DNR Sec. Adam Payne resigns less than one year after appointment, citing aging parents
Laura SchulteMADISON - The leader of the Department of Natural Resources will step down from his post at the end of the month, after serving less than a year.
Secretary-designee Adam Payne said he would leave the agency on Nov. 1 in a letter to Gov. Tony Evers dated last Friday.
"This is bittersweet, but the past year really helped put into better focus what is most important to me. After a very fulfilling career in public service, 24 years at Sheboygan County alone, I need to spend more quality time with my aging parents and support my wife's role as caretaker," he said in the letter. "I also want to spend more time with our four young grandchildren and focus more attention on my personal health and well-being."
In his short tenure at the DNR, Payne was vocal in his desire to address water quality issues, such as "forever chemical" contamination. He also waded into the debate on the wolf management plan, which will go before the DNR's policy-setting board for a vote Wednesday.
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In a letter shared with environmental leaders, obtained by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Payne said he resigned with a "heavy heart."
"Since I was a boy, the Department of Natural Resources has always been an agency that I admired. Now, I have even a greater appreciation and understanding for why — DNR employees are something special, and I am proud to know you and count many of you as friends," he said.
Evers appointed Payne late last year, after years of public service in both administration and natural resources.
Earlier in his career he was the executive director for the Wisconsin Land and Water Conservation Association and served for five years at the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection from 1990 to 1995, including as director of the Farmland Preservation Program.
He then served as the administrator of Sheboygan County, where he focused on conservation, leading projects to clean up the Sheboygan River and Harbor and purchasing and preserving the Amsterdam Dunes, which encompasses 328 acres of undeveloped shoreline along Lake Michigan.
Payne had not yet been confirmed by the Senate, but had undergone questioning earlier this year by the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Energy. No vote had been scheduled for Payne in that committee, either.
As of Tuesday morning, Evers had not yet appointed a new secretary.
"The governor will be working expeditiously to find a replacement," said Britt Cudaback, the governor's communications director.
In an interview, Payne said his and his wife's parents are both in their 80s, and caring for them has become a larger task, in need of more of his attention.
"I see what my my wife is going through, as a registered nurse and cutting back on her job to spend more time helping and caring for her parents and I want to be there to support her and to support my parents," he said.
And though the department has faced some upheaval in the past few weeks with the ousting of more than half of the Natural Resources Board by the Senate, Payne said he's confident there won't be a lack of leadership in his absence.
He said he's confident his departure won't impact the wolf management vote the board is expected to make Wednesday.
"There's always controversy with the Department of Natural Resources. There's always new challenges, and there's new fires to put out," he said. "I'm proud of our staff, I'm proud of the (management plan) and I'm hopeful that tomorrow the Natural Resources Board is going to support it."
Laura Schulte can be reached at leschulte@jrn.com and on X at @SchulteLaura.