State agency continues to lose top executives

BILOXI — Another top official at the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources has announced he’s leaving.

The Sun Herald reports Danny Guice, who had been interim director of the agency after DMR executive director Bill Walker was fired in January, announced to the staff last week he would be retiring, effective June 30.

The agency is the focus of ongoing state and federal investigations of spending during Walker’s tenure.

Guice had sought the director job on a permanent basis, but Jamie Miller was appointed instead. Miller took over earlier this month.

Guice joins two other top DMR officials who recently decided to leave the agency. Last week, Miller confirmed chief of staff Joe Ziegler will retire June 30 and Kerwin Cuevas, head of DMR’s artificial reefs program, would resign effective May 10.