REDWOOD CITY — For the second time in the past week, San Mateo County has tapped a retired public official for a key, temporary job.

County Manager John Maltbie said Friday he has asked Jim Nantell, former Burlingame city manager, to resurrect the county’s parks department and lead it for a while. He intends to ask the board of supervisors to give his selection its stamp of approval Tuesday.

“I’ve talked to Jim and he said he’s interested,” Maltbie said. “Somebody needs to get the department up and running and organized.”

It’s not yet known how much Nantell will be paid if hired, because the two sides are negotiating. He currently receives $191,744 annually in retirement pay, according to California Public Employees’ Retirement System records. Before the county parks department was merged with public works in 2011 to save money, former parks director Dave Holland received about $171,662 a year, according to salary data provided by the county.

On Tuesday, the board of supervisors without discussion approved a temporary contract for former deputy district attorney Alfred Giannini — who just retired last month — to help the county prosecute the William Ayres molestation case. Giannini, who also is eligible for pension payments, will be paid $86.71 per hour — the same hourly rate he made as deputy district attorney.

In response to a question, Maltbie said hiring retired public officials already drawing pensions is “not an issue for me.”

At its meeting Tuesday, the board unanimously voted to spend more than $5.2 million from the Measure A half-cent sales tax increase that voters approved in November to re-establish the parks department by hiring seven employees, including the director, doing maintenance work and making capital improvements.

If the supervisors are OK with Nantell, they likely would be scheduled to approve a contract at their May 7 meeting, Maltbie said. Nantell could then start almost immediately and do the job for about four to six months until a permanent director is hired, he added.

Before he became Burlingame’s city manager, Nantell was superintendent of recreation and human services for the city of San Mateo from 1981 to 1985, so the county job would be “right within his wheelhouse,” Maltbie said.

Nantell retired from his job in Burlingame at the end of 2011 but continued to work another year at the city’s request while receiving a pension. The California Public Employees’ Retirement System allows retirees to take on temporary assignments with a public agency and still collect their retirement pay as long as they don’t work more than 180 hours in a fiscal year — a practice critics call “double dipping.”

In explaining why the practice doesn’t bother him, Maltbie said no one would be critical if Nantell took a job with a private company. He described as “a red herring” the argument that taxpayers shouldn’t have to fund an employee’s retirement pay and public salary at the same time.

“You earn a retirement,” Maltbie said. “And it’s yours to do with what you want.”

Maltbie had been retired himself when he accepted the job of acting county manager in late 2011 after the departure of David Boesch. Although he collected his annual $133,000 pension while getting paid a salary in the ensuing year, he suspended the pension after being hired as permanent county manager in December.

The county’s interim chief probation officer, Cal Remington, also is collecting a pension from having worked for Ventura and Los Angeles counties, according to Donna Vaillancourt, San Mateo County’s human resources director.

Follow Bonnie Eslinger at Twitter.com/bonnieeslinger.