Emails: Walker Administration Knew Key WEDC and DOA Officials Were Incompetent When Appointed
http://uppitywis.org/blogarticle/emails-walker-camp-appointed-key-wedc-and-doa-officials-despite
In an October 2010 email from Scott Walker's campaign manager, Keith Gilkes, to Kelly Rindfleish, Gilkes praised then Milwaukee Health and Human Services Director Geri Lyday, saying, "I feel like she is getting more done in a couple of months than what Corey Hoze and Lisa Marks couldnt get done at all."
Corey Hoze and Lisa Marks were the previous directors of Milwaukee HHS and were central figugres in the sexual assault scandal at Milwaukee County Mental Health (MCMH) Complex. The two faced criticism for many of the decisions that led up to the sexual assaults, with the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel pointing-out that neither Hoze or Marks had mental health or hospital adminstration backgrounds before Walker appointed them to lead the HHS.
Despite calling Hoze and Marks incompetant, however, Gilkes as Governor Walker's Chief of Staff, appointed Hoze to the board that oversees the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) and Marks as Administrator to the DOA's Division of Housing. In the announcement of the appointement of Hoze, Walker described Hoze as "exceptionally qualified."
Since its inception, the newly created WEDC, for which Hoze continues to serve as chair of the Contracts Committee, has been widely criticized for gross mismanagement. WISN reported that a "blistering" audit of WEDC by the non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau said, "Gov. Scott Walker's premier job creation agency repeatedly broke state law in its first year of operation, failed to adequately track money it awarded for economic development projects and sometimes gave money to ineligible recipients."