Florida

Support the whistleblower who exposed Florida’s secret plans for its state parks

The saying is doubly true for anyone who works under Florida Governor Ron DeSantis: “No good deed goes unpunished,” and wow, did James Gaddis get punished for his good deed.

Gaddis, pictured above, was the employee at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection who leaked the state’s rushed-under-cover-of-secrecy plans to build golf courses, hotels, pickleball courts, and more land developer-friendly conversions of Florida’s state parks, which are natural protected lands. His leaking of that information and the Florida government’s rushed timeline led to the outcry that led to the postponement of those plans.

Here’s what Gaddis told the Tampa Bay Times:

“It was the absolute flagrant disregard for the critical, globally imperiled habitat in these parks,” Gaddis said in an interview Monday morning. Gaddis said he was tasked with making the proposed conceptual land use maps that depicted the golf courses and other developments. Two proposals were especially egregious in his eyes: The Jonathan Dickinson State Park golf course, and the 350-room hotel at Anastasia State Park.

“This was going to be a complete bulldozing of all of that habitat,” Gaddis said. He recalls his hand, hovering over a computer mouse, shaking with anger and frustration as he was told to rush his maps from senior leadership. “The secrecy was totally confusing and very frustrating. No state agency should be behaving like this.”

Unfortunately, doing the right thing sometimes means doing the career-limiting thing. For his heroic actions, he was fired. Here’s his dismissal notice:

While he was technically fired for “conduct unbecoming a public employee,” it’s the rest of Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection who are truly guilty of unbecoming conduct, for doing the exact opposite of what the Department is supposed to do.

Because the job market is tough out there, Gaddis has set up a GoFundMe to help him as he looks for new work. Because what he did was heroic, he’s surpassed the modest goal of $10,000, but don’t let that stop you from pitching in.

Thank you, James Gaddis, for taking the whistleblower risk and saving our state parks!