So Jeff Plale is the ailroad commissioner and Tom Nardelli (pictured) the triple-dipping former Milwaukee alderman and ex-Walker county chief of staff, has quit state government.
You have to read between the lines of the Nardelli story, but there doesn't seem to be much joy in working for Walker's state government. To wit:
Nardelli said Tuesday he resigned as administrator for the state Division of Environmental and Regulatory Services because he decided it would be unfair to keep the job knowing he planned to resign soon anyway.
"I was toying with leaving at the end of September," he said. He picked that exit date because it was the 100th anniversary of another state division Nardelli led - Safety and Buildings. He held that job for the first six months of Walker's tenure as governor.
Really? He chose a date to mark the 100th anniversary of a state division he no longer works for? Is there some significance or is he just nuts?
In an interview, Nardelli said "other little things" related to the internal operations of his former state agency also led to his resignation. He declined to say what those were.John Murray, a spokesman for Nardelli's former state agency, said Nardelli had left "to pursue other opportunities." Another state official is temporarily filling Nardelli's job, Murray said.
Spokesmen for Walker did not return calls about Nardelli's resignation.
Those "other opportunities" he's going to pursue?
Nardelli said he plans to revive his dormant consulting business, though he'll be barred temporarily from lobbying the state or the county. Both have laws banning lobbying by former employees for a year after they quit their public jobs.
Reviving a dormant consulting business. Just too tempting to pass up, right? Then there's this:
Nardelli said an ongoing John Doe investigation that included prosecutors' seizure of work computers of at least two former county staffers of Walker's had nothing to do with his resignation from his state job. Nardelli said he had not been questioned in the probe, which began more than a year ago.The probe is believed to focus at least in part on allegations of county workers aiding Walker's campaign while on the job for the county.
In an interview earlier this summer, Walker said prosecutors were "looking at a lot of people?.?.?.?things like that are pretty much open-ended. So they can look at just about anything."
He did not respond to a question about whether he thought his former county staffers would be cleared in the Doe investigation.
We don't think so, either.