did what needed to be done."
What Meeker did from May 2011 when Gov. Rick Scott hand-picked her for the job until her resignation two years later was shepherd the district through a traumatic period that included a $100 million state-imposed budget cut and 134 layoffs.
"We were there to change the internal philosophy and culture from one of entitlement to a sense of passion for the job, giving them a vision they could work with," she explained.
By all accounts, Meeker did that. She effected change at the 1,600-employee agency, largest and most complex of the state's water management districts. She also helped craft a new $880 million Everglades restoration plan -- one that would resolve a lingering legal fight over what litigants called "Florida's failure to meet water quality standards."
Asked what the hardest part of the job was, she replied without hesitation: "Telling people who had been there their whole careers it was time to move on."
She said, "The governor has been nothing but supportive. He talks me up even now ... Every now and then I hear from somebody who says 'Oh, the governor is raving about you,' and it feels really wonderful."
Meeker has moved on to become the executive director of the WateReuse Research Foundation in Washington, D.C. The foundation is an educational, nonprofit public benefit corporation, a centralized organization for the water and wastewater community to advance the science of water reuse, recycling, reclamation, and desalination.
"Living in D.C. is amazing," she said, "but a challenge. For instance, we had a wonderful $240,000 house in Stuart. Anywhere around Washington, you can't get a double-wide for that. ...
"This is a totally different thing than I've ever done before, but I'm having a blast," she said. "I've been all over the world, to Singapore and Australia, and I'm going to Hawaii next month."
In fact on Sunday she was conducting a workshop in New Orleans, in conjunction with WEFTEC, billed as the largest annual water quality conference and exposition in the world. The WateReuse Research Foundation workshop was to educate media covering the environment and water issues. And the highlight of the two-day event was a Sunday night gala for 175 guests, featuring food and beverages produced with recycled wastewater -- all prepared New Orleans-style.
Asked to define the main challenge of the new job, Meeker said, "Where water reuse is now is sort of like where the district (SFWMD) was when I went into that job. It's ... we have a great story to tell here, but we're working out what that story is and then we're going to take it to the next level."
"Water reuse," she said, "is sustainability. People talk about sustainability but they never include water in that. But the thing is, there's no new water coming into the atmosphere. This is it. We have to work to protect it."
She said drought-prone states like California and Texas are already doing a lot to treat wastewater to such an extreme, it's being made potable. The technology is here and now. "Some large farmers in Florida are irrigating with treated wastewater," she explained, "but mostly, it's being sent into deep wells and then wastewater becomes wasted water."
Meeker is a Tampa-born marine biologist who was examining an outbreak of algae blooms and sick fish in the Indian River lagoon in 1998 when she was appointed to run the Port St. Lucie office of the Department of Environmental Protection.
She made it her job that year to get state money for river cleanup projects and at age 29 recruited officials to figure out how best to spend it.
She was a Charlie Crist-appointed SFWMD board member in 2010, and in 2011, when former district executive director Carol Wehle resigned in a cloud of scandal, Scott tapped her for the job.
Just before Meeker handed in her resignation, the Palm Beach Post linked her to a decision that allowed billboards on water management district land -- and to a former board member and Meeker's ex-business partner who stood to benefit financially.
"The knives were out for Melissa," said contractor Gray Ramos, who was familiar with the atmosphere within the district office during Meeker's tenure. "Believe that stuff at your own peril. I think she probably said in the end, 'I don't need this' and really she doesn't."
Florida Audubon Executive Director Eric Draper had only praise for the outgoing executive director in 2013. Melissa Meeker has ably advanced Gov. Scotts agenda with the water quality plan and reducing the districts budget," he said in a written statement. "She held one of the toughest jobs in Florida and deserves our gratitude.
(Editor's note: Watch Sunshine State News for stories about water reuse development in Florida.)
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
