“Employees must be accountable for their actions, and in turn, those actions must be transparent to our board and the taxpayers of Wisconsin,” Maley said.

“We expect our staff to act responsibly in our organization as we maintain a professional work environment.”

Swindall did not respond to an email request for comment.

According to an online resume, Swindall lives in Platteville, has held his position since September 2011 and was previously an executive director at the Wisconsin Manufacturing Extension Partnership and a vice president for marketing and client relations at Argea Inc.

In an email to his staff, Swindall said he had “received many appeals, and not a little pressure, to rescind my resignation, from both internal and external parties.”

“I am responding to these appeals for what I believe to be the good of WEDC at large, and the BID Division in particular,” Swindall wrote.

“I remain concerned for the likely confusion this news will produce both inside and outside of WEDC. This is certainly not my intent and I will do my best to try to alleviate concerns this may cause. I am not deluded so as to think this move will be uniformly popular in all of WEDC, or beyond.”